January 6, 1921] 



NATURE 



5V7 



If the writings of Lamarck (notably the laws quoted 

 by Sir Ray Lankester) and of those of his successors 

 (e.g. Spencer, Jioinanes, Wallace, Weismann, and 

 even Darwin) be examined, two assumptions will be 

 found — never formally expressed, perhaps, but alwajs 

 ipparent. On one hand, it is assumed that all 

 haracters develop in response to use. On the other, 

 it is assumed that this development is never con- 

 siderable. Both assumptions are monstrously wrong. 

 Kven in human beings many characters (e.g. hair, 

 leeth, external ears, and external organs of generation) 

 (io not develop in the least in response to functional 

 activity ; on the other hand, in the higher animals, and 

 i>pecially in man, most characters develop from the 

 infantile standard wholly, or almost wholly, in 

 response to that stimulus. Physically and mentally 

 man is the educable animal. He is immensely re- 

 sponsive to both use and disuse. 



Low in the animal scale we find little or no evi- 

 dence of development in response to functional 

 activity, .\pparently, even in an animal so high in 

 the scale as a butterfly, use does not cause 

 development nor disuse atrophy. In the egg use 

 plays no part. We have no grounds for supposing 

 that any structures grow during the caterpillar 

 stjige hecause they are used. In lack of func- 

 titinal activity the butterfly's structures develop vastly 

 in the chrysalis. .Afterwards functional activity does 

 not cause them to grow. The evidence as regards 

 mind is even clearer. In all its conscious phases this 

 animal seems purely instinctive. It does not profit 

 from experience, it does not learn, it is not etlucable. 

 At anv rate, if it develops at all in response 

 to mental functional activity, it does so to a very 

 small extent. Higher in the scale animals are born 

 more and more helpless, but more and more r.nnable 

 of developing in response to use. Nature substitutes 

 "acquired" for "innate" characters. That substitu- 

 tion marks the higher animal. Presently we find 

 animals so capable of learning that mates are able to 

 ri-cognise one another. an<l also to recognise offsnring. 

 Thus family life arises, whereby offspring are afforded 

 opportunity to develop in response to use. .\t last we 

 reach man. who is horn particularly helpless and im- 

 mature, but enormously capable of growing through 

 use. both in mind and in body. To this potentiality 

 he owes all his adaptability, all his morality, religions, 

 intelligence, knowledge, his whole intellectuality. 



Now consider whether the problem of the " trans- 

 mission of acquired characters " furnishes materials 

 "for a legitimate inquiry." fi) The evolution of the 

 power of developing in response to use is \he feature 

 of the rise of the higher animals. Steadily this 

 f)otentialitv increases at the expense of other 

 potentialities. It may be argued, therefore, with 

 some appearance of plausibility, that " innate charac- 

 ters " tend to be " transmitted " as " acquirements " ; 

 l)ut the opposition that "acquirements" tend to 

 t)ecome " innate " is, in the face of enormously mas- 

 ..ive evidence, ridiculous. (2) For thousands of 

 L;eneralions the muscles of the boy have developed 

 into those of the ordinary man in response to use, 

 but no one has suggested that these " acquirements '* 

 lend to be "inherited "—to develop in the lack of 

 u»i'. But let one man (e.g. a blacksmith) display his 

 human adaptabilitv by developing his muscles by a 

 little more use. and the Lamarckian immediatelv 

 bfgins to wonder whether this last scrap of dewlop- 

 mcnt is "transmissible." f.^) .Acquirenii-nts con- 

 sequent on use and injurv fmade as Nature designed 

 ihem to be made) are all useful. Transmitted, they 

 would be less useful, or useless, or, more often, 

 burdensome. For example, of what utility would 

 NO. 2671, VOL. loiS] 



scars be to an unwounded man, or the muscles of a 

 blacksmith to his descendant the clerk X Lamarckians 

 gravely argue, in effect, that after Nature has ex- 

 pended millions of generations in evolving a useful 

 trait, this trait, directly it appears, tends to be con- 

 verted into a useless trait. Here we have the oddest 

 view of evolution conceivable. 



To us as rational beings the evolution of the power 

 of developing in response to use is immensely the most 

 important phase of evolution. Of course, everyone 

 is more or less aware of it. Thus parents know that 

 it is necessary to train children, and even schoolboys 

 know that men are more educable than dogs, dogs 

 than cats, and so on. But it is remarkable how this 

 tremendous truth has been ignored in scientific litera- 

 ture. If Lamarck and his supporters had realised it, 

 would they have argued for the transmission of 

 acquired characters? If Weismann and his followers 

 had realised it, would they have condescended to argue 

 against such transmission ? Would any men have 

 asked whether nature or nurture is the stronger? 

 Would they have concluded that "nature is certainly 

 five, and perhaps ten, times stronger than nurture"? 

 What caused all this blindness to exceedingly obvious 

 truth? Plainly, it was caused by the classification of 

 characters as "innate" and "acquired." This led to 

 the assumption that use-acquirements are of trivial 

 magnitude, and so threw a veil over reality. 



Men of science who study organic Nature — zoo- 

 logists, botanists, palaeontologists, anatomists, physio- 

 logists, bacteriologists, psychologists, and the like — 

 are necessarily specialists and, unless they pass the 

 boundaries of their particular studies, very narrow 

 specialists. Biology supplies the connecting links. 

 Every science is at first purely descriptive. Later, as 

 the woof to the warp, interpretation is added. .\s 

 Newton interpreted facts of astronomy, so Darwin 

 accounted for the structures which zoologists, 

 botanists, and paljeontologists describe. Physiology is 

 accounting for the facts of anatomy. It tells, among 

 other things, of the influences in response to which 

 structures develop. Pathology and bacteriology are 

 accounting for the facts, that medical men have 

 described, in terms of causation (nurture). But 

 psychology is as yet, in very great measure, 

 purely descriptive, and, even so, in a very 

 limited field. Perception, conception, association, 

 and the like have been described, but there are 

 other and, for people who seek practical results, even 

 more important characters — e.g. courage, cowardice, 

 chivalry, meanness, energy, prejudice, and, above all, 

 intelligence and stupidity. How do these traits, which 

 in their sum constitute individual and national 

 "character." develop? Do they arise in response to 

 training (functional activity), or in response to in- 

 fluences (hormones and the like) largely beyond our 

 present control? 



Only biologists arc able to settle these problems, 

 for they alone are in a position to combine knowledge 

 sufficiently deep and wide with relative freedom from 

 blinding preiudice, religious and other. Presently, 

 when. <lrawing on the vast stores of verifiable evi- 

 dence which are available, they account indisputably 

 for the various items of human character, science will 

 come into its own. It will then have an indisputable 

 title to control education and make it scientific in the 

 sense that right means are adapted to achieve desired 

 ends. It will raise issues far more burning and vital 

 than even Darwin and Huxley raised. It will give n 

 new rending to history. This is what I meant when 

 I said I believed I was fighting Sir Rav Lankester's 

 battle. But. obviously, the first step must he to 

 achieve a right tormindlof^v. :mcl so a valid rtassifirn- 



