216 General Discussion 



J. Verzdr: Yes. It was hunger motivation, not very extreme, daily 

 fasting. 



Parkes: And tliat again makes the penalty for failing to learn quite 

 different from what might be applied to human experiments. 



J. Verzdr: Yes. But we were interested in these individual differences, 

 that some old beasts could still remember and others had total loss of 

 memory. 



Parkes: Does that kind of sanction mean the same to an old animal as 

 to a young one? 



J. Verzdr: There is admittedly the possibility of an age difference 

 there. 



Parkes: If I remember rightly, Sir Frederic, one of the original ideas 

 behind this project was to find out what particular jobs old people might 

 be suitable for. I take it that the answer is still rather in the future, 

 is it? 



Bartlett: That is quite true, but I think the very general answer is 

 that provided one avoids the difficulties inherent in a great many 

 current industrial processes of rapid forced pacing, there are probably 

 practically no jobs for which the upper age ranges are not suitable. 



Parkes: Provided they are taught appropriately or allowed to take 

 things at their own pace? 



Bartlett: Provided conditions of operation are readjusted at the right 

 age range. If one looks at the structure of British industry — if we are 

 talking about the practical side of this — at the moment, one of the most 

 astonishing things is (it is reported over and over again, and is I think 

 quite definitely established) that there is a very great proportion of 

 older people doing heavier work and doing it successfully. I didn't say 

 anything about heavy work, but in point of fact if a man remains fit, he 

 seems to be perfectly capable of going on doing heavy work, provided 

 he can do it in his own time. A great amount of the heavy work in 

 industry at the moment is done at the operator's own pace. So that is 

 one of the many reasons which tend to make the heavy work be passed 

 over to the older people. 



Parkes: Does that mean that old people now are more capable of 

 doing heavy work than old people were previously? 



Bartlett: No. I don't think there is any reason to think they are more 

 capable of doing heavy w ork. They are more capable of doing slow work, 

 and most heavy work is slow work. There are other reasons — ^one is 

 that all the heavy jobs in a modern industrial community are relatively 

 unmechanized, and all the forces of current education are in favour of 

 people getting into higlily mechanized industries early, leaving the people 

 who haven't had that kind of training to do the unmechanized jobs. 

 That is going to become much less possible every year because there are 

 fewer and fewer of such operations. Therefore if one is looking at this 

 thing in a practical sense, the really important thing is not to bother 

 very much about the heavier work at the moment but to find out what 

 could be done, given proper conditions, with the type of activity which 

 is obviously going to predominate in the community in a few years' 

 time. 



