For good reasons it is generally assumed that the organisms have not always been what they are now, but have "developed"from previous simpler forms. It is undecided whether originally there were one or several forms from which the present forms sprang, nor is it known how life first made its appearance on earth. So long as the various assumptions with regard to this question have not led to decisive, actually demonstrable differences in the results, a discussion of it is fruitless, and therefore unscientific. The usual word evolution is non-purposive in so far as it signifies the appearance of something already existing. Another conception is better according to which the influence ofchangedconditions of existence has yielded the most important factor of change.
The change that the organisms undergo is always in a definite direction. More and more complex and manifold forms are evolved, and the evolution of these forms is characterized by an ever greater specialization of the functions of life, so that every specially developed organ comes to perform but one function. It is true that by this means the organism is better fitted to perform those functions, but at the same time it grows more susceptible to injury, since its existence depends upon the proper simultaneous activity of many different organs. Such an evolution, therefore, can occur only when the general conditions of life have grown steadier, so that the danger of disturbance becomes less. We are accustomed to regard changes in this direction as higher developments, and the progressive simplificationsof the organization (as for example in parasites) as backward steps.
Since our opinion as to what constitutes a higher and a lower organism is doubtless arbitrary, let us ask whether it is not possible to find anobjectivestandard by which to measure the relative perfection of the different organisms. The question must be answered in the affirmative when we take into consideration the following. Since the quantity of available free energy upon the earth is limited, the organism which transforms the energy at its disposal more completely and with the least loss into the forms of energy necessary for the function of life, must be regarded as the more perfect organism. In fact, we observe that with increasing complexity of the organisms there is for the most part also an increasing improvement in that direction, and we can therefore speak of some beings as more perfect than others. This view-point is especially significant in the evaluation ofhumanprogress, appearing, as it does, as the general standard of all civilization.
The perfection of the organism shows itself in relation to the outer world in the development of thesense organs. While a single-celled animal reacts almost exclusively to chemical, sometimes also to optical, stimuli, and receives these with the entire surface of its body, special parts of the body develop more and more toward perfection. These are the parts that respond with special ease to the appropriatestimuli, that is, react to them with an increasingly smaller expenditure of energy. Then the points at which the stimuli are received are separated from those in which the reaction occurs, and the two are connected byconducting paths, the nerves, in which an energy process takes place. Our present knowledge of this process still leaves much to be desired. It is a process which moves with fairly great but by no means extraordinary rapidity (about ten to thirty meters per second) along the conducting paths. At the one end of this path it is caused by actions of various kinds, chiefly that of the specific energy, for which the sense organ is developed. At the other end it discharges specific effects. There is no doubt that here we have in each instance a case of energy transformation connected with adischarge, that is, with the action of other energies which lie at the ends ready for change. Hence there is no equivalence between the different kinds of energy, the discharging and the discharged, mostly not even a proportional relation, although both increase and decrease simultaneously.
What the form of the energy is that is propagated in the nerves is unknown. It can be either a special form which arises only under the conditions here present (just as, for example, a galvanic stream develops only under definite chemical and spacial conditions), or a special combination of known energies, as in sound and probably in light. Some day, it is likely, we shall have a more accurate knowledgeof the nerve process which will solve the question.
When such a process is caused by some energy impulse from without, it may produce various results. In the simplest case it discharges the corresponding reaction, just as the leaves of the sensitive plant close when they are touched. Or it may give rise to a series of processes following one another like the instinctive actions. Or, finally, it may bring about a series of inner processes which lead to an extreme differentiation of slight differences of this stimulus and to a corresponding graded reaction with the anticipation of success. We call this conscious thinking, willing, and acting.
Through the age-long effect of the blunder committed by Plato in making a fundamental distinction between mental life and physical life, we experience the utmost difficulty in habituating ourselves to the thought of the regular connection between the simplest physiological and the highest intellectual acts. Moreover, this contrast has been accentuated by the mechanical hypothesis. If we abandon the mechanical hypothesis and adhere to the summarization of experience free from all hypotheses, as represented in the science of energy, this contrast disappears. For even if we concede the impossibility of conceiving thought asmechanical, there is no difficulty in conceiving of it asenergetic, especially since we know that mental work is connected with expenditure of energy and exhaustionjust as physical work is. However, the elucidation of this subject lies almost entirely in the future since the idea just developed has but only begun to influence scientific work in this field. But judging from the results that have already been obtained we may hope for a speedy development.
The external circumstance that as an organism multiplies the new being must come to life in the proximity of the older one, is in itself cause for the formation of closed groups confined to certain localities by animal organisms of the same species. But they become scattered if the advantage of their living together is not such as to outweigh the disadvantage of having a narrow field of competition for the means of sustenance. Thus we see different plants and animals behaving differently in this respect. While some species live in as great isolation as possible, others form communities, even if there is no mechanical tie to hold them together by a common integument.
Since the second case is true of man in a highly marked degree, hissocialcharacteristics and needs form a large and important part of his life. And since, further, the socialization of man makes continuous headway with increasing civilization—we need but think of the development of the former little groups and tribes into states and the present very active internationalization of the most important affairs of mankind, especially of the sciences—the social problems also occupy an ever larger place in the organization of human life.
What distinguishes man most essentially from the other animals, even the most advanced, is his capacity for perfection, which in the lower animal can be paralleled at best by its capacity forself-preservation. While the organization of the animals within the short period of which we have any historical knowledge has to all appearances remained essentially unchanged, the world of mankind has changed in quite a remarkable way. This change consists in an increasing subjection of the external world to human purposes, and rests upon the increasing socialization of his capacities.
Memory and heredity (the latter being but an extension of memory to the offspring, which is to be conceived of as a part of the older organism) secures in the first place only the preservation of the stock and the renewed development of the new individual in the average type. If a specially favored individual succeeds in accomplishing greater achievements, he may in favorable circumstances transmit this capacity for higher attainments to his offspring. But such individuals gain an advantage in the struggle for existence only if the other sides of their activity do not suffer curtailment as a result. With the limited amount of energy at the individual's disposal every extraordinary accomplishment involves a correspondingone-sidedness, and as soon as a certain measure is slightly overstepped,it will cause a reduction of the other functions which will render the individual less fit in the struggle for existence. But this is true only so long as an individual must liveby himself. As soon as he forms part of a social organization which benefits by his particular activity, the organization compensates for the personal disadvantages by its collective activity, and a social community not only finds room for such special developments, but it even encourages and promotes them.
We have already seen that such manifestations occur within the organism itself. Higher functions, depending upon the higher susceptibility of the sense organs, can only be attained at the expense of the general functions by the organ in question. We observe this fact in all socially organized beings, like bees and ants, which display a high degree of specialization in the functions of the individual subordinate groups; the specialization often being carried so far that the individual groups can no longer subsist by themselves alone. It is only the organization as a whole that is capable of permanent existence.
While the evolution of such superior functions involves a corresponding differentiation, and therefore adivisionandseparationof the superior functions within the social structure, the necessity forcommunicationand formutual supportresults in anapproximationof the individuals and the groups. In every society, therefore, the centrifugal and thecentripetal forces work simultaneously in co-operation and in opposition to one another. While the extreme specialization on the one hand seems to make for the best individual functioning, on the other hand it renders the entire collective structure much more dependent, and therefore much more subject to injury, as is shown by the example of the queen bee, whose departure threatens the existence of the entire hive. Thus a medium degree of differentiation will as a general rule produce the most permanent social structure.
The essential value of the social organization resides in the fact that the work of the individual, in so far as it is adapted to it, accrues to the benefit of the collective whole. For this it is absolutely essential that the members of the collectivity should be able tohave intercoursewith one another in order that every part of the general activity may be communicated to the others. This intercourse is obtained through language in the most general sense.
We have already learned that the essence of language consists in the co-ordination of concept to sign. The social application of language demands that the signs co-ordinated to the concepts in use should be the same for all the members of the social organization. Only in this way can the members make themselves mutually understood. But intelligible means of communication and division of labor impart to the social knowledge that is setdown in writing a kind of independent existence. Many centuries ago the possibility ceased for one person to store in his memory the entire stock of human knowledge. Nowadays we have men who are versed only in single parts of separate sciences, and the aggregate knowledge appears at first to be a unity existing only in thought. But because this knowledge is set down in signs which endure far beyond the life of the individual and at the appropriate moment can unfold its entire power even after a long period of inactivity, it has acquired an existence of a social character independent of the individual. For although it survives the individual, it cannot survive the death of human society.
As the socialization of all mankind advances to ever greater unities, the linguistic limitations sprung from former stages of evolution prove to be a hindrance. The mother tongue, of course, forms the first and most important entry for the individual to the common store of knowledge. But in view of the linguistic limitation of which I have just spoken the efforts in our day are carried on with renewed zeal to create auniversal auxiliary language(p. 100) by means of which intercourse should be made possible beyond the language boundaries. There have already been gratifying results.[I]
Everything which serves the social progress of mankind is appropriately called civilization or culture, and the objective characteristic of progress consists in improved methods for seizing and utilizing the raw energies of nature for human purposes. Thus it was a cultural act when a primitive man discovered that he could extend the radius of his muscle energy by taking a pole in his hand, and it was another cultural act when a primitive man discovered that by throwing a stone he could send his muscle energy a distance of many meters to the desired point. The effect of the knife, the spear, the arrow, and of all the other primitive implements can be called in each case a purposive transformation of energy. And at the other end of the scale of civilization the most abstract scientific discovery, by reason of its generalization and simplification, signifies a corresponding economy of energy for all the coming generations that may have anything to do with the matter. Thus, in fact, the concept of progress as here defined embraces the entire sweep of human endeavor for perfection, or the entire field of culture, and at the same time it shows the great scientific value of the concept of energy.
If we consider further that, according to the second fundamental principle, the free energy accessible to us can only decrease, but not increase, while the number of men whose existence depends directlyon the consumption of a due amount of free energy is constantly on the increase, then we at once see the objective necessity of the development of civilization in that sense. His foresight puts man in a position to act culturally. But if we examine our present social order from this point of view, we realize with horror how barbarous it still is. Not only do murder and war destroy cultural values without substituting others in their place, not only do the countless conflicts which take place between the different nations and political organizations act anticulturally, but so do also the conflicts between the various social classes of one nation, for they destroy quantities of free energy which are thus withdrawn from the total of real cultural values. At present mankind is in a state of development in which progress depends much less upon the leadership of a few distinguished individuals than upon the collective labor of all workers. Proof of this is that it is coming to be more and more the fact that the great scientific discoveries are made simultaneously by a number of independent investigators—an indication that society creates in several places the individual conditions requisite for such discoveries. Thus we are living at a time when men are gradually approximating one another very closely in their natures, and when the social organization therefore demands and strives for as thorough an equalization as possible in the conditions of existence of all men.
FOOTNOTES:[A]Sometimes on suddenly awaking from a profound sleep a person finds himself for the moment deprived of his personal stock of memories, unable to recall where and in what circumstances he is. No one who has experienced such a condition can ever forget the terrifying sense of helplessness it brings.[B]More precisely, a very pale blue.[C]It cannot be objected that inorganic nature also is known to be subject to the law of causation. The causal mode of regarding inorganic phenomena is a distinctly human one, and nothing justifies the assertion that the same phenomena cannot be viewed in an entirely different manner.[D]Mathematicians who busy themselves a great deal with the formal theory of four-dimensional space, seem to acquire a capacity for imagining this form as easily as the three-dimensional form with which we are all familiar. Therefore, despite the oft-repeated statements to the contrary, it is not impossible to imagine four-dimensional space. Only, we must not attempt to represent to ourselves four-dimensional space in three-dimensional space, especially not without a knowledge of its properties.[E]The usual designation of the larger groups, ten, hundred, thousand, million, billion, etc., is also quite irrational. If it is our object to secure expressions for place values in as few words as possible, we find that the numbers of the form 102n, in which n is a whole number, must receive their own names, that is, 10, 100, 10,000, 100,000,000 etc. In this way the problem of designating as many numbers as possible by as few words as possible is solved.[F]It is not difficult to perfect musical notation with a view to unambiguity, a thing which would greatly facilitate the study of music.[G]For the sake of the layman it must be observed that those "quantities" are not energy magnitudes but factors of the electrical and magnetic energies. Energy itself in its various forms is anexclusively positive magnitude, and the result of the additions of their various amounts is always the sum, never the difference, of their numerical values. By the negative sign is understood the energyexpendedin contradistinction to the energyreceived. It is therefore nothing more than the indication of a mathematical operation.[H]Lately changes of elements into one another have been observed in individual instances, but in such peculiar circumstances that for the present we need not consider these discoveries, which have only just begun.[I]At the present time "Ido" is the best. It is a highly practicable artificial language, and its advocates have succeeded in organizing it to insure its normal development. An older and still rather widespread form called "Esperanto" has failed to organize itself so as to insure its development and it must inevitably die out.
[A]Sometimes on suddenly awaking from a profound sleep a person finds himself for the moment deprived of his personal stock of memories, unable to recall where and in what circumstances he is. No one who has experienced such a condition can ever forget the terrifying sense of helplessness it brings.
[A]Sometimes on suddenly awaking from a profound sleep a person finds himself for the moment deprived of his personal stock of memories, unable to recall where and in what circumstances he is. No one who has experienced such a condition can ever forget the terrifying sense of helplessness it brings.
[B]More precisely, a very pale blue.
[B]More precisely, a very pale blue.
[C]It cannot be objected that inorganic nature also is known to be subject to the law of causation. The causal mode of regarding inorganic phenomena is a distinctly human one, and nothing justifies the assertion that the same phenomena cannot be viewed in an entirely different manner.
[C]It cannot be objected that inorganic nature also is known to be subject to the law of causation. The causal mode of regarding inorganic phenomena is a distinctly human one, and nothing justifies the assertion that the same phenomena cannot be viewed in an entirely different manner.
[D]Mathematicians who busy themselves a great deal with the formal theory of four-dimensional space, seem to acquire a capacity for imagining this form as easily as the three-dimensional form with which we are all familiar. Therefore, despite the oft-repeated statements to the contrary, it is not impossible to imagine four-dimensional space. Only, we must not attempt to represent to ourselves four-dimensional space in three-dimensional space, especially not without a knowledge of its properties.
[D]Mathematicians who busy themselves a great deal with the formal theory of four-dimensional space, seem to acquire a capacity for imagining this form as easily as the three-dimensional form with which we are all familiar. Therefore, despite the oft-repeated statements to the contrary, it is not impossible to imagine four-dimensional space. Only, we must not attempt to represent to ourselves four-dimensional space in three-dimensional space, especially not without a knowledge of its properties.
[E]The usual designation of the larger groups, ten, hundred, thousand, million, billion, etc., is also quite irrational. If it is our object to secure expressions for place values in as few words as possible, we find that the numbers of the form 102n, in which n is a whole number, must receive their own names, that is, 10, 100, 10,000, 100,000,000 etc. In this way the problem of designating as many numbers as possible by as few words as possible is solved.
[E]The usual designation of the larger groups, ten, hundred, thousand, million, billion, etc., is also quite irrational. If it is our object to secure expressions for place values in as few words as possible, we find that the numbers of the form 102n, in which n is a whole number, must receive their own names, that is, 10, 100, 10,000, 100,000,000 etc. In this way the problem of designating as many numbers as possible by as few words as possible is solved.
[F]It is not difficult to perfect musical notation with a view to unambiguity, a thing which would greatly facilitate the study of music.
[F]It is not difficult to perfect musical notation with a view to unambiguity, a thing which would greatly facilitate the study of music.
[G]For the sake of the layman it must be observed that those "quantities" are not energy magnitudes but factors of the electrical and magnetic energies. Energy itself in its various forms is anexclusively positive magnitude, and the result of the additions of their various amounts is always the sum, never the difference, of their numerical values. By the negative sign is understood the energyexpendedin contradistinction to the energyreceived. It is therefore nothing more than the indication of a mathematical operation.
[G]For the sake of the layman it must be observed that those "quantities" are not energy magnitudes but factors of the electrical and magnetic energies. Energy itself in its various forms is anexclusively positive magnitude, and the result of the additions of their various amounts is always the sum, never the difference, of their numerical values. By the negative sign is understood the energyexpendedin contradistinction to the energyreceived. It is therefore nothing more than the indication of a mathematical operation.
[H]Lately changes of elements into one another have been observed in individual instances, but in such peculiar circumstances that for the present we need not consider these discoveries, which have only just begun.
[H]Lately changes of elements into one another have been observed in individual instances, but in such peculiar circumstances that for the present we need not consider these discoveries, which have only just begun.
[I]At the present time "Ido" is the best. It is a highly practicable artificial language, and its advocates have succeeded in organizing it to insure its normal development. An older and still rather widespread form called "Esperanto" has failed to organize itself so as to insure its development and it must inevitably die out.
[I]At the present time "Ido" is the best. It is a highly practicable artificial language, and its advocates have succeeded in organizing it to insure its normal development. An older and still rather widespread form called "Esperanto" has failed to organize itself so as to insure its development and it must inevitably die out.