EVOLUTION AND ETHICS 217 



It would seem, then, that a high-level ethic must involve 

 high-level intelligence in a natural "operational" sense; that 

 is, the awareness and intelligence which the processes of 

 nature are evolving must be used as a guide to the ethic. 

 Only then will a culture become adult, giving up childish 

 dependence on the omnipotence of the father and becoming 

 a brotherhood of brave, intelligent men, not of frightened 

 children. Such a culture would gradually solve its problems 

 in the same way science progresses— by factual observation, 

 by careful check, by maturing judgment as the mind is freed 

 of its superstitions. (In Chapter 17 the possibilities in using 

 the rising levels of awareness and intelligence will be ex- 

 amined.) 



From the study of social groups rather extensive evidence 

 is available that ethics at the human level, however com- 

 plex, are an outgrowth of a basic animal response. There is 

 hardly any better evidence for any statement in science. 

 And yet the great majority of the peoples of the world to- 

 day are under the dominance of the vested interests of au- 

 thoritarian dogma— interests which insist against all reason 

 that morals are immutable, of divine origin, and supernat- 

 urally revealed; interests which by these assertions retain 

 an authority that presumes to regulate the whole range of 

 human affairs. A dangerous split is set up between the basic 

 nature of man and his natural methods of science to dis- 

 cover and know on the one hand, and the supernatural in- 

 tuitive dogma of absolute morals on the other. By sincere 

 and arduous effort science may show that much is wrong 

 with present trends (say, birth rates and differentials), or 

 with certain phases of morality, or with the doctrine that 

 faith alone will solve our problems; and dogma can block 

 any action or any further interest and investigation with a 

 gesture. 



The dogmatist never seems to be aware of the fact that 

 his tribal truths are not necessarily the truths of the tribe on 

 the other side of the hill; or if he does, he reassures himself 



