CHAPTER 111 



THE BIOLOGICAL UNIT 



Civilized man devotes much of his energy to 

 classifications even if they have to be supplanted 

 by other classifications on the morrow. So nu- 

 merous are the units upon which groupings can be 

 made that experts are required to explain them, 

 for example, a given number of unit movements in 

 laying bricks or nailing on laths. This unit idea 

 came from science where it is the common practice 

 to start with what appears to be an indivisible unit, 

 such as ohm, watt, kilogram, atom, ion, and nu- 

 merous others. He who would read of efficiency 

 methods or know about electricity, chemistry or 

 any present-day treatment of such themes, expects 

 to master first the units on which the whole plan is 

 based. 



We are so accustomed to regard man himself as 

 a unit that it seems odd to think of him as contain- 

 ing literally millions of biological units, all work- 

 ing in harmony, all contributing to his life as a 

 whole. It was a long time before man was placed 

 in the same category as other living things in this 

 respect. It seems perfectly harmless to describe 



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