466 PHYSIOLOGICAL EEGULATIONS 



tive load at which rate of loss is no longer in excess of rate of gain, 

 or a negative load at which gain is not greater than loss. This is 

 another way of stating that recovery does not occur, (b) Or, one 

 or more components lose their ties with the remainder of the inter- 

 relations. Then individual components are incompatible with the 

 surviving state of other components. Quantitative data do not 

 seem to exist by which to differentiate these possibilities. But a 

 person who investigates methods of killing vermin does nothing 

 other than find the limits to the behavior and equilibration that 

 preserve the vermin from each agent that he tests. 



The acquisition of equilibration is a "mechanism" of fitness, 

 perhaps. It enables the organism that acquires it to survive, con- 

 ferring upon it the advantages that Darwin attributed to the fittest 

 individuals. Indeed, regulation as measured in this investigation 

 is perhaps the only criterion known which shows physiological 

 characters to be related to the '^ success" of the species. 



I can imagine further that equilibrations and their factors can 

 be acquired, possibly through processes of conditioning such as are 

 recognized in animal behavior. If an advantageous relation can 

 be experimentally established between load and exchange of the 

 same component, then unusual or artificial advantages can be pre- 

 sented to fool an animal into forming a relation of load to some 

 exchange that later will be disadvantageous. Maybe equilibrations 

 are not fixed, and physiological patterns are labile enough to be 

 manipulated by experimenters. 



Everyone can discover some exchanges or behaviors that he 

 judges to be inappropriate for recovery or for survival. He will 

 have a hard time demonstrating that they are deleterious ; for, any 

 other exchange or behavior might be incompatible with some more 

 crucial recovery. Load of Ji leads to modified exchanges of J2 

 and J3, and I rarely feel able to ascertain whether those correla- 

 tions are appropriate or not. But the exchange of Ji itself I can 

 evaluate for every component; it alone I am sure is a measure of 

 recovery, without further ado. All appropriateness outside that 

 correlation of AJi with SJi/At is at present speculation. 



§ 171. Integeations 



The fact is that diverse functions get along together in one 

 living unit. Some persons suppose there is a head-office for coordi- 

 nation of them all. Formerly it was believed to be a center in the 



