TRANSACTIONS OF SECTION G. 745 



at some generalisation which would show us which was the absolutely fittest, if 

 only the necessary data were in any way complete, which they very seldom are. 

 Perhaps in one sentence we may say that that scheme, or system, or machine, will 

 be the absolutely best in any particular case which will the longest survive and 

 maintain its place in its particular environment. I cannot doubt that this 

 development of Darwinian ideas in the world of the inorganic is a legitimate one. 

 Of course the problem would be comparatively easy in each particular case if only 

 the environment would stand still. It would even be comparatively easy if w& 

 knew how the environment was going to alter, but this we are unable to do. We 

 only know that it certainly ivill change and will go on changing, and that there- 

 fore the things which we make now have not got to survive in the conditions 

 in which we make them, bat have got to survive through some new sets 

 of conditions of which we know nothing. I do not think the difHculty is in 

 any way met by the popular method of guessing at what will be wanted fifty 

 years hence, which generally means simply guessing at something very big. It is 

 of no use making our ships or our engines of a type which we choose to imagine 

 will be that of fifty years hence. If we do they will be of no use to-day, and for 

 that very reason they will not even be in existence, useful or other, at the end of 

 the fifty years. Sufficiently sad illustrations of this will occur to everyone in very 

 different directions. I hope I shall not be considered churlish in saying that I do 

 not think that the men who have worked on this principle have really been far- 

 seeing, or have really brought us much forward. They have been men often of 

 genius, often of great personal fascination, always of immense imagination. But 

 ihey have proceeded by methods essentially opposed to anything like the gradual 

 evolution which must occur in technical as it does in natural matters, and in too 

 many cases the results of their labours have not even been giants, but only monsters. 



As to wliat causes one thing to survive rather than another we can only speak 

 ver}' generally. Mere survival may come about by the accident of a peculiarly 

 tough constitution. A few engines built in the time of James "Watt are still to be 

 found at work in our own day, but can no more be taken as the fittest type than 

 some solitary megatherium would be who, having outlived all his contemporaries, 

 was able in after ages to look down upon his pigmy and short-lived successors. 

 Mere length of life in such a case may be a mere accident, and is not itself a proof 

 of fitness. We have it thrown at us every now and then that our engines nowa- 

 days do not last like the old ones, as if the mere existence of a very old machine 

 were a proof of its virtues. It is certainly a proof of the excellence of its 

 construction — or, as one may say, of its constitution — and perhaps also of the very 

 small amount of work it has done in proportion to its life and its dimensions. 



It is sometimes, I am afraid, rather humiliating to have to remember that, to a 

 very great extent, the question of the fittest, so far as it affects Uc, is a financial 

 one. In manufacturing processes etficiency and economy tend to survival because 

 they lead to decreased cost of production. In structures or other large permanent 

 works those types tend to perpetuate themselves which require the least material — 

 that is, in which the material used is disposed to the best advantage — and in which 

 the outlay on labour is also smallest, assuming, of course, equal fitness in other 

 respects. There is, no doubt, at present a tendency to dispute this altogether, and 

 to treat all reductions in cost of labour as disadvantageous, unless, indeed, the 

 labour be very highly skilled, in which case its remuneration must necessarily be 

 brought down for tlie sake of equality ! I imagine this tendencj' will last exactly 

 as long as the faithful can get some other people to pay the increased cost, and 

 will thereafter determine itself somewhat suddenly. It can no more stand in the 

 way of natural progress in engineering matters than could the somewhat similar 

 outcry against the introduction of machinery into manufactures two generations 

 ago. It would be as wise to paint a generation of cats green, in the hope of com- 

 pelling natural selection to work along new lines. 



I think we may fairly assume, therefore, that efficiency and economy are both 

 legitimate criteria as to ultimate fitness, and will remain so. Moreover, they are 

 both matters in which measurements can be made, and as to which judgment 

 can be guided by such measurements. But there are other characteristics, not 



