Exhibition of Purpose and Intelligence In/ Foraminifera. 137 



And as the raarvelhms evolution can, and does, take place 

 every day in the due order of reproduction, I see no difficulty in 

 supposing that a similar evolution has taken place in the passage 

 from Protozoa to Man, and no reason for holding that high 

 psychical activities are present in l^rotozoa on the ground that if 

 they were not there present their subsequent evolution in the 

 course of geologic time would involve a break in the developmental 

 series — a sudden discontinuity. 



If we once recognize the fact that mental faculties are, like 

 human structure, immensely complex, and are dependent for their 

 manifestation on the healthy activity of an almost inconceivably 

 complex structure — the brain — we shall, it seems to me, lie able 

 to conceive of the reduced or less complex mental faculties of less 

 elaborate brains. Descending step by step we shall arrive at the 

 conception of the microscopic mentality of a Foraminifer, and 

 cannot fail to dismiss the notion of attributing to it Purpose and 

 Intelligence, or anything which can seriously be called by those 

 names. 



The President, in rejoinder to the above note, and in reply upon 

 the discussion which ensued, made the following observations : — 



I cannot but regard it as an honour that my friend Sir Pay 

 Lankester should have undertaken the useful, but often ungrateful, 

 office of advocatus diaholi upon the questions which I have raised 

 and the principles which I have formulated upon a subject which 

 in my opinion has lain dormant far too long. It seems to me, 

 however, that there is little or nothing between us beyond a few 

 points of terminology and degree, and that the limitaiions of 

 language and the elastic interpretation of terms are alone respon- 

 sible for such differences as may exist between our points of view 

 and consequent conclusions. The late John Stuart Mill formu- 

 lated tlie axiom that " it is the aim of the physical philosopher 

 to determine what are the fewest and simplest assumptions from 

 which, being granted, the whole existing order of nature would 

 result." * As Sir Kay Lankester points out, I first made use of 

 the phrase " Purpose and Intelligence " ; this I modified later to 

 " Purposive Intelligence," and to-day I would rather use the term 

 " Definitive Purpose," or, perhaps iinally, " Purposiveness " — with- 

 out prejudice to any terminological improvement which may later 

 suggest itself to me. 



I agree with my critic in his view that Dr. Carpenter did more 

 to increase our knowledge of the Foraminifera than any other 

 naturalist since his day, but the greatest and most unassailable, 



and indeed unassailed, contribution to our knowledge was made 



o^ 



MiU's " Logic," 3rd ed. i. p. 327. 



