l80 HUMAN BIOLOGY 



of the tropics; and the results could not possibly be equahty, 

 physical, physiological, or intellectual. In broad Hnes it is 

 legitimate therefore to speak of "advanced" and "belated" 

 human groups or races. And the cultural and other indirect 

 evidence sustains this assumption. 



As to direct scientific determination of the differences 

 between races, what has thus far been accompHshed is in the 

 physical hne. Comparative racial physiology, chemistry 

 and psychology are only in their beginnings. Of the physical 

 studies the most relevant in this connection are those of the 

 brain and the skull, or the head in the Hving. These 

 researches, too, are far from finished; but enough has already 

 been done for some vaHd conclusions. These are, in broad 

 hnes once more, that within the same stem what differences 

 there are are essentially individual; but that between the 

 moderate zone peoples and those of the tropics, or, more 

 particularly, between the whites and the blacks, there are 

 differences that sustain the conclusions arrived at through 

 other considerations. 



The point is raised, now and then, that what differences 

 there are between, for instance, the white and the negro, 

 are differences in accomphshments and education, rather 

 than those of potentiahties. Should this mean that the brain 

 of the belated group is capable of development, the prop- 

 osition could readily be assented to for there is no evidence 

 or probabihty to the contrary. But there appears to be no 

 possibility of estabhshing the thesis that the brains of the 

 belated human groups, such as the negro, the negrito, the 

 Bushmen-Hottentot, the Melanesians, the Australo-Tas- 

 manians, the Veddahs, the Fuegians, is of equal potentiahty 

 with those of the Old American, the English, Scotch, Irish, 

 French, Germans, etc., and that the only differences are in 

 training, enlightenment and opportunity. 



A serious question with which anthropology is frequently 

 confronted, is: What are the indications as to the future 

 of the belated groups? This question involves much more 

 than physical anthropology, more even than anthropology 

 in general. It involves pathology, economics, competition, 

 adaptation. The answers are to be seen wherever the 

 advanced come into direct contact with the really belated. 



