374 Information Storage and Neural Control 



Lamarckian system in which the lower levels are maximally able 

 to affect the higher ones, then perhaps we are headed for chaos. 



Gerard: I am sorry we are talking about the giraffe. It seems 

 a camel would be more appropriate. As you know, the definition 

 of a camel is an animal made by a committee. This seems to be 

 the problem you are bothered about. I also think that, in a sense, 

 it should be a camel, because I let his head under the tent and 

 you have brought the whole animal in. The issues you are raising 

 are really not too close to the basic one of the fixation of the experi- 

 ence as I was trying to discuss it. Let me simply say this in response 

 to these important considerations. 



As you know, this difficulty — the fact that there must be multiple 

 changes that interact with each other — has been recognized by 

 evolutionary theorists for a long time. One of the earliest criticisms 

 of natural selection was that it could explain the survival of the 

 fittest but not the arrival of the fittest. I think this is partly what 

 you are raising. I am certainly no expert in the field of evolution, 

 but I have been in close touch with many of the experts in this 

 field over many years. They remain an absolutely solid phalanx 

 on selection as an adequate and satisfactory mechanism for 

 evolution, without bringing in Lamarckianism. Waddington and 

 Dobzhansky have recognized very clearly the fact that natural 

 selection has favored mutable genes, which is a bit in your direction. 



Hyman Olken (Livermore, California): I have one question 

 I would like to ask Dr. Morrell. Bottley pointed out that if you 

 increase the frequency of light pulses toward a certain value, you 

 get increased response; then if you increase beyond that frequency, 

 the response decreases. Would that have any effect on the results 

 that you pointed out yesterday where you tested the memory of 

 certain frequencies and recovered other ones? 



Morrell: Well, it would have an influence on the detectability 

 of any frequency in the system with which we were working. You 

 could see from the illustrations that frequencies beyond seven, say, 

 would gradually fill in the interval, and you could not possibly 

 count a frequency; therefore, it would be undetectable with these 

 methods. 



Max E. Valentinuzzi (Atlanta, Georgia): I think that this 

 is the appropriate moment to bring up three questions which have 



