EVOLUTION AND ETHICS 233 



there must be a constant study and control of dangerous dif- 

 ferential birth rates and of total numbers of individuals in 

 the populations of the world. A decline of intelligence levels 

 would be fatal to a high-level scientific civilization where 

 the planning and control of engineers is so necessary. 



By now in our review of the evolution of an ethic it is ob- 

 vious that the social man with his sense of companionship 

 and conscience is no special creation coming miraculously 

 from the hand of a Personal Supernatural Creator, but a 

 latter-day production of an immeasurably long and natural 

 process. Morals have no absolute values. They are a code of 

 conduct which has developed through the early formative 

 years of man's history to aid in group survival, and they vary 

 widely in different peoples. The moral response is both in- 

 nate and learned and, as in the organization of "learning sets" 

 in the development of the individual's mind, take on complex 

 interlocking patterns which can be manipulated with such 

 ease as to give the impression of inspiration. 



The code of conduct of man's early formative period is 

 still undergoing change and will continue to change through 

 all his future history so that, even if science were able to 

 estabhsh an entirely satisfactory ethical evaluation for the 

 present moment, it would not hold in all respects at some 

 distant day. How very important it is, then, to develop at 

 the earliest possible moment a science of ethics, the central 

 study of a science of man, and to keep that science always 

 democratic and free of all authoritarianism. 



