How to Read a Book: The Classic Guide to Intelligent Reading

by Mortimer J. Adler

  CHAPTER VIII. INSTINCT

  Instincts comparable with habits, but different in their origin. Instincts graduated. Aphides and ants. Instincts variable. Domestic instincts, their origin. Natural instincts of the cuckoo, molothrus, ostrich, and parasitic bees. Slavemaking ants. Hive-bee, its cell-making instinct. Changes of instinct and structure not necessarily simultaneous. Difficulties of the theory of the natural selection of instincts. Neuter or sterile insects. Summary.

  CHAPTER IX. HYBRIDISM

  Distinction between the sterility of first crosses and of hybrids. Sterility various in degree, not universal, affected by close interbreeding, removed by domestication. Laws governing the sterility of hybrids. Sterility not a special endowment, but incidental on other differences, not accumulated by natural selection. Causes of the sterility of first crosses and of hybrids. Parallelism between the effects of changed conditions of life and of crossing. Dimorphism and trimorphism. Fertility of varieties when crossed and of their mongrel offspring not universal. Hybrids and mongrels compared independently of their fertility. Summary.

  CHAPTER X. ON THE IMPERFECTION OF THE GEOLOGICAL RECORD

  p. 398 On the absence of intermediate varieties at the present day. On the nature of extinct intermediate varieties; on their number. On the lapse of time, as inferred from the rate of denudation and of deposition. On the lapse of time as estimated by years. On the poorness of our palaeontological collections. On the intermittence of geological formations. On the denudation of granitic areas. On the absence of intermediate varieties in any one formation. On the sudden appearance of groups of species. On their sudden appearance in the lowest known fossiliferous strata. Antiquity of the habitable earth.

  CHAPTER XI. ON THE GEOLOGICAL SUCCESSION OF ORGANIC BEINGS

  On the slow and successive appearance of new species. On their different rates of change. Species once lost do not reappear. Groups of species follow the same general rules in their appearance and disappearance as do single species. On extinction. On simultaneous changes in the forms of life throughout the world. On the affinities of extinct species to each other and to living species. On the state of development of ancient forms. On the succession of the same types within the same areas. Summary of preceding and present chapters.

  CHAPTER XII. GEOGRAPHICAL DISTRIBUTION

  Present distribution cannot be accounted for by differences in physical conditions. Importance of barriers. Affinity of the productions of the same continent. Centres of creation. Means of dispersal by changes of climate and of the level of the land, and by occasional means. Dispersal during the glacial period. Alternate glacial periods in the north and south.

  CHAPTER XIII. GEOGRAPHICAL DISTRIBUTION, continued

  Distribution of fresh-water productions. On the inhabitants of oceanic islands. Absence of batrachians and of terrestrial mammals. On the relation of the inhabitants of islands to those of the nearest mainland. On colonisation from the nearest source with subsequent modification. Summary of the last and present chapters.

  CHAPTER XIV. MUTUAL AFFINITIES OF ORGANIC BEINGS, MORPHOLOGY, EMBRYOLOGY, RUDIMENTARY ORGANS

  Classification, groups subordinate to groups. Natural system. Rules and difficulties in classification, explained on the theory of p. 399 descent with modification. Classification of varieties. Descent always used in classification. Analogical or adaptive characters. Affinities, general, complex, and radiating. Extinction separates and defines groups. Morphology, between members of the same class, between parts of the same individual. Embryology, laws of, explained by variations not supervening at an early age, and being inherited at a corresponding age. Rudimentary organs: their origin explained. Summary.

  CHAPTER XV. RECAPITULATION AND CONCLUSION

  Recapitulation of the objections to the theory of natural selection. Recapitulation of the general and special circumstances in its favour. Causes of the general belief in the immutability of species. How far the theory of natural selection may be extended. Effects of its adoption on the study of natural history. Concluding remarks.

  Test E:

  Questions about Darwin and about The Origin of Species

  1. In The Origin of Species Darwin undertakes to describe the origin and evolution of man. (True or False?)

  2. The work is divided into (a) 12 (b) 15 (c) 19 chapters.

  3. The book emphasizes the role of domestication in natural selection. (True or False?)

  4. Darwin asserts that the struggle for life is (a) more severe (b) less severe between individuals of the same species than it is between individuals of different species.

  5. Darwin takes no account of, and does not try to answer, difficulties of and objections against his theory. (True or False?)

  6. Darwin was unable to complete The Origin of Species, and the book therefore lacks a chapter summing up his theory and his conclusions. (True or False?)

  7. Darwin enjoyed taking part in the disputes that developed as a consequence of his work. (True or False?)

  8. In the famous debate at Oxford between T. H. Huxley and Bishop Wilberforce, which man defended Darwin and his theory?

  p. 400 9. Darwin described as “by far the most important event in my life” (a) his reading of Malthus’s Essay on the Principle of Population (b) his youthful study of medicine (c) his voyage on the Beagle.

  10. Darwin thought that “a law ought to be passed” against (a) novels (b) pornographic novels (c) novels having scientists as their main characters (d) novels with unhappy endings.

  Turn to p. 415 for the answers to Test E.

  Those questions were all very easy ones. Now take another twenty minutes to read the table of contents of The Origin of Species (see p. 395) superficially, and then we will ask you to consider some more difficult questions.

  Test F:

  Further questions about Darwin and The Origin of Species

  1. Darwin, making extensive use of the geological record, considers it (a) complete and satisfactory (b) incomplete but an invaluable source of data on the origin of species.

  2. Species refers to a group of animals or plants (a) lower (b ) higher than a genus.

  3. Members of a species share common characteristics, and can interbreed and reproduce their kinds. (True or False?)

  4. Members of a genus share common characteristics, but are not necessarily able to interbreed and reproduce their kind. (True or False?)

  5. Of the following factors, which ones play a major role and which a minor role in natural selection?

  Major

  Minor

  (a)

  The struggle for existence

  ____

  ____

  (b)

  Variation of individuals

  ____

  ____

  (c)

  Heritability of traits

  ____

  ____

  p. 401 6. Darwin compares the power of natural selection to that of man’s selection. Which does he think is greater?

  7. The Latin phrase Natura non facit saltum appears in the table of contents. Can you translate this phrase? Can you state the significance of the phrase for Darwin’s theory?

  8. What is the significance of geological dispersion and of natural barriers such as the oceans on the evolution of species?

  9. In his Introduction to The Origin of Species, Darwin refers to the origin of species as “that mystery of mysteries, as it has been called by one of our greatest philosophers.” Can you state fairly exactly the problem that his work sets out to solve? You might try to do this in no more than a sentence or two.

  10. What is Darwin’s theory—in a nutshell? Can you state it in no more than 100 words?

  Turn to p. 415 for the answers to Test F.

  You have now completed the two-part exercise at the second level of reading. As before, you will have noted that the questions draw not only on the texts read but also on historical and other information. Indeed, you may feel that some of the questions were eminently unfair. And so they wou
ld be, if any critical decision depended on your ability to answer them. That, of course, is not so. We hope that the questions you were unable to answer, or that you found it very difficult to answer, will not irritate you, but will instead lead you to search in the works that have been only superficially discussed here for better answers than the ones we have given. Better answers are available in the works themselves. And also answers to many more interesting questions that we have not had the time, the space, or the wit, to ask.

  III. Exercises and Tests at the Third Level of Reading:

  Analytical Reading

  p. 402 The text used for the exercises in this part of the Appendix is this book itself. We would prefer it if this were not so. There are many books that it would be better and more fruitful to practice analytical reading on. But over against that preference there is one overriding consideration: this book is the only one that we can be sure that all persons taking this test have read. The only alternative would be to reprint another book along with this one, and that is out of the question.

  You will recall that the analytical reader must always attempt to answer four questions about whatever book he is reading: (1) What is the book about as a whole? (2) What is being said in detail, and how? (3) Is the book true, in whole or part? (4) What of it? The fifteen rules of reading, as they are listed on pp. 163-64 and discussed at length in Part Two, are designed to help the analytical reader answer these questions. Can you answer them about this book?

  You must be the judge of whether you can or not. There are no answers at the end of this Appendix to these four questions. The answers are in the book itself.

  Not only is it true that we have done the best job we could of making these matters clear in writing the book. It is also true that in an important sense it would be inappropriate to try to help you any more than we already have. Not only is analytical reading work—it is lonely work. The reader is alone with the book he is reading. Basically, there is no resource to exploit except his own thought; there is no place to go for insight and understanding except into his own mind.

  We have explained how the questions must be answered for, and the rules applied to, different kinds of books. But we cannot state how they are to be applied to any given work. The reader himself must be the one to do that.

  There are, nevertheless, a few things that can be said withp. 403out exceeding the proprieties. We have not concealed the fact that this is a practical book, so applying the first rule of structural analysis is easy enough. We think we have also made it pretty clear what the book is about as a whole, although now you should state this more briefly than we have done in any one place. We hope that our organization into four parts and twenty-one chapters is perspicuous. However, in outlining the book, it might be desirable to comment on the unequal treatment, in terms of numbers of pages, accorded the various levels of reading. The first level of reading—elementary reading—receives relatively short shrift in this book, although it is of undoubted importance. Why? The third level of reading—analytical reading—receives much more extensive and intensive coverage than any of the other levels. Again, why?

  With regard to the fourth rule of structural analysis, we want to emphasize that the problem we set out to solve cannot be defined simply as teaching you to read. There is nothing in this book, for example, that would be of much help to a first- or second-grade teacher. We have concentrated instead on reading in a certain way, and with certain goals in mind. In applying the fourth rule of reading, that way and those goals should be described with precision.

  Similarly with the second stage of analytical reading—interpretation. The first three rules at that stage must be applied by the reader without our help: the rules that require you to come to terms, to find the key propositions, and to construct the arguments. There would be no point in our trying to list what we think are the terms of this work—the important words that must be understood commonly by you and by us if the work as a whole is to communicate knowledge, or impart skill. Nor will we repeat the propositions that we have asserted, and that the reader, if he has read analytically, should be able to state in his own words. Nor will we repeat the arguments. To do so would be to write the book over again.

  Something can be said, however, about the problems that we did and did not solve. We believe we did solve the main problem that faced us at the beginning—the problem that you p. 404 must have identified in your application of the fourth rule of structural analysis. We do not believe that we solved all of the problems of reading that face students and adult readers today. For one thing, many of these problems involve individual differences between human beings. No book on a general subject can ever hope to solve such difficulties.

  The criticism of a book as a communication of knowledge involves, as you will recall, the application of seven rules, three of which are general maxims of intellectual etiquette, and four of which are specific criteria for points of criticism. We have done what we could to recommend the maxims of intellectual etiquette (they are discussed in Chapter 10). With regard to the first three points of criticism, we can have nothing to say. But a few remarks about the last of the four criteria of criticism—to show wherein the analysis in the book is incomplete—are not inappropriate.

  We would say that our analysis or account is incomplete in two respects. The first is in regard to the first level of reading. There is much more to be said about elementary reading, but we do want to emphasize that that was not our primary concern. Nor would we claim for our discussion of the subject any degree of finality. Elementary reading could be discussed, and has been discussed, in quite different ways.

  The other respect in which our analysis is incomplete is much more important. We did not say all that could be said—perhaps not even all that we could say—about syntopical reading. There are two reasons for this.

  First, syntopical reading is extraordinarily hard to describe and explain without having the texts of various authors in front of one. Fortunately, we will have the opportunity in the last part of this Appendix, which follows, of presenting an actual exercise in syntopical reading. But even there we will be confined to two short texts by only two authors. A full-scale exercise would involve many texts from many authors, and the examination of many complex questions. Space limitations prohibit that here.

  Second, it is almost impossible to describe the intellectual p. 405 excitement and satisfaction that come from syntopical reading without actually sharing the experience of doing it. Nor is the understanding that one finally arrives at attained in a day. Often, it takes months or years to unwind the twisted thread of the discussion of an important point, a thread that may have been in the process of becoming twisted over centuries. Many false starts are made, and many tentative analyses and organizations of the discussions must be proposed, before any real light is thrown on the subject. We have suffered through many of these problems, and we know how disheartening the business can be at times. As a result, however, we also know how wonderful it can be when one finally wins one’s way through to a solution.

  Are there other respects in which our analysis is incomplete? We can think of a few possibilities. For example, does the book fail to differentiate sufficiently between what might be called first-intentional reading (that is, reading a text) and second-intentional reading (that is, reading a commentary on that text)? Is enough said about reading heretical in contra-distinction to canonical texts; or enough about the reading of texts that stand detached, above so-called canonical and heretical texts? Is enough attention paid to the problems raised by special vocabularies, especially in science and mathematics? (This aspect of the general problem of reading is mentioned in the chapter on reading social science.) Perhaps not enough space is devoted to the reading of lyric poetry. Beyond that, we are not sure that we know of anything that deserves criticism on this last count. But we would not be surprised to discover that some defects or failures that are not at all obvious to us are perfectly obvious to you.

  IV.
Exercises and Tests at the Fourth Level of Reading:

  Syntopical Reading

  Two texts are used for the exercises in this fourth and last part of the Appendix. One consists of selected passages p. 406 from the first two chapters of Book I of Aristotle’s Politics. The other consists of selected passages from Book I of Rousseau’s The Social Contract—a sentence from the Introduction to the book, and passages from Chapters 1, 2, 4, and 6.

  Aristotle’s Politics appears in Volume 9 of Great Books of the Western World. Volumes 8 and 9 of the set are devoted to the complete works of Aristotle; besides the Politics, Volume 9 includes the Ethics, the Rhetoric, and the Poetics, as well as a number of biological treatises. Rousseau’s Social Contract appears in Volume 38 of the set, a volume that includes other works by Rousseau as well—the essay On the Origin of Inequality, and On Political Economy—together with another important eighteenth-century French political book, Montesquieu’s The Spirit of Laws.

  You will recall that there are two stages of syntopical reading. One is a preparatory step, the other is syntopical reading proper. For the purposes of this exercise we assume that the first or preparatory step has already been taken—that is, that we have decided on the subject we wish to consider and have also decided on the texts we want to read. The subject in this case may be defined as “The Nature and Origin of the State”—a subject of importance about which a great deal has been thought and said. The texts are as described above.