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As a chemistry major, I was intrigued by Dennet’s use of the universal acid concept.  A universal acid is an imaginary and impossible substance that eats through any container.  In ordinary chemical terminology, an acid is a substance capable of donating protons; it increases the concentration of protons in solution.  A more sophisticated chemical definition of an acid is a substance that accepts electron pairs.  Both these characterizations imply a duality; an acid requires a base with which to react.   In the case of a universal acid, everything it comes in contact with would behave as a base.  The bases in Dennet’s metaphor would be art, culture, humanities, natural sciences, social sciences, religion, or any other human creation.  These fields have accepted concepts of evolution and incorporated them into their own cannon.  When an acid and a base interact a chemical reaction occurs.  A chemical reaction is a process in which one or more substances are converted into other substances, also called chemical change.  Such a change indicates that the acid is no longer the same chemical compound nor is the base.  So every time the theory of evolution interacts with another theory it is changed?  No longer the same substance?  The content of the theory of evolution is undergoing a sort of intellectual evolution?