حقيقة العادة .. العادة .. كتاب علم النَّفس جميل صَليبا

The truth about habit... habit

The truth of habit

Some of the characteristics of habit remind us of inertia, and some of its other characteristics remind us of freedom. Therefore, philosophers are divided in explaining the truth of habit into two groups: The first group claims that biological adaptation and mechanical movements do not require will, but rather are subject to the laws of mechanics, physics, chemistry, and the benefits of organs. Their scope of custom is very broad, and it includes living and non-living people. The second group claims that habit is connected to the will and mind, and that it is the daughter of freedom. Therefore, according to them, it is limited to living organisms, because it is not only a material change, but rather it is directing the activity of life to an intended goal. Let us now examine each of these two doctrines.

A - Biological theory

Habit is a particular characteristic of living things

Aristotle said: Habit is a particular characteristic of living things. A stone does not learn to rise even if you throw it into space a thousand times, just as a flame of fire does not become accustomed to falling. Habit is therefore inherent to the spontaneity of life. Rather, it is inherent to individuality, I mean flexible individuality, which only changes. To overcome external influences. Work imprints life with its own character, creating a new nature. Thus, activity imitates the system of nature in generating successive movements, because nature itself is generated by repetition. Habit is therefore an activity or action that imprints nature with a special character.

Leibniz's opinion.
In the history of philosophy, there are many opinions similar to the opinion of Aristotle, including the opinion of Leibniz, who attributed the habit to minor perceptions. He said: “The present is burdened by the past, and what this means is that perception, whether great or small, remains in the soul, and joins with previous conditions and amplifies them. Habit is therefore a memory, rather it is the enrichment of psychological life with psychological life (Roustan, p. 502).

Raphson's theory.
Among these doctrines is the doctrine of (Raphson), whose elements were borrowed from the philosophy of (Aristotle), (Leibniz), and (Maine) Doberand. He said: Habit turns reason and freedom into nature and necessity. The general result of the continuation of every change, or its repetition, is that If the action persists, its effect diminishes little by little, and whenever a living being regains a movement emanating from its nature, its tendency to restore it increases, and the movement that comes to it from the outside world becomes with repetition personal to it, specific to it, so the ability decreases and spontaneity increases. This is the general law of habit. If the nature of life is It is based on the victory of spontaneity over ability. Habit does not only condition the existence of nature, but rather grows with its growth and flows in its direction. It is therefore an imitation of the free effectiveness of the fundamental mechanism in every nature. Indeed, the mechanism itself may arise from the will, and it may be the influence of the mind.

(Raphson) said: (There is no difference between habit and nature except in degree, and this difference can be reduced indefinitely, just like the effort between action and emotion. Likewise, matter is the common limit or the middle limit between will and nature, and this middle limit is moving; it moves without interruption. It advances little by little from one extreme to the other. Thus, habit is the infinite differentiation, or dynamic completion, between will and nature, and nature is the final limit of the decrease of habit.

He also said: (When habit descends from the luminous aspects of feeling, it carries the light with it into the depths of nature and its dark night. Therefore, it is an acquired nature, or even a second nature, that returns in the end to the first nature) (1).