when fierce competition was the prevailing pattern in human affairs, it is 

 not so strange that several scientists simultaneously came to the same inter- 

 pretation of what happens to plant and animal species through the ages. As 

 we have seen, Charles Darwin and Alfred Russel Wallace independently hit 

 upon the idea of "survival of the fittest in the struggle for existence" as an 

 explanation of how new species arose (see page 466). 



We may well believe that neither Darwin nor Wallace had the slightest 

 intention of connecting his scientific ideas with business or politics. For 

 years at a stretch Wallace was away in the tropics exploring, fir from public 

 discussions. And although Darwin lived in England most of the time after 

 his early voyages, his life too was far removed from political and economic 

 questions. It is therefore interesting to see not only that their thoughts con- 

 verged in this way, but also that many immediately seized these ideas to get 

 the support of science for their way of carrying on affairs. 



The doctrine that "nature selects" the "fittest" by forcing all living beings 

 to "struggle for existence" against great odds appeared to justify intensive 

 competition as a means of ensuring "justice" and "progress". Competition 

 results in justice because it enables the "fittest" to get ahead of the others. 

 It makes for "progress" because it forces the less able out. 



Men Must Fight As we have seen, dividing tasks up more and more 

 makes it possible — and necessary — for more and more individuals to attend 

 to problems that are not life-and-death issues (see page 530). Human life 

 could go on if nobody ever crossed the ocean or made stainless steel or ever 

 broke another speed record. At the same time fewer men have to struggle 

 with wolves or bears or fight snakes and tigers. 



The struggle has taken on new forms and calls for new skills. But it also 

 calls for primitive qualities of courage, of hitting hard, of fortitude and en- 

 durance, of shrewdness and wile. We are not much concerned with old fight- 

 ing skills and tricks, but we still value the qualities of warriors and heroes; we 

 still go out for risk and adventure. We are concerned with carrying out more 

 quickly and more eflficiently a great variety of acts that are utterly meaning- 

 less in themselves, but that are related to the lives of vast multitudes. Thus 

 men spend hours boring holes in the earth or in various kinds of stuff, in load- 

 ing parcels into cars, in transferring fluid from one tank to another, in piling 

 up stones, in sharpening tools, in polishing doorknobs, or in mixing mortar or 

 dyes or insect sprays. 



These various specialized tasks are not interesting in themselves and are 

 likely to become rather dull. They are not always obviously related to human 

 welfare. Nevertheless we come to realize how completely each of us depends 

 upon what all the others are doing — or fail to do. We come to appreciate the 

 necessity for teamwork, for fitting our own activities into a common program 

 of action. 



