A Review of the Systems of Ethics Founded on the Theory of Evolution Part 6

[55] Ibid. p. 223, 224.

[56] Vol. II. p. 212.

[57] Ibid. pp. 227, 228.

W. H. ROLPH

"BIOLOGICAL PROBLEMS" ("Biologische Probleme," 1884)

For what purpose are we in the world? asks the philosopher, and lays, with this question, the foundation for later errors. In the effort to rescue from destruction the theory of a creative intelligence, teleology has adapted itself to many forms of scientific theory, not excepting that of evolution. It reads into evolution progress towards what is, in one way or another, a.s.sumed to be an end. But we really know, in the universe, nothing but continuity, eternal change according to natural law, and so only _causae efficientes_, never _causae finales_; and organic development as well as processes in inorganic nature are to be explained in this manner. The a.s.sumption that the result of a process is an end towards which the process was directed is unwarranted. The question of science is not: Wherefore is any creature in the world? but: What is he?

What is his actual aim, that is, his endeavor?

In the answer to this question, all philosophical schools have something in common. Happiness, in one form or another, is acknowledged to be the "end" of life in this sense. A follower of the utilitarian school may define happiness as the "sublime feeling that one has taken part in the continuous improvement of humanity, and the increase of human happiness," but his words are less a definition of the concept than a designation of the way in which happiness is to be arrived at. The "sublime feeling" can be represented only as a feeling of happiness, of joy. The religious theory, too, which represents the joys of religion on earth and in heaven, as compensating for the evils of this life, makes happiness the end of life, though in a different manner. Spencer is right in declaring that happiness, however it may be defined, always means, in the end, a greater amount of pleasure than of pain. At this point, however, the harmony of the schools ceases. The question as to the method by which this surplus of pleasure is to be obtained is answered in different ways. All say, indeed, by seeking good and avoiding evil. But opinion is divided as to what is good and what is evil.

Rolph here introduces a long criticism of the different schools. Against utilitarianism he urges that, in so far as it makes the happiness of the greatest number its principle, it a.s.serts the right of the majority over a minority, and so advocates, by implication, an absolute subjection to authority.

Our whole moral education has for its aim to give the young as high a conception as possible of the happiness which springs from virtue and, on the other hand, to decry the pleasure which may result from forbidden acts. We seek, in this manner, to diminish the inward struggle and bring about the right result. He who has grown up under good influences escapes many temptations to which a man of less moral education falls a prey. According to Wallock, who makes the degree of inner struggle the measure of virtue, the man of better education in this case, the more moral man, must have less merit than the less moral man. Wallock thus founders on the rock which Kant so skilfully avoids; according to the former, the man whose l.u.s.ts have been mastered by education could never equal the man of evil instincts, and the chast.i.ty of a Magdalen must be regarded as more moral than that of a pure woman.

Spencer's theory, that the conduct of the higher animals is better adjusted to ends than that of lower species, is erroneous; the lower animals are exactly as well organized for the ends of their existence as are the higher animals for theirs; the tapeworm is relatively just as perfect as the human being, in comparison with whom he possesses many superior qualities. The common judgment that the human being is superior does not accord with the real adjustment of things, but with our human conception of the ideal end of organization, our anthropocentric idea of the aim of life. We foolishly believe that the tapeworm and every other animal has the same end as the human being, and rank the animals according to this principle, instead of tracing the different genealogical branches to a like height and then comparing them. Not the fitness for ends, but the kind and multiplicity of the ends for which there is fitness, determine our judgment; and the ends by which we judge are those of our own life. We judge subjectively and absolutely instead of objectively and relatively. We are ever unconsciously influenced by the conception that nature, in creating the tapeworm, merely made a false step and a step backwards in her way towards the creation of man.

That all animals are adapted, some in a greater, some in a less degree, to the ends of their existence, is proved by the simple fact of their existence, that is, of their survival in the struggle for existence; but which are in a higher, and which are in a less degree so adapted, is, in the individual instance, extremely difficult to determine. In any attempt at such an estimate, we must meet with peculiar difficulties, resulting from the fact that we judge of the adaptation to ends with less certainty the further from us any animal is in its organization. A comparison such as Spencer inst.i.tutes is possible only with respect to like functions of similar organs in closely related forms.

The a.s.sertion that increase of ability for self-preservation leads to better care for the young, and makes of such care a duty, is likewise erroneous. For, up to the highly organized cla.s.s of the crustacea, we have no example of care for the young. In the struggle for existence, the species which survive must be such as not only are in themselves best fitted for survival, but as also bring forth best fitted progeny.

Nor has Spencer made clear on what ground natural process is to be regarded as identical with duty. In truth he has succeeded in showing only that care for the young is wide-spread in the animal kingdom, from which fact naturally follows that it is a quality which tends to the preservation of species.

It cannot be conceded that such a perfection as Spencer pictures, where each shall fulfil all the functions of his own life in the most perfect and complete manner without interfering with a like freedom in others, is possible. The a.s.sertion involves the extension to all living beings of that ideal principle of equal claims which Spencer repudiates with regard to man,--showing that not all men are capable of a like degree of happiness and that individuals desire, moreover, pleasure differing in quality. Furthermore, a world of beings which, like the animals and many plants, can support life only by means of organic material, must, in order to exist, destroy organic life, either animal or vegetable. The theory does not even hold with regard to individuals of the same species; Spencer himself acknowledges the truth of the principles of Malthus and of Darwin, according to which, even with the lowest rate of increase, a struggle of compet.i.tion must soon arise between individuals of the same species.

Nor does Spencer's proof of the fundamental character of altruism hold, on investigation. He demonstrates that through the animal species up to man, there is less and less self-sacrifice of the mother animal in giving birth to offspring. But this physical sacrifice is not altruism; altruism lies in conscious care for the young after birth, and this is not lessened, but increased, the higher we ascend.

That morality is but greater adjustment of acts to ends cannot be admitted. If, in ordinary speech, the word good refers to greatest adjustment to ends, whatever the ends may be, that is no proof that it must have the same significance in Ethics. A good shot may be a good one in that it hits the mark; but what if it kill a man? The acts of criminals may be as well adjusted to their ends and as easy to predict as those of a good man. Spencer's theory would lead, consistently carried out, to the principle that the means justify the end, an a.s.sertion that is even more dangerous than its opposite. The fact is, that in Ethics it is the nature of the end which is of importance.

Spencer endeavors to show that only normal exercise of function is favorable to life, and so moral;--that excess and deprivation are both injurious. It is not true, however, that excess is always injurious; within certain bounds it is made up for by reserves in the animal organism. Or, if Spencer should answer to this objection, that his "normal" is not to be represented by a sharp line, difficult to keep to, but by a broad road within which excess is safe, such a representation would both burden his theory with two dividing-lines, and moreover would not save it. For he has not deemed it necessary to treat the concept "normal" to an exact definition, and we find him using it in his later deductions in an entirely new sense--not as equilibrium between capacity of function and its exercise, but in the ideal significance of a harmony between the claims of the individual on the one side, and those of the environment on the other. This normal is nowhere actually to be found and cannot, from the nature of things, be arrived at. By addition of this significance, the word normal becomes indefinite in meaning, and is used, now in one sense, now in the other. Normal exercise of function has, however, nothing to do with the claims of the environment, which generally demands, indeed, a deviation from the normal.

Nor is Spencer's a.n.a.lysis of the beginning of the process of food-seizure, adduced in support of the theory that happiness and morality are commensurable, confirmed by facts. According to this theory, the process of food-taking begins with the contact of animal and food, in which act the commencement of diffusion of food in the body of the animal causes a pleasure which leads to the seizure of its prey and the further act of devouring it. The theory might hold of the lowest organisms, but could not be true of any animal furnished with an impenetrable sh.e.l.l or skin. Nor would the seizure follow with sufficient promptness if it were left to the action of the pleasure caused by diffusion. Moreover, we should expect to find, according to this theory, a much more general and finer development of the organ of taste among the animals,--to find it as a special organ on the lowest planes of animal life; it is, on the contrary, the latest of the special senses to develop. It is the reaction on the sense of touch, the lowest and most general of the special senses, which causes the seizure of nourishment.

We must, therefore, deny that pleasure is the motive to the seizure of food, and so, too, reject the conclusion that it is the motive to every other act.

Besides arguing that normal function brings pleasure, Spencer has attempted to prove that all pleasure has its spring in normal function, and is therefore moral. Could he succeed in so doing, hedonism would be proved. For since all schools agree in regarding happiness as the end of life, and since all these, in common, acknowledge happiness to be an excess of pleasure over pain, enjoyment might be regarded as the absolute guide. But if, as Spencer acknowledges, pleasure and morality are only in a perfectly adapted society commensurate, then in only such a society can pleasure be the criterion; and since we do not live in a perfectly adapted society, the theory is not applicable to us, and if practicably applied would be fatal to society.

Against Spencer's theory of the final spontaneity of morality, many objections may be urged, among others especially the one that such a morality ceases to be morality at all, virtue being possible, as Kant has demonstrated, only where a certain conquest of desire is achieved.

Such a morality is, moreover, unattainable, an extravagant fancy.

THE PROBLEM OF FOOD-TAKING

Rolph thinks Spencer's theory awakes the conjecture that it was not first arrived at through investigation, but rests upon a preconceived opinion, as do to a greater or less extent all theories on this subject.

It seems as if the author had first attached himself to that theory which best accorded with his scientific bias, and then tried whether this theory might be proved or supported by facts of biology and psychology. One might surmise, from the very skilful, but often too artificial argument, that the author pursued the following train of thought. Pleasure, and indeed the greatest possible pleasure, is the end of endeavor in the organic world, that is, the psychical cause of endeavor. May it not also be the physical cause?

Rolph answers this question with a denial, and endeavors to show that the taking of food has its cause in the insatiability of all organic substance. The theory of Spontaneous Generation contains nothing impossible or improbable; is, on the contrary, a necessary logical a.s.sumption not to be disproved by the mere result of experiment under conditions of the laboratory. It is easy to imagine that organic elements, which are to be found in great quant.i.ties in inorganic nature, may come together by chance, or rather in the natural order of things, to the formation of protoplasm.

The movement of these ma.s.ses of protoplasm seems, at first glance, to set the law of gravitation at defiance, but we may answer that an ascending balloon might seem, to an uninstructed observer, to do the same, although its movement is merely the natural result of that force; it is not necessary, therefore, to a.s.sume a free inner motive, the soul, as the cause of the one motion or the other. The first a.s.similation of food has its beginning in the process of endosmose and exosmose, in which the protoplasm, as in general the denser fluid, increases in volume, taking up more than it gives out; the process occurring, in detail, according to the special relations of attraction in the parts.

The organism always takes up the greatest amount possible under the circ.u.mstances, exactly as, in the inorganic world, water takes up the greatest amount possible of salt or any other soluble substance; the growth of a crystal, and the oxidation of iron are ill.u.s.trations of the same principle. Of the limit of this capacity to take up new matter into the organism we know nothing; all recent experiments go to show that the organism is capable, under propitious circ.u.mstances, of an enormous receptivity, such as, under natural conditions, it never reaches. The lower animals feed continually, and their whole lives are pa.s.sed in this employment. In plants the tendency is seen still more clearly.

Experiments with electric, violet, and ultra-violet light show an enormous growth in plants exposed to its action. But this can be only an indirect growth, namely, the exorbitant acceleration of organic change and a.s.similation. This fact is proved by experiments turning on increase of warmth in soil; from which is seen to result an unusual development of that part of the plant to which growth is especially directed at the time. When the warmth of an incubator is increased, the animal organ especially engaged in development at the time is affected in like manner. So that we may a.s.sume that the organism is capable of responding to every demand that nature makes upon it under normal conditions; and since the greatest possible a.s.similation under the existing conditions is thus removed from the control of the creature, the latter appears practically insatiable. This insatiability must appear to the observer an inner impulse of the organism, an effort towards increase of nourishment. It may be called mechanical hunger in distinction from psychical hunger, of which it is the basis. It is not necessary to take into consideration, in the question as to the degree of a.s.similation possible, the amount of excretion of substance by the organism; we must, on the contrary, a.s.sert that this is dependent upon the amount of a.s.similation. The measure of growth depends, therefore, on the degree of a.s.similation of new material. This degree, however, like the degree to which the matter may be dissolved in a liquid in the case of inorganic matter, is especially affected by light and warmth. The creature which comes into existence in the sun will experience a decrease of organic change when placed in the shade; and the creature which comes into existence in the shade will experience an increase of such change under the influence of the sun, a decrease again with a return to the shade.

This decrease means hunger,--harm. Experiments with zoospores throw an interesting light upon these relations. They show that the zoospores, although suited to very different degrees of light, all shun darkness.

Although when in the light they soon come to rest, divide, and copulate, they remain, in the darkness, in a state of continual unrest and motion.

They grow so thin "that they almost excite pity" (Stra.s.sburger), and finally perish of hunger. Only such zoospores as are distinguished by s.e.x and copulate come to rest, or those of such sorts as prey upon others. It is easy to perceive that the unrest of the zoospores in the darkness springs from lack of nourishment, from hunger; they seek feverishly for the light, without which a.s.similation follows with insufficient energy to satisfy need and render life possible. In darkness, copulation alone can do this; copulation takes, then, the place of normal nourishment.

Or let us consider the case of an organism which has originated in the shade. Heat, as we know, increases chemical change, in inorganic as well as organic matter; it hastens the disintegration of certain compounds, and alone renders it possible in many cases. In general, we may a.s.sert that increase of temperature within certain limits increases a.s.similation; that is, capacity to a.s.similate. Therefore, if an animal is placed in the sun, its capacity, that is, its need, to a.s.similate is increased, although a.s.similation is much more energetic than before.

Need to a.s.similate or hunger is, therefore, dependent upon the supply of food, although, doubtless, also on other conditions, especially those of light and temperature. If this is true, the hunger of a simple organism that a.s.similates energetically must be more intense than that of one which a.s.similates slowly, in spite of the consumption of an enormous quant.i.ty of food in the case of the former. Botanists know (Sachs, "Lehrbuch der Botanik," p. 613) "that growth may be so hastened by too high a temperature that a.s.similation (especially under scanty light) does not suffice to provide the necessary material for it. The transpiration of the leaves may be so increased that the roots cannot repair the loss. And on the other hand, a too low temperature of the soil may so diminish the action of the roots that even a small loss by transpiration cannot be repaired."

At what stage of organization psychical hunger is added to mechanical hunger, or whether it may be identified with it, we cannot say. In any case, the former appears exceedingly early, for excitations of hunger may be observed in creatures very low in the scale of being. Certainly hunger is never absent where there is movement.

Hunger, a sense of pain, is, therefore, the first impulse to action.[58]

With a like effort in the attempt to obtain food, that organism will be best nourished which commands the best means of obtaining and preparing its food,--the best apparatus for the seizure and grinding of food, and the best salivary gland. And finally, greater surface of skin, of lungs, of gills, or of intestines, causes greater capacity for a.s.similation, and since this surface is increased by cell-division or propagation, the capacity of the organism for a.s.similation grows with its capacity of propagation.[59] Protoplasm is never entirely h.o.m.ogeneous, and we must suppose some difference even in the beginning; such difference is, indeed, fundamental through the very composition of protoplasm from the four fundamental elements, and this or that other element. These different elements must be held together by forces of attraction, and the direction of these forces must have some common centre represented by some differentiation of the protoplasm, whether as clearer spot, or as nucleus. This spontaneously generated organism, neither animal nor plant, is nourished, as we have seen, by diffusion, by the transformation of inorganic into organic substance. The lowest organisms possess no definite organs for taking food; they manifest, however, phenomena of movement which are exactly like those of the animal organism, for they appear unconditioned and hence voluntary. Locomotion is, in the lowest animal forms, the only means of obtaining nourishment.

The amoeba surrounds and takes in whatever is by chance met with.

Animals a little higher in the scale swim about and seek their food; or, remaining in one place, they cause, by means of cilia, a movement of the water towards a certain part of the body, a sort of mouth where the protoplasm is open and can take up the prey in the same manner as does the amoeba. Ascending the scale of life, we find more and more complicated apparatus for the seizure of food, for its preparation and digestion, and the beginning of a nervous system, first as the differentiation of certain muscle-cells, then in connection with a special sense, that of hearing. If we a.s.sume any pleasure to be connected with the earliest acts of a.s.similation, it must be that of the satisfaction of a want, the stilling of pain in the form of hunger.

THE PROBLEM OF PERFECTIBILITY

In the earliest forms of propagation, the younger organism is a true copy of that from which it springs, the trifling differences being due, as Schmankewicz has shown, to outer influences. The differences of male, female, worker, and soldier are due to such outer influences. The differences in the younger organism, where propagation takes place through copulation, may be explained by the mixture of types, through which, by action and reaction, some qualities are intensified, while some others become latent or are entirely destroyed. To these mutual influences are to be added such as come from without, especially those of warmth, and of quant.i.ty and quality of food. Under too great an increase in temperature, the young organism may even be destroyed, the process of a.s.similation not being able to keep pace with it. Those variations which have led to the development of existing forms, that is, which were favorable to life, are chiefly such as could be brought about by relative or absolute increase of a.s.similation. This is true of mental, as well as of physical, qualities.

It is a fact established without doubt, that the most common and most widely distributed species show the greatest variability, and that those species, on the contrary, which are now rare, although they were, perhaps, at earlier periods, the most common and extremely variable, vary, at the present date, the least of all. Following Darwin, one generally draws the conclusion that the severity of the struggle for existence favors the formation of varieties. For, it is said, the most common species fight the severest battle with one another, while the scanty representatives of rarer species come the least into compet.i.tion and continue unchanged. But this theory is, in two ways, erroneous. In the first place, no attention is paid to the fact that a rare species may be exposed to a severe struggle against another species for the same nourishment, while a common species may, on the other hand, be exposed to no such struggle, and, supporting life from a generous supply of food, be subjected to but slight pressure. The conception of the Darwinians means nothing more or less than that the individuals of a species vary the more, the less favorable the conditions of nourishment; and this cannot be conceded. Again, the fact is to be taken into consideration, that the species at present common must have pa.s.sed through a favorable period in which food was so plentiful that it not only afforded an abundance to individuals past the dangers of infancy and youth, but allowed, in addition, the existence of an ever-increasing number of individuals. And it is this period of increase, of abundance, not a period of struggle, which has developed the variations we now have before our eyes. In the same manner one must conclude, with regard to the rarer species, that the formerly existing numerous varieties were destroyed during the period of decline, that is, of overpowering pressure. We have abundant proof of this in the fact that domesticated species, which are carefully tended and fed, and so wholly withdrawn from the struggle for existence, vary enormously, and produce the most wonderful monstrosities.

To what direct causes the appearance of a variety is due, is a question as yet unanswered. But Weismann's investigations have shown us that climate plays a large part in their development. Embryology teaches us, moreover, that the development of the young organism does not take place with the same uniformity in all organs, but that, on the contrary, in one period one organ, in another, another, undergoes a more rapid growth, which may be influenced by variations in food or temperature.

Through such variations the development of monstrosities is explained.

We know that influences of nourishment are operative in the development of the larvae of bees to workers or to queens, and we can easily conceive that other organs besides the s.e.xual are subject to these influences.

The field in which such influences may be operative is, indeed, boundless.

All these considerations lead us to the conclusion that variability in general, but especially that variability resulting in a so-called improvement of the varieties producing it, is an accompaniment of prosperous conditions. This is a conclusion not yet reached in zoology, although botanists long ago recognized, in abundance of food, the most essential condition for the development of variations.

Darwinism fails to account for any need of nourishment beyond that necessary for the maintenance of the _status quo_ of life. According to Darwin, the animal can acquire only sufficient for the repair of loss.

The struggle for existence is, therefore, according to him, a struggle of self-defence, and its results could be, at the best, only the maintenance of species in their present position or, in a less favorable case, their decline, and finally their destruction. But this view is wholly false. The animal acquires not only enough to repair loss, but much more. How could the first amoeba have propagated itself, if it consumed no more than it needed for mere self-maintenance, and how could evolution have taken place? We have seen that, even in the inorganic world, there is not an equality of loss and repair, but that, in osmose, the denser fluid takes up more than it gives, while the fluid that is less dense loses more than it receives, and the mutual exchange reaches the maximum possible under the existing circ.u.mstances. It is this characteristic which renders the involuntary and forced tendency of the organism to satiation independent of the amount of waste; this mechanical hunger is the spring of the insatiability of organisms, and explains to us their increase in number, the process of increasing perfection, and individual development. Without it, an eternity would not have sufficed for evolution; we should still have only a world of primitive amoebae.

This theory of development is, then, the opposite of that ordinarily a.s.sumed. The latter a.s.serts that increase of growth demands increase of nourishment, whereas this a.s.serts the fact that increase of nourishment determines growth. The struggle for existence is not a struggle for the mere necessaries to maintain life, but a struggle for increase of acquisition, increase of life; it is not a struggle of defence, but an attack which only under certain circ.u.mstances becomes a defence. The rule with which we advise our friends is, "Forward! strive to better yourself!" though we may endeavor, in hypocritical spirit, to persuade to contentment those who come into compet.i.tion with our interests.

The chief points, therefore, in which this theory differs from that of Darwin, are as follows:--

"The struggle for existence is really a struggle for increase of nourishment, of life; and independent of the supply of the moment, it goes on at all times, hence even in a state of abundance.

"Limitation of supply by compet.i.tion leads to fixation of the species and, in the end, to its decrease and disappearance.

"Sickness, climate, and direct enemies are the destructive agencies, and must secure more propitious conditions for survivors, the stronger their effect.

"Only under conditions of prosperity can the survivors propagate largely, and perfect themselves, separating into varieties and species.