Some object having once appeared, the automatism of the brain will rapidly induce the series of changes.
On the other hand, if the attention is fixed on the end or on any particular part of a given action, and the other component parts of the action are performed unconsciously, the automatism may be called relative.
An interesting form of speech automatism is known as Glossolalia; in the typical case of Helène Smith, Th.
Professor Huxley revived the doctrine of animal automatism and extended it so as to include man.
The belief in animal automatism has passed away, it is to be hoped, never to return.
Doubtless he owes this to the superiority of his brain, which enables him to build an unlimited number of motor mechanisms, to oppose new habits to the old ones unceasingly, and, by dividing automatism against itself, to rule it.
Shut up in the habits of the species, it succeeds, no doubt, in enlarging them by its individual initiative; but it escapes automatism only for an instant, for just the time to create a new automatism.
This automatism is of a special kind; especially is it an automatism that is out of place, that occurs at the expense of spontaneity, vitality, and freshness.
To imitate anyone is to bring out the element of automatism he has allowed to creep into his person.
His automatism is essentially a lack of mental nimbleness, a formal lack of mental elasticity, a defective capacity for rapid adjustment, in short, a mental laziness.
He reduces the various characteristic features in the main to one, namely, automatism on the part of the comical person or thing.
Excited masses are, it is well known, capable of the most inhuman behavior, and indeed for the very reason that, instead of sound logic, automatism and impulsiveness have entered in as direct results of suggestion.
The Automatism of the elements, incidents, changes, and sequences of our states of consciousness; based upon, and including all that we know of physiology.
The paper on Animal Automatism is in effect an enlargement of a short paper read before the Metaphysical Society in 1871, under the title of "Has a Frog a Soul?
Now this theory of conscious automatism is not merely a legitimate outcome of the theory that nervous changes are the causes of mental changes, but it is logically the only possible outcome.
Under the name of automatism it has been advocated by Professor Huxley, and with firmer logic by Professor Clifford.
Automatism he then conceived broadly as a message of any kind from the Subliminal to the Supraliminal.
Myers' work on automatism led to his brilliant conception, in 1891, of hysteria.
Evidently automatism is a word that covers an extraordinary variety of fact.
A fuller understanding of the possibilities of abnormal personality and the reach of automatism are likely to work against Spiritualism.
Automatism lays hold of it, and life, inevitably forgetting the end which it had determined, which was only to be a means in view of a superior end, is entirely used up in an effort to preserve itself by itself.
Man has triumphed; with difficulty, it is true, and so incompletely that a moment's lapse and inattention on his part surrender him to automatism again.
The automatism which it claimed to be drawing towards liberty enfolds it and drags it down.
He owes it without doubt to the superiority of his brain, which allows him to construct an unlimited number of motor mechanisms, to oppose new habits to old time after time, and to masterautomatism by dividing it against itself.
The above-mentioned faculties are manifested only in an extremely feeble form beyond the confines of the instinct-automatism stereotyped in the species.
The distinction between automatism and plasticity in brain-activity is, however, only a relative one and one of degree.
On the other hand, inherited automatism exhibits a colossal preponderance.
On this account the term automatism or instinct is justifiable.
But he who uses the term habit, must imply secondary automatism and a pre-existing plastic adaptability.
Women's ideal of compelling every one whom they meet to like them is a noble one, and the control of every automatism is not only a part of good breeding, but nervous health.
Every untrained automatism must be domesticated, and every striated muscle capable of direct muscular control must be dominated by volition.
Often such movements pass over by insensible gradation into the morbid automatism of chorea, and in yet lower levels of decay we see them in the aimless picking and plucking movements of the fingers of the sick.
I have already repeatedly referred to the hypothesis that the psychic automatism in question may be only concomitant.
All these observations and several others of a similar nature would seem to be arguments in favour of a presumed "intelligence" rather than of an automatism in the animal.
Without possessing much intrinsic probative value of its own, it is certain that all this fits in very badly with the supposition of a purely mechanical automatism operated by the person making the experiments.
It is to be wished that competent observers would pay more attention to such savage practices as crystal-gazing and automatism as illustrated by the sticks of the Melanesians, Zulus, and Yaos.
Therefore, the theory of automatism has to meet the unanswerable question--How is it that in the machinery of the brain motion produces this something which is not motion?
But that which does require explanation from automatists is why automatism should have become associated with consciousness, and this so intimately that every change in the sequence A, B, C, &c.
Now, this theory of conscious automatism is not merely a legitimate outcome of the theory that nervous changes are the causes of mental changes, but it is logically the only possible outcome.
Therefore, before reason can allow the theory of automatism to pass, it must be told how this wonderful fact of parallelism is to be explained.
