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THE POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY 



THE PROGRESS OF SCIENCE 



THE ADD BESS OF THE P BE SI- 

 DENT OF THE BBITISH 

 ASSOCIATION FOB THE 

 ADVANCEMENT OF 

 SCIENCE 



The meeting of the British Associa- 

 tion for the Advancement of Science in 

 Canada, in South Africa and now in 

 Australia exhibits those national traits 

 which led to the founding and develop- 

 ment of these dominions, and year 

 after year the president of the associa- 

 tion represents the leadership in sci- 

 ence which the British races have so 

 continuously maintained since the time 

 of Roger Bacon. Recent advances in 

 biological science are scarcely parallel 

 in importance to the newer develop- 

 ments in physics, recounted before the 

 association by Dr. Lodge last year, but 

 the experimental and quantitative meth- 

 ods now being applied in genetics, as 

 clearly explained by Professor Conklin 

 in the present issue of this journal, are 

 a beginning from which much may be 

 expected. Professor William Bateson 

 has been a leader, perhaps the chief 

 leader, in this work, and his presiden- 

 tial address deserves attention both for 

 the advances which he recounts and for 

 the speculations in which he indulges. 



The address — which in this country 

 has been printed in full in Science — was 

 divided into two parts, or it may rather 

 be said that two addresses were made, 

 one at Melbourne and one at Sydney. 

 The first describes Mendelian genetics 

 with special reference to its evolution- 

 ary aspects and its destructive side, the 

 second is largely concerned with appli- 

 cations to man and to society. Pro- 

 fessor Bateson tells us that in biolog- 

 ical science we are just about where 

 Boyle was in the nineteenth century; 

 we can dispose of alchemy, but we can 

 not make more than a quasi-chemistry. 

 Still, he is pretty positive, not only in 



his destructive criticism, but also about 

 the wide implications of his quasi- 

 chemistry. 



If, as Professor Bateson tells us, 

 genetic research can only obtain new 

 varieties by crossing, and if new traits 

 can only be exhibited bv the loss of in- 

 hibiting factors, we are certainly put to 

 ignorance in regard to the entire proc- 

 ess of evolution. This is doubtless 

 where we have always been, for no biol- 

 ogist now supposes that natural selec- 

 tion can account for the origin of vari- 

 ations. Darwin did not, but assumed 

 variability to be a natural function of 

 organisms. Mendelism is supplying a 

 vast amount of new and exact knowl- 

 edge in regard to the results of crossing 

 and hybridization, but in so far as it 

 can not explain the origin of those vari- 

 ations which have led to new species 

 and organic evolution, it only exhibits 

 our failure in this direction. Pro- 

 fessor Bateson says: "We have to re- 

 verse our habitual modes of thought. 

 At first it m?" seem rank absurdity 

 that the primordial forms of proto- 

 plasm could have contained comnlexity 

 enough to produce the diverse types )f 

 life." But this is what the mechanical 

 theory of life presupposes, and how we 

 are helped by assuming, as Professor 

 Bateson does, that the differentiation 

 that gives rise to new species is due en- 

 tirely to the loss of factors rather than 

 to the addition of factors, it is difficult 

 to see. The proposition that we all 

 have the genius of Shakespeare and 

 Newton, but that they were able to ex- 

 hibit it owing to the loss of inhibiting 

 elements appears to be purely mytho- 

 logical. 



Professor Bateson and other Mendel- 

 ians are doubtless correct in regarding 

 the doctrine of natural selection and the 

 survival of the fittest as a kind of phil- 

 osophical truism, but it is not clear 



