February 11, 1916] 



SCIENCE 



199 



have such a variety of cutting tools as we 

 find in our museums? The unity of mind 

 seems to be an expression for uniform be- 

 havior and applies to the original nature 

 of man. To explain facts of culture by 

 asserting the unity of the human species, 

 is little more than the useless pleasantry 

 that culture exists only because there are 

 men in the world. But one may retort that 

 a psychology of religion, or what not, seeks 

 to discover precisely why these ideas arose 

 or were so associated. Our contention is 

 that this can be done only by knowing the 

 history of the case and that this history can 

 not be reconstructed from an ensemble of 

 culture traits, however minutely they may 

 be described in psychological terms. 



In the various aspects of the tool traits 

 of culture we have one of the most impor- 

 tant series of data bearing upon both the 

 psychological and the anthropological prob- 

 lems of culture origin. It is perhaps less 

 fundamental than language, but is objec- 

 tively superior because of the indestructible 

 nature of many types of tools. For ex- 

 ample, we find in the cave deposits of west- 

 ern Europe, some of man 's first stone tools. 

 "We have previously noted the probably in- 

 stinctive basis for tools. Thus, it may be 

 granted that man is by original nature a 

 tool-using and tool-wanting animal. Yet it 

 is difficult to determine if he is a tool-maker 

 by original nature, for the tool-making 

 complex appears as only the mechanical 

 adaptation of natural forms in which mate- 

 rials are found. It has been shown by 

 anthropologists that many forms of stone 

 tools are but slight modifications of selected 

 pebbles, whose natural shapes were adapted 

 to the specific purpose for which tools were 

 sought. The same general principle holds 

 for all tools, for the maker has to adapt his 

 methods to the mechanical properties of the 

 original materials from which the tools 

 were to be made. This adaptation is surely 



the rationalization of experiences arising 

 from original responses to tool-using situa- 

 tions. This invention, or the production of 

 new traits of culture, may itself be rational- 

 ized, as is the case when we deliberately set 

 ourselves an inventive task, or even when 

 we recognize the inventive process as a 

 method of culture production. All this 

 must be granted, but there are innumerable 

 times when new conceptions come as the 

 normal undirected activity of thought. So 

 it seems that rationalization must as a proc- 

 ess be original or a part of man's original 

 nature. We see that culture production, 

 as the devising of tools, etc., is a product of 

 the rationalizing capacity of man, which in 

 turn is a part of his original nature. There- 

 fore, there is good reason for assuming an 

 underlying innate basis for tool-making in; 

 particular and culture production in gen- 

 eral. 



This clears the way to a fundamental 

 problem: viz., the origin of culture. If 

 culture is a matter of ideas, or the func- 

 tioning of the rationalizing mechanism, 

 then the first prerequisite to the observed 

 condition is the appearance of an anthro- 

 poid with this element in his original na- 

 ture. The forms and varieties of cultural 

 remains seem to necessitate from the first 

 the existence of this rationalizing power at 

 its present level. Thus, it may be objected 

 that the forms of stone tools found in the 

 oldest cave deposits were produced by in- 

 stinct alone, just as the spider spins a web 

 or the bee fashions a comb. The answer to 

 this lies in our museum collections where 

 we find considerable variety in form in a 

 given deposit, but particularly in the many 

 sudden and abrupt changes as we pass from 

 one stratum to another. Then again, Aus- 

 tralian natives were but recently observed 

 making forms identical with some of paleo- 

 lithic origin and with them the instinctive 

 explanation would be absurd. Theii' 



