(1) Study of biology furnishes knowledge of adaptive value
(1) Some knowledge of the processes by which individual plants and animals grow and differentiate, through nutrition and activity; of the process of development common to all organisms; and the bearing of these facts on human life, health, and conduct.
(2) An outline knowledge of reproduction in plants and animals; the origin, nature, meaning, and results of sex; the contribution of sex to human life, to social organization and ideals, and its importance in determining behavior and controls.
(3) A good knowledge of the external forces most important in influencing life; of the nature of the influence; of the various ways in which organisms respond and become adjusted individually and racially to these conditions. A sense of the necessity of adaptation; of the working of the laws of cause and effect among living things, as everywhere else; of the fact that nature's laws cannot be safely ignored by man any more than by the lower organisms; of the relation between animal behavior and human behavior.
(4) Equally a true conception of the known facts about the internal tendencies in organisms including man, which we call hereditary. The principles underlying plant, animal, and human breeding. Any progress in behavior, in legislation, or in public opinion in the field of eugenics, negative or positive, must come from the spread of such knowledge.
(5) A knowledge of the numerous ways in which plants and animals contribute to or interfere with human welfare. This includes use for food, clothing, and labor saving; their destruction of other plants or animals useful or hurtful to us; their work in producing, spreading, or aiding in the cure of disease; their æsthetic service and inspiration; the aid they give us in learning of our own nature through the experiments we conduct upon them; and many miscellaneous services.
(6) A conception of the evolutionary series of plants and animals, and of man's place in the series; a reassurance that man's high place as an intellectual and emotional being is in no way put in peril by his being a part of the series. Some clear knowledge of the general manner of the development of the plant and animal kingdoms to their present complexity should be gained. The student should have some acquaintance with the great generalizations that have meant so much to the science and to all human thinking, should understand how they were reached and the main classes of facts on which they are based.
(7) The general student should be required to have such knowledge of structure and classification as is needed to give foundation and body to the evolutionary conceptions of plants and animals, and to the various processes and powers mentioned above—and only so much.
(8) Some knowledge of the development of the science itself; of its relation to the other sciences; of the men who have most contributed to it, and their contributions; of the manner of making these discoveries, and of the bearing of the more important of these discoveries upon human learning, progress, and well-being.
(9) Something of the parallelism between animal psychology, behavior, habits, instincts, and learning, and those of man,—in both the individual and the social realm.