16 



Evolution and Ethics 



We have reached another critical stage of our thesis. If 

 the origin of morals is to be considered as extra natural or 

 even supernatural; if one cannot, as we have already done 

 with "mind and matter," show that such a dualistic point 

 of view has no basis in evidence, the effort to establish the 

 unity of nature fails. There must be continuity not only in 

 the evolution of the mind-body, but also in the evolution 

 of ethics. In surveying the evidence for the evolution of 

 the mind-matter substance, we found that nowhere in the 

 rising levels of this process was there any line of division; 

 imperceptibly and gradually, through billions of years, na- 

 ture evolved all the configurations of the cosmos. Each is 

 traceable backward through its various levels of organiza- 

 tion to the microcosm. This chapter maintains that man's 

 morals, like his body and mental faculties, are traceable 

 backward to the underlying origins of the realm of life, to 

 the natural and innate social groupings of all organisms. In 

 short, there is no new thing in the ethics of man, merely a 

 superlative consciousness of the cooperative and only w^ay 

 by which nature may reach the higher levels of under- 

 standing. 



Both the moral nature of man and his mental faculties 

 arise out of the deeply underlying organizing capacities of 

 evolution which reveals itself as a cosmos in process, carry- 

 ing the inanimate from subatomic levels to man and the 

 final extension, social life. It is only in and through social life 



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