66 THE FOUR SEGREGATIVE PRINCIPLES. 



Coincident selection rests on the protective and, therefore, control- 

 ling influence of accommodation rather than adaptive -variation, during 

 several generations of first encounter with great changes. 



11 . Coincident Election Illustrated. 



Any form of election when introduced and protected from failure by 

 variation and selection I call "coincident election." A ship bearing a 

 number of families of Europeans is wrecked on an island of the cen- 

 tral Pacific, where the only land product available for food is the 

 cocoanut, while the sea is swarming with fish, sea-weeds, crabs, 

 shellfish, etc., furnishing a large variety of nourishment. One-half 

 of the shipwrecked people are by nature fond of the water and are 

 able to secure an abundance of food. The others, unable to swim 

 and dreading the sea, seek their support from the barren land and 

 are so hard pressed for food that most of them perish, while some of 

 them overcome their instincts and seek food from the sea, though at 

 a disadvantage as compared with those who are at home in the water. 

 In time the arts of fishing, and swimming, and diving, and canoe 

 building and navigating are so fully developed that a thrifty and vig- 

 orous colony is established, in which the type of election, both reflexive 

 and environal, is determined by the relations of the community to the 

 sea. But these relations to the sea were made possible by the fact 

 that part of the community were by nature endowed with some meas- 

 ure of aptitude for such a life. If all had been as destitute of such 

 aptitudes as a colony of gorillas the whole colony would have per- 

 ished, unless perchance a few might have led a precarious existence, 

 subsisting entirely on cocoanuts. S-uch a case would be an exam pie of 

 coincident election. 



12. Endonomic and Coincident Influences Contrasted and Defined. 



Isolation, selection, partition, and election are controlled by endo- 

 nomic influences when the relations of the group to the environment 

 are liable to be turned in different directions according to the pre- 

 viously attained innate aptitudes or acquired habitudes of the indi- 

 viduals from whom the colony springs. This action becomes most 

 manifest when the isolated sections of the group are exposed to the 

 same environment that surrounds the original stock; but there may 

 also be alternative methods of dealing with a new or greatly changed 

 environment, and in such cases endonomic influences are present. 



If inherited aptitudes are the controlling influence preceding and 

 shaping the habitudes, then the partition and election are said to be 

 coincident. If acquired habits and other powers of accommodation 

 are the controlling factors, then the isolation and selection are said to 



