140 HUMAN BIOLOGY 



behavior (qualities) as compared with the behavior of their 

 components. Thus when sodium and chlorine combine 

 chemically to form common salt, we observe that it behaves 

 in a manner very different from either of its constituent 

 substances in isolation. Similarly, a personal organism 

 behaves very differently from its individual cells. A new 

 phenomenal "level" has been created, so to speak, which 

 is not a mere sum or resultant of the component units but a 

 novelty, or "emergent." This term, like the noun "emer- 

 gence," has in this connection the meaning of "emergency" 

 and is not to be understood in the ordinary sense which 

 implies simply a manifestation or revelation of behavior, 

 or properties previously existing in the components of the 

 system or organism. It should also be noted that in order to 

 bring this consideration into harmony with present physical 

 theory, we must not regard the various components and 

 emergent wholes (systems and organisms) as static things, 

 or as so many lumps of inert matter, but as activities or 

 movements, albeit of very various velocities. Such an atti- 

 tude enables the scientist to avoid the embarrassing con- 

 tradictions and inconsistencies with which our thinking 

 has been seriously infected by age-long indulgence in 

 dualistic (materialistic and spiritualistic) notions of reality. 

 Leaving the physicists, chemists and astronomers to deal 

 with the inorganic aggregations and systems, we may turn 

 to their counterparts, the associations and societies among 

 living things. Here the cohesion and organization of like 

 elements, or components, is indeed astonishingly diverse 

 and complicated. Some of the wholes which they constitute 

 are very loose and temporary and may be called aggregations, 

 like the swarms of dancing midges or the collections of 

 hibernating lady-bird bettles in the mountains of the Pacific 

 States. Others are very persistent and consist of very 

 interdependent, and therefore very intricately organized, 

 parts, like the multicellular bodies of most plants (Meta- 

 phyta) and animals (Metazoa). Less highly organized are 

 the wholes, represented by the colonies of the social insects, 

 the flocks and herds of birds and mammals, and the societies 

 of man. Table i enumerates the various categories of associa- 

 tions and societies. 



