The Courtship of AnimalsPycraft, W. P. (William Plane)
Science
The Courtship of Animals
Pycraft, W. P. (William Plane)
Animal behavior; Natural selection
By now it will have become apparent that the study of the “Courtship”
of animals is one of alluring interest and full of pitfalls for the
unwary. And this because of the apparent difficulty in drawing any
hard-and-fast line between the part played by “Natural” and the part
played by “Sexual” Selection, at any rate in some cases.
To this aspect of the theme Professor Lloyd Morgan has drawn particular
attention. “It is difficult,” he remarks, to accept the view that
individual choice has played no part where the sexual instincts are
concerned. But supposing that it has played its part ... the effects
will be wrought into the congenital tissue of the race if, and only
if, there are certain individuals which, through failure to elicit the
pairing response, die unmated. Is preferential mating, supposing it to
occur, carried to such a degree that some individuals fail to secure
a mate? That is the question. If so, sexual selection is a factor in
race progress; if not, though it may occur in nature, it is inoperative
as a means of evolutionary development. The whole question, in itself a
difficult one, is further complicated by the fact that the males which
are possessed of the most exuberant vitality, and are therefore by
hypothesis rendered the most acceptable through emotional suggestion,
are likely to compete with other males of less exuberant vitality by
direct combat. Such competition, by which the weakest are excluded from
mating through no choice on the part of the female, falls under the
head of natural selection, and not of sexual selection, if by that term
we understand preferential mating.
“This serves to bring out the difference ... between natural selection
through elimination and conscious selection through choice....
Sexual selection by preferential mating begins by selecting the most
successful in stimulating the pairing instinct.... The process is
determined by conscious choice. It is in and through such choice that
consciousness has been a factor in evolution.”
Herein Lloyd Morgan, like Darwin, recognizes the existence of a
dual machinery in determining survival, where this depends on the
co-operation of two individuals leading separate existences—Natural,
and Sexual, Selection—sometimes the one and sometimes the other
prevailing. In the former, the females are seized by force; in the
latter, won by displays.
But is this really so? In these pages it is contended that a sharp
line must be drawn between all those attributes and characters which
are necessary to achieve individual survival, the survival of the
Ego, and all those which, on the other hand, are necessary to achieve
reproduction and the survival of the race. The former are governed, or
determined, by Natural, the latter by Sexual, Selection.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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