438 Living in a World of Change 



supposed past and the observed present, in every department 

 of thought. It is a different matter, and the special task 

 of science, to find out whether, in the first place, the sup- 

 posed past corresponds to actuality and whether, in the sec- 

 ond place, the imagined bridge corresponds to historical 

 reality. 



Evolution and Progress 



The term evolution has come to be applied rather loosely 

 to the whole historic process through which the universe 

 is conceived to have passed. Some writers speak of inor- 

 ganic evolution, by which they mean the formation of stars 

 and planets from nebular mists — or whatever it was that 

 preceded stars and planets and gave rise to them. We hear 

 also of the evolution of different types of matter from pre- 

 sumably simpler types. The stimulation of intellectual 

 activity by Darwin's work, and especially by the concept of 

 evolution as ** one thing leading to another," led to the appli- 

 cation of this concept to superorganic processes such as lan- 

 guage and social institutions, forms of government, the 

 comparative study of religions, and so on. This use of the 

 term evolution has in turn injected into discussions of the 

 subject a certain implication of betterment. 



Historically there have been many improvements in the 

 daily management of our lives. We point to advances made in 

 government and in economic surplusage. There has been a 

 wider distribution of the accumulations of culture, and ad- 

 vance in cleaning up pestholes. This conception of progress 

 in human affairs has in fact furnished a stimulating catch- 

 word, with invidious reflections upon its opposite. From 

 the scientific point of view, however, progressive change may 

 be considered without regard to any such implication of bet- 

 terment. Progressive means in fact no more than continu- 

 ous, as to direction. Darwin himself pointed out that many 

 of the adaptations which a theory of evolution had to explain 

 were of a retrogressive or degenerative type. Reduced or- 



