32 EVOLUTION AND ETHICS 



There is another fallacy which appears to me 

 to pervade the so-called " ethics of evolution." It is 

 the notion that because, on the whole, animals and 

 plants have advanced in perfection of organization 

 by means of the struggle for existence and the 

 consequent ' survival of the fittest ' ; therefore men 

 in society, men as ethical beings, must look to the 

 same process to help them towards perfection. I 

 suspect that this fallacy has arisen out of the un- 

 fortunate ambiguity of the phrase ' survival of the 

 fittest.' 'Fittest' has a connotation of 'best'; and 

 about ' best ' there hangs a moral flavour. In cosmic 

 nature, however, what is ' fittest ' depends upon the 

 conditions. Long since I ventured to point out that 

 if our hemisphere were to cool again, the survival of 

 the fittest might bring about, in the vegetable king- 

 dom, a population of more and more stunted and 

 humbler and humbler organisms, until the ' fittest ' 

 that survived might be nothing but lichens, diatoms, 

 and such microscopic organisms as those which give 

 red snow its colour ; while, if it became hotter, the 

 pleasant valleys of the Thames and Isis might be un- 

 inhabitable by any animated beings save those that 

 flourish in a tropical jungle. They, as the fittest, 



the best adapted to the changed conditions, would 

 survive. 



Men in society are undoubtedly subject to the 

 cosmic process. As among other animals, multiplica- 

 tion goes on without cessation and involves severe 

 competition for the means of support. The struggle 

 for existence tends to eliminate those less fitted to 



