Sketch of an Organismal Theory of Consciousness 31 Ji 



doubt, receive the assent of most zoologists, as will also the 

 statement that our lonf^ familiarity with structural organi- 

 zation and morphological inheritance is what makes us re- 

 gard these without surprise, and, by inference, as compre- 

 hensible. It is not that the corporeal form and structure of 

 the worker ants and of the larvae which they manipulate as 

 spinning instruments and shuttles for making the nest, are 

 necessarily simpler and, on that account, more com])rehen- 

 sible than are the instinctive acts of the workers, but that 

 during our whole lives we have been familiar with structure, 

 and ourselves exist as "structural organizations." Tliis is 

 equivalent to saying that we have always been not only learn- 

 ing but directl}^ experiencing interdependences and correla- 

 tions among the common body-parts and body-acts, and so 

 regard them as comprehensible, as explicable. To compre- 

 hend really an external complex of structures and activities 

 is to live the counterpart of it. To understand such a com- 

 plex scientifically is to understand it through a course of 

 observation and reasoning; that is, rationally. To explain 

 such a complex is to bring in, or recognize consciously one by 

 one the constituent elements of the complex, and recognize 

 all these as parts of the ens£mhle. It is to recognize the 

 elements in both their isolate and integrate capacities. 



So much for the evidence of integration between instinct 

 and physical organization as presented by one carefully i)hil- 

 osophical naturalist. Several other naturalists have gone 

 nearly as far, but this single instance is so typical and conclu- 

 sive as to the objective facts that it will suffice. In com- 

 menting on the significance of being surprised at such rarely 

 witnessed performances as those furnished by these ants, 

 w^hile we are not surprised at common structures and acts 

 of equal or greater complexity furnished by more familiar 

 animals and by ourselves, I go beyond, though only a little 



beyond Wheeler. . 



The only other zoologist to whom I turn for evidence of 



