The Universal KinshipMoore, J. Howard (John Howard)
Philosophy
The Universal Kinship
Moore, J. Howard (John Howard)
Evolution; Human beings; Sociology
2. Closely allied to the foregoing reason for a belief in the
evolution of mind is that derived from a comparative survey of the
nervous system in man and other animals. In man, mind is closely
associated with a certain tissue or system of tissues—_nerve
tissue or the nervous system_. That mind is correlated with nerve
structure, and that mental anatomy may be learned from a study of
the anatomy of the nervous system, especially of the brain, is the
basic postulate of the science of physiological psychology. Now,
nerve cells exist in all animals above the sponge, and a
comparatively well-developed nervous system is found even among many
of the invertebrates, as the higher worms, crustaceans, insects, and
mollusks. The nervous system of invertebrates, though composed of
the same kind of tissue, is constructed according to a somewhat
different plan of architecture from that of the vertebrates. But in
all of the great family of backboned animals the nervous system is
built on the same general plan as in man, with a cerebro-spinal
trunk extending from the head along the back and motory and sensory
nerves ramifying to all parts of the body. There is also a
sympathetic nervous system in all animals down as far as the
insects. The brain, which is the most important part of the nervous
system, and which has been called the ‘organ of consciousness,’
presents throughout the animal kingdom, from its beginning in the
worms to man, a graduated series of increasing complication
proceeding out of the same fundamental type. This is especially true
of the vertebrates. Fishes, amphibians, reptiles, birds, and
mammals, all have in their brains the same primary parts, the same
five fundamental divisions, as are found in the brain of man. Hence,
whatever may be thought about the mental states of invertebrates, we
have the right, in the case of the vertebrate orders of life, to
infer, from the general similarity of their nervous system to our
own, that they have a corresponding similarity to ourselves in
mental constitution and experience.
3. The evolution of mind is suggested by the existence in the animal
world of all grades of intelligence, from almost mindless forms to
forms even exceeding in some respects the mental attainments of men.
The jelly-fish and the philosopher are not mental aliens. They are
linked to each other by a continuous gradation of intermediate
intelligences. The existence of these grades of mental development
suggest psychical evolution and kinship, just as the existence of
like grades of structural development suggest physical evolution.
4. In the mental life of animals the same factors of evolution exist
as those by means of which organic structures have been brought into
existence, and it is reasonable to suppose that the operation of
these factors have produced in the mental world results analogous to
those produced by the operation of the same factors among organic
structures.
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