BIOLOGY IN HUMAN AFFAIRS 



the range of the natural conceived in psycho-social terms. 

 Culture is a measure of man's adaptation to nature. It 

 must thus be looked upon as in no sense divinely created or 

 inspired, but as an expression of human needs and human 

 capabilities seeking a solution of the multiple problems of 

 adjustment to physical and social environments. 



Numerous attempts have been made to list these needs 

 and capabilities. Not long since, it was the habit in the 

 social sciences to make long lists of instincts and thus to 

 explain all that man does or has done as the expression of an 

 instinct. Nowadays this sort of explanation is a little like 

 explaining the origin of life as due to "spontaneous genera- 

 tion." This does not mean that man may now be supposed 

 to be entirely free from native tendencies to action, but 

 rather that the existence of an instinct must not be assumed 

 but must be demonstrated. Man forms habits so easily 

 that, although these may be built upon inherent neural 

 patterns, he may, for all social science purposes, be looked 

 upon as a creature of habits instead of instincts. This view 

 is obviously more in harmony with the facts because human 

 behavior is so highly variable from culture to culture that 

 the theory of inherent instinctive patterns of behavior is of 

 little sociological use. There are, however, certain 

 "drives," urges, or primary needs which may be looked 

 upon as universal sources of human activity. Among these 

 may be listed food, sex, bodily security, activity itself, and 

 egoistic satisfaction. One might include here gregarious 

 and parental urges. Some of these drives are primarily 

 physical, or neuro-muscular, others are primarily neural, 

 or psychic. They are implicit in the cultures of men at all 

 stages of social evolution, and hence are satisfied in a great 

 variety of ways. It was from man's efforts to satisfy these 

 needs that culture first began. Impelled by them and guided 

 by his feeble intelligence, which deluded him more often 

 than it led him aright, we see man stumbling and zigzag- 



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