206 EVOLUTION AND GENETICS 



for mental superiority I should like to add that I am 

 inclined to think that there are considerable indi- 

 vidual differences in man that are probably strictly 

 genetic, even though I insist that at present there is 

 for this no real scientific evidence of the kind that we 

 are familiar with in other animals and in plants. I 

 will even venture to go so far as to suppose that the 

 average of the human race might be improved by 

 eliminating a few of the extreme disorders, how- 

 ever they may have arisen. In fact, this is attempted 

 at present on a somewhat extensive scale by the seg- 

 regation into asylums of the insane and feeble- 

 minded. I should hesitate to recommend the incar- 

 ceration of all their relatives if the character is 

 suspected of being recessive, or of their children if a 

 dominant. After all, these segregations are based on 

 humanitarian principles, or for our i^rotection rather 

 than for genetic reasons. How long and how exten- 

 sively this casual isolation of adults would have to 

 go on to produce any considerable decrease in defec- 

 tives, no informed person would, I should think, be 

 willing to state. 



Least of all should we feel any assiu-ance in de- 

 ciding genetic superiorit}^ or inferiority as applied 

 to whole races, bv which is meant not races in a 

 biological sense but social or political groups bound 

 together by physical conditions, by religious senti- 

 ments, or by political organizations. The latter have 

 their roots in the past and are acquired by each new 



