Foundations of philosophy
The Triune of Life
Three connected factors: intelligence, force, and matter.
The big idea
Stephenson organizes his explanation of life around three factors. Intelligence supplies direction, force connects that direction with matter, and matter expresses it. Following these roles helps make sense of his vocabulary without having to memorize every principle.
An everyday illustration
A musical idea, the action of playing, and a sounding instrument offer three different ways to look at one performance.
An original illustration to help explain the idea, not a quotation or evidence of a biological mechanism.
In the author’s words
“Life is a triunity having three necessary united factors, namely, Intelligence, Force and Matter.”
1927 edition · PDF page 29
Explore this book
Short excerpts from the indexed edition; line breaks are normalized. PDF page numbers refer to the source file, and may differ from printed page numbers.
Read it in context
This is a philosophical framework. The three factors are not three separately measured ingredients or a formula for assessing someone’s health.
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How does the Green Books discussion of the triune of life help a new reader understand chiropractic philosophy? Explain simply, cite the relevant passages, and distinguish historical philosophy from current clinical evidence.
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