BIOMETRIC IDEAS AND METHODS 49 



variation has, in a strict sense, very little if any 

 significance in evolution, biometric methods will 

 help to demonstrate the fact. Further, as has 

 been implied above, the statistical study of 

 variation is only one side of biometry. 



Based on a misconception similar to that just 

 discussed is the point of view which criticizes 

 biometry as being necessarily tied fast to a par- 

 ticular view regarding the hereditary process. 

 The "law of ancestral inheritance" first enunciated 

 by Galton and later extensively developed by 

 Pearson is simply a statistical statement. It 

 concerns itself with the end results of the action 

 in a general population of a whole complex of 

 biological processes, of which inheritance is only 

 one. It is the opinion of many workers in the 

 field of genetics that this "law" probably 

 has very little direct relation to the really signif- 

 icant biological facts of heredity, and that 

 whatever apparent significance it may have is 

 largely accidental and fortuitous. But whether 

 this opinion is correct or not certainly has no bear- 

 ing on the question of the validity of bringing 

 appropriate and correct mathematical methods to 

 the aid of the investigator wherever they can be 

 of help in solving problems. It is a confusion of 

 thought to criticize a scientific method of investi- 

 gation because of the theoretical views held by 

 some of those who employ it. There is yet to 

 be discovered a scientific method which can be 



