Febeuaet 11, 1916] 



SCIENCE 



195 



of the two methods, it is clear they have im- 

 portant differences. Both use the same 

 data as to the kinds of religious activities 

 in the world, but the psychologists seek 

 their origin in universal psychic activities, 

 while the anthropologist is content to find 

 the approximate localities and relative 

 times whence the various elements come 

 into view. Though perhaps not at first ap- 

 parent there is nevertheless a fundamental 

 difference 'between the two, which it is my 

 purpose to develop in this discussion. 



Like psychology, anthropology has been 

 rapidly developing its problems and con- 

 ceptions, and is just emerging from its 

 formative period. Its position and scope 

 is perhaps as clearly formulated now as is 

 that of psychology. In the main, it deals 

 with culture and the various problems 

 directly related thereto. Anthropology is 

 perhaps most correctly defined as dealing 

 with the first appearance and subsequent 

 career of man upon the earth. While com- 

 parative morphology in all its human as- 

 pects is an important method, it is based 

 upon and dependent upon other sciences 

 and has for its ultimate goal the elucida- 

 tion of historical cultural relationships. 

 Culture is the distinctly human trait and 

 must always be appealed to to determine 

 the status of such fossils as the Pithe- 

 canthropus erectus. 



Cultural phenomena are conceived of as 

 including all the activities of man acquired 

 by learning. Thus we eliminate, on the 

 one hand, the permanent individualities of 

 the separate men and, on the other, what- 

 ever equipments they may have had by 

 birth. Cultural phenomena may, therefore, 

 be defined as the acquired activity com- 

 plexes of human groups. 



It follows, then, that there is a problem 

 of almost equal concern to psychologists 

 and anthropologists — the differentiation 

 between the innate and the acquired. Psy- 



chologists give their attention to innate 

 phenomena, especially man's psycho-phys- 

 ical equipment. If we extend the meaning 

 of the term behavior so as to include con- 

 sciousness, we may say that psychologists 

 are concerned with the behavior of man as 

 an individual. If one may trust to the re- 

 marks heard, psychologists are quite given 

 to the assumption that anthropologists are 

 simply students of comparative human be- 

 havior. At least psychological literature 

 contains more than one example of the 

 behavioristic interpretation of cultural data. 

 Now, it may be that there is a problem in 

 the comparative behavior of the individuals 

 comprising ethnic groups, but, if so, it is 

 a psychological one and must be solved by 

 the use of psychological data. Anthropolo- 

 gists give it little concern because they see 

 in differences of individual behavior no 

 significant cultural correlates. So far as 

 they can see, all the known culture phe- 

 nomena since the dawn of the paleolithic 

 period necessitate no changes in man's in- 

 nate equipment nor in his innate behavior. 

 So, on the whole, anthropology is quite in- 

 different to the problems of comparative be- 

 havior, because it is concerned with the ob- 

 jective aspects of what is learned in life. 



There is, however, one problem that 

 troubles the anthropologists, viz., to dis- 

 tinguish between the innate and the ac- 

 quired elements of the more fundamental 

 activity complexes. One of the pressing 

 anthropological problems of the hour is 

 the effectiveness or non-effectiveness of in- 

 stinctive factors in the differentiation of 

 cultures. The problem is almost identical 

 with the educational problem of inborn 

 versus learned activities. The only syste- 

 matic discussion of this problem is Thorn- 

 dike's "Original Nature of Man," which, 

 while projected from an educational hori- 

 zon, is, nevertheless, a distinct contribution 

 to the anthropological problem. One of 



