Concurrent Determination 107 



influence is seen most interestingly in the complex in- 

 stincts. We find in some instincts completely reflex or 

 congenital functions which are accounted for by organic 

 selection. In other instincts we find only partial coordi- 

 nations given ready-made by heredity, and the creature 

 actually depending upon some conscious resource (imita- 

 tion, instruction, etc.) to bring the instinct into actual 

 operation. But as we come up in the line of evolution, 

 both processes may be present for the same function ; the 

 intelligence of the creature may lead him to do consciously 

 what he also does instinctively. In these cases the addi- 

 tional utility gained by the double performance accounts 

 for the duplication. It has arisen either (i) by the accu- 

 mulation of congenital variations in creatures which 

 already performed the action by individual accommoda- 

 tion and handed it clown socially, or (2) the reverse. In 

 the animals, the social transmission seems to be mainly 

 useful as enabling a species to get instincts slowly by evo- 

 lution in definite directions, the operation of natural selec- 

 tion being kept off. Social heredity is the lesser factor ; 

 it serves physical heredity. But in man, we find the re- 

 verse. Social transmission is the important factor, and the 

 congenital equipment of instincts is actually broken up 

 in order to allow the plasticity which the human being's 

 social learning necessitates his having. So in all cases 

 both factors are present, but in a sort of inverse ratio to 

 each other. In the words of Preyer, 'the more kinds of 

 coordinated movement an animal brings into the world, 

 the fewer is he able to learn afterward.' The child is the 

 animal that inherits the smallest number of congenital 

 coordinations, but he is the one that learns the greatest 

 number. 



