336 THE PHILOSOPHY OF BIOLOGY 



In the evolutionary flux the changes are non- 

 functional ones, that is to say, any phase, whether it 

 be one in an individual or a racial development, is not 

 merely a rearrangement of the elements of the preceding 

 phases, as in the case of a transforming system of 

 material particles and energies. There is inherent, 

 spontaneous variability. 



The organism endures. 



That is, all its activities persist and become part of 

 its organisation. It does not matter whether or not 

 we decide that characters which are acquired are 

 transmitted, nor does it matter whether or not we 

 conclude that the environment is the cause of these 

 acquirements. Some time or other in the individual 

 or racial history new characters arise by the activity 

 of the organism itself, and these characters either 

 persist in an individual or in a race. They endure. 

 All its activities, even its thoughts, persist and form 

 the experience of the animal — an experience which 

 continually modifies its conduct. In man those true 

 acquirements, the results of education and of investiga- 

 tion, persist as written language, or as tradition, even 

 if they are not inherited. 



Duration is not time. The mathematician does 

 not employ, in his investigations, intervals of duration. 

 When he relates something which is happening now to 

 something which happened some time ago he employs 

 the differential co-efficient dyjdx, so that the interval 

 between the two occurrences becomes an " infini- 

 tesimal " one. When the astronomer predicts events 

 that will happen some years hence, or describes those 

 that happened some years ago, he is really describing 

 things that are all there at once, so to speak, things 

 which are given. If we unfold a fan, stick by stick, 

 we see the separate members in succession, but they 



