78 HEREDITY AND ENVIRONMENT 



germ cell and the relatively free activities of 

 a mature man is bridged not only in the proc- 

 ess of evolution, but also in the course of indi- 

 vidual development. 



6. Consciousness. — The most complex of 

 all psychic phenomena, indeed the one which 

 includes many if not all of the others, is con- 

 sciousness. Like every other psychic process 

 this has undergone development in each of us ; 

 we not only came out of a state of unconscious- 

 ness, but through several years we were grad- 

 ually acquiring consciousness by a process of 

 development. Whether consciousness is the 

 sum of all the psychic faculties, or is a new 

 product dependent upon the interaction of the 

 other faculties, it must pass through many 

 stages in the course of its development, stages 

 which would commonly be counted as uncon- 

 scious or subconscious states, and complete 

 consciousness must depend upon the complete 

 development and activity of the other facul- 

 ties, particularly associative memory and in- 

 telligence. The question is sometimes asked 

 whether germ cells, and indeed all living 

 things, may not be conscious in some vague 



