1915] Ecological Foundations of Applied Entomology 19 
at least as much for the common welfare as the insect does in 
the interest of its kind under the impulse of a wholly ignorant 
instinct. 
I venture now to hope that I may have made by this time 
a sufficient showing of the fundamental nature of the connection 
between ecology and applied entomology to justify a few closing 
sentences upon the educational bearings of my conclusions. 
If applied entomology is essentially a mixture of human and 
insect ecology, then it seems clear that courses in general 
ecology should form a part of the education of the economic 
entomologist. Indeed, I have much tangible evidence of the 
value of this combination in the results shown in my own 
university department of entomology, whose more capable 
students all tell me of the unique advantage which they find 
in ecological courses because of the broader outlook and the 
new point of view which these give them, and especially be- 
cause of the greater theoretical interest of their technical studies 
when related to the foundation principles of ecology. The 
ecological environment is a complex of causal agencies, without 
an analysis and interpretation of which an adequate knowledge 
of causes in biology is impossible. 
I believe that students of ecology itself would be equally, 
although somewhat differently, profited if they were to take 
one or more economic courses in entomology; that they too 
would find a new outlook thrown open to them and a new and 
larger meaning given to their work. I hope that the time may 
soon come when ecology shall be taught in at least every state 
university and every agricultural college, and when something 
of applied biology shall be included among the regular courses 
of every university student specializing in ecology. Then for 
the first time we may be in a position to estimate fairly the value 
of the contributions which entomological ecology, fully and 
thoroughly applied, may be competent to make to the progress 
of biology and to the welfare of civilized man. 
Urbana, Illinois, December, 1914. 
