society?" until it reaches its final development. Nevertheless, some
conception or definition of society is necessary for the beginner, for
in the scientific discussion of social problems we must know first of
all what we are talking about. We must understand in a general way what
society is, what sociology is, what the relations are between sociology
and other sciences, before we can study the social problems of to-day
from a sociological point of view.

The word "society" is used scientifically to designate the reciprocal
relations between individuals. More exactly, and using the term in a
concrete sense, a society is any group of individuals who have more or
less conscious relations to each other. We say conscious relations
because it is not necessary that these relations be specialized into
industrial, political, or ecclesiastical relations. Society is
constituted by the mental interaction of individuals and exists wherever
two or three individuals have reciprocal conscious relations to each
other. Dependence upon a common economic environment, or the mere
contiguity in space is not sufficient to constitute a society. It is the
interdependence in function on the mental side, the contact and
overlapping of our inner selves, which makes possible that form of
collective life which we call society. Plants and lowly types of
organisms do not constitute true societies, unless it can be shown that
they have some degree of mentality. On the other hand, there is no
reason for withholding the term "society" from many animal groups. These
animal societies, however, are very different in many respects from
human society, and are of interest to us only as certain of their forms
throw light upon human society.

We may dismiss with a word certain faulty conceptions of society. In
some of the older sociological writings the word society is often used