THE NEW EVOLUTION 



Whether the actions of the solitary wasps transcend 

 their general intelligence or experience we do not 

 know. We have no measure whatsoever of their 

 intelligence, and we cannot tell how much or how 

 little they may remember from their larval life. 



There is no object in prolonging this discussion. 

 On examining the facts we see that intelligence and 

 reason are supposed to be peculiar to man. Actions 

 which in man are acknowledged to be the result of 

 intelligence and reason, such as the use of heat, tools 

 and clothing, if duplicated in insects are assumed to 

 be the result of blind instinct. But in the absence of 

 indubitable proof the same or very similar actions 

 cannot be supposed to arise from wholly different 

 causes. So after all we are forced to admit that intel- 

 ligence and reason are simply mental attributes we 

 think we understand, while instinct is a mental 

 attribute we know we do not understand. That 

 seems to be the only tangible difference between them. 



This raises some very interesting questions. Can it 

 be possible that after all the animal world is really a 

 much more unified whole than it is commonly con- 

 sidered? Can it be possible that all forms of animal 

 life, although so very widely different in their struc- 

 ture, are merely diverse and concurrent manifestations 

 of the same broad principles? Are we to look upon 

 the numerous animal types not as higher and lower 

 but as representing a different grouping of features, 

 both physical and mental, inherent throughout the 

 animal world and in some way combined in the origi- 

 nal prototype? Or is there some other explanation? 



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