Functional Selection 109 



an important factor in evolution. Without prejudicing the 

 statement of fact at all we may inquire into the actual 

 working of the organism in making its functional selec- 

 tions or accommodations. The question is simply this : 

 How does the organism secure, from the multitude of pos- 

 sible ontogenetic changes which it might and does undergo, 

 those which are adaptive ? As a matter of fact, all per- 

 sonal growth, all motor acquisitions made by the individual, 

 show that it succeeds in doing this ; the further question 

 is, how ? Before taking this up, it may be said with em- 

 phasis that the position taken in the foregoing pages, 

 which simply makes the fact of ontogenetic accommoda- 

 tion a factor in development, is not involved in the solu- 

 tion of the further question as to how the accommodations 

 are secured. But from the answer to this latter question 

 we may get further light on the interpretation of the facts 

 themselves. So we come to ask how 'functional selection' 

 — the technical term for the process — actually operates 

 in the case of a particular adjustment effected by an indi- 

 vidual creature. 



The organism has a way of doing this which seems to 

 be peculiarly its own. The point is elaborated at such great 

 length in one of the books referred to [Mental Develop- 

 ment, Chaps. VII., XIII.) that details need not be repeated 

 here. The summary made above (Chap. VII. § 3^) may 

 also be referred to. There is a fact of physiology which, 

 taken together with the facts of psychology, serves to indi- 

 cate the method of the adjustments or accommodations of 



Ward applied Subjective Selection explicitly to the problem of evolution in his 

 original publication {Encyclopcedia Britannica, 9th ed,, art. 'Psychology'). 

 — Note added 1902; cf. the additional note above, p. 48. 

 1 On the * circular reaction ' involved, see Chap. IX. § 2. 



