BIOMETRIC IDEAS AND METHODS 47 



is gradually coming to be clearly recognized by 

 general biologists that biometric methods when 

 properly used add an important weapon of re- 

 search to the investigator's armament. It is the 

 purpose of this paper to attempt in a very modest 

 way to help along, if possible, this better under- 

 standing of and greater sympathy towards bio- 

 metric work. 



II 



The underlying and essential point of view of 

 biometry has been quite generally misunderstood by 

 biologists. In the first place biometry is often 

 strongly and quite unjustly criticized because it has 

 developed primarily as a statistical science. It is 

 supposed that this method of inquiry cannot prop- 

 erly or profitably have anything to do with any 

 problems not immediately reducible to frequency 

 polygons and correlation tables. The charge is 

 made that biometrical methods can deal only with 

 mass phenomena, and that they intentionally disre- 

 gard the detailed study of the individual, and 

 therefore lead directly to experimental indeter- 

 minism as a mode of biological thought. Such 

 a charge is based on an entire misconception of 

 the biometrical standpoint. This attitude, how- 

 ever, has done a great deal of harm in hindering 

 the wider use of these methods by biologists. 

 Nothing has been more strongly emphasized by 

 the trend of recent biological discovery than the 



