1929 ] 
Human and Insect Societies 
187 
capitalistic class, and the castes of India, are not homolog- 
ous to the castes of insects. 
There are at least two classes of human beings that might 
be considered as being somewhat analogues to the workers 
of the termites, or higher ants: the priests of many re- 
ligions, and the eunuchs of Eastern countries. The priest, 
in so far as he represents a sterile class, sterile through 
voluntary celibacy, is an example of a non-reproducing in- 
dividual laboring for the good of the organization to which 
he belongs. (Not necessarily for the good of society). The 
eunuch is functionally sterile, and thus approaches nearer 
an analogy to the insect worker. And if the interpretation 
of polymorphism of the social insects which holds that the 
differentiation of the castes is caused by giving different 
food to the larvae that are destined to develop into different 
forms be correct, the difference between the ennuch of the 
harem and the worker insect becomes still less. Both are 
then products of a deliberate castration, whether it be a 
reasoning and purposive act, or a blind instinctive reaction 
governed by the needs of the insect colony. 
But the likness of the priest and eunuch to the worker 
insect is more apparent than real. Although the priest may 
be socially sterile he is not functionally so, and he is not 
morphologically set apart for the performance of certain 
duties. And while the eunuch is, of course, sterile, his 
sterility is not the result of the necessity of society to have 
a group of workers who will have their labors uninter- 
rupted by the functions of reproduction, but is to prevent 
his having sexual connection with the women of his master’s 
household. 
While the exploitation of the trophoporic field by a 
society requires many laborers, and the problem has been 
solved in man and in insects by two methods of reproduc- 
tion (a great number of offspring produced by one female, 
and a great number of females each producing a few off- 
spring) man has added a second method of producing 
workers, that is by the invention and development of 
machinery. The machine either greatly increases the ef- 
ficiency of the individual worker, or greatly multiplies him 
by doing what many men would be required to do. In being 
