340 



THE QUARTERLY REVIEW OF BIOLOGY 



a chimpanzee. We can then say pretty 

 positively that the ape does not have a 

 religion; we can also say pretty positively 

 that he acts at times as if he were religious. 

 When we put together the observations 

 and interpretations just reviewed, it be- 

 comes clear that we have in the anthro- 

 poid apes beings remarkably close to 

 ourselves. They are animals behaving in 

 innumerable respects like men and differ- 

 ently from all other animals. Faculties 

 which we are accustomed to regard as 

 specifically human prove again and again 

 to be present in them in rudimentary form. 

 What they do lack totally, so far as we 

 can yet judge, is speech and culture. In 

 this regard they are as sub-human as the 

 other mammals and the birds. This is 

 really remarkable in view of their possess- 

 ing some of the ingredients universally 

 accepted as going into the makeup 

 of culture: especially inventiveness. The 

 ape will not only use tools, he will not 

 only make them when he is taught, he 

 will invent them. That the tools are 

 simple and crude is expectable; that he 

 can and does devise them makes us won- 

 der why he did not pass on to develop an 

 elementary culture. The absence of 

 speech undoubtedly is an important factor 

 in this deficiency. This lack of language 

 faculty has been ascribed to a lack of 

 imitativeness as regards sounds. This 

 lack may be granted; yet one cannot help 

 but feel that it is not a wholly sufficient 

 explanation. Similarly, it seems doubt- 

 ful whether lack of speech alone is suffi- 

 cient to account for the total absence of 

 culture. It may well be so; but it will 

 require further experiment, or at least 

 much more extensive observation, before 

 we may be sure that there exist no other 

 potent factors of deficiency. 



IS INVENTION THE CHIEF FACTOR IN CULTURE? 



With the ape inventive but cultureless, 

 the question arises whether we have not 



perhaps hitherto exaggerated the im- 

 portance of invention in human culture. 

 We are wont to think of it as the creative 

 or productive element in civilization. 

 We tend to view the other processes in 

 culture as essentially those of transmis- 

 sion, preservation, or decay. The idea of 

 progress, which has so powerful a hold 

 on the unconscious as well as the con- 

 scious thought of our day, may have led 

 us to overemphasize the role of invention. 

 Perhaps the thing which essentially 

 makes culture is precisely those trans- 

 missive and preservative elements, those 

 relational or binding factors, which social 

 scientists have indeed occupied them- 

 selves with, but have been inclined to 

 regard as after all of secondary importance 

 in comparison with the dynamic phenom- 

 enon of invention. It may be that in- 

 vention will prove to be what is incidental 

 in culture; that it is merely a fashion of 

 our day to look upon it as primary. 

 What may ultimately be recognized as 

 counting for more is the way the pattern- 

 ings of culture shape themselves to permit 

 or prevent or induce invention, or, for 

 that matter, any change of civilization. 

 This shaping of patterns is in another 

 aspect a matter of interrelations of culture 

 material; and what appears to be indis- 

 pensable for such interrelations to exist 

 is a certain social relation, an organiza- 

 tion, or form, or almost a standardization. 

 The fundamental thing about culture then 

 would be the way in which men relate 

 themselves to one another by relating 

 themselves to their culture material. 

 This is perhaps not so far from the basic 

 concept which Durkheim was trying to 

 formulate when he succeeded in express- 

 ing himself in a manner that seems some- 

 what mystic. It must be admitted that 

 the present formulation too is lacking in 

 precision. But it is difficult to see with 

 clarity into the murky area that lies on 

 the edge of or beyond what we actually 



