The Meaning of Infancy (John Fiske Classics Collection)

But this period of helplessness has to be viewed under another aspect. It is a period of plasticity. The creature's career is no longer exclusively determined by heredity. There is a period after birth when its character can be slightly modified by what happens to it after birth, that is, by its experience as an individual. It becomes educable. It is no longer necessary for each generation to be exactly like that which has preceded. A door is opened through which the capacity for progress can enter. Horses and dogs, bears and elephants, parrots and monkeys, are all teachable to some extent, and we have even heard of a learned pig. Of learned asses there has been no lack in the world.