136 SYMBIOGENESIS 



speaking) positive demanded its being in various ways 

 antagonised to negative and disruptive influences. 



In the web of life, as in human society, it is true that 



Malus malum vult, ut sit sui similis. 



Hence, in order that the danger of deterioration and reversion 

 may be obviated it has become necessary that a deep-seated 

 biological antagonism should separate the good from the 

 (relatively) evil. In the Bible even we get a hint of a kind of 

 biological antagonism : 



And I will put enmity between thee and the woman, and between 

 thy seed and her seed. 



Darwin and others noticed the extreme horror of apes and 

 other animals at the very sight of a snake, the very type of 

 predatoriness and degeneracy. This curious form of innate 

 biological antagonism thus finds a rational explanation on my 

 theory of biological values of the divergent bio-economic 

 paths the one leading by way of symbiogenesis, the strenuous 

 life and social co-operation to progress, and the other through 

 reckless depredation, selfish exploitation and parasitism to 

 degeneration and decay. 



Frequently this safe-guarding biological antagonism 

 results in slow eliminative processes analogous to the way, 

 though more gradual, in which the digestive process or the 

 intolerance of the body to poisons, acts as safeguards to health. 

 Mendelian extrusion (of " recessives " or " dominants," as the 

 case may be) may be viewed as the genetic mode of getting rid 

 of (bio-economically) undesirable strains, much in the same 

 way as the various forms of bodily elimination achieve the 

 riddance of the individual body from impurities. In the 

 interest of values neither impurities, nor redundancy, nor 

 swamping effects can be countenanced by Nature; hence the 

 manifold forms of elimination, extrusion, and segregation. 



Let us inquire a little further how there was developed 

 this biological antagonism, which, in my opinion, is respon- 

 sible not only for numerical but also (and indeed mainly) for 

 qualitative distinctions, for real prepotency, for genuine 



