228 ANNUAL REPORT SMITHSONIAN INSTITUTION, 1940 



viduals and groups in the midst of competition. To see in advance the 

 remote consequences of contemplated action is an ability that ought to 

 be increasingly cultivated rather than scouted as a menace. 



There seems to be no good reason why a sound mind should not be 

 accompanied by a sound body. If the number of psychopathic in- 

 dividuals is increasing in this high-speed, technologic age, it is a 

 challenge to be met not by bemoaning the imminent collapse of civ- 

 ilization but by intelligent adjustment of habits and activities to the 

 new demands of the new times. 



Once the commitment is made to the belief that the cooperative way 

 of life offers the best chance for the future security of man as an 

 inhabitant of the earth, the need is greater for intelligence to be 

 used as a guide for good will, rather than for good will to be applied 

 as a brake on any possible increase in intelligence. 



The roots of self-centered individualism may be traced backward 

 for at least 600 million years in the record of geologic life develop- 

 ment, whereas our heritage of social consciousness dates from a time 

 only about 60 million years ago when gregarious instincts became 

 clearly evident among placental mammals. That trend is, however, 

 especially apparent in the group from which mankind has stemmed. 



Man is still in the stage of specific youth. His golden age, if 

 any, is in the future rather than in the past. Human nature is still 

 sufl5ciently plastic and pliable to permit considerable change, notably 

 in this important area of attitudes and relationships wherein the 

 increase of good will as a motive for action seems most likely to 

 result in beneficial adjustments to the new factors in the environment. 



In thus seeking a satisfactory coordination of intelligence and good 

 will, it becomes necessary for research scientists to give more thought 

 than has been customary in the past to the social consequences of 

 their work. They share with statesmen, politicians, educators, and 

 all molders of public opinion the responsibility for determining the 

 uses to which the new tools provided by scientific research are put. 

 As scientists, they should continue to seek truth regardless of its 

 consequences and to increase human efficiency in every possible way, 

 but as members of society, as individual representatives of a species 

 seeking future security as inhabitants of the earth, they must also 

 do their utmost to ensure wise use of knowledge and constructive 

 application of energy. 



There is a real difference between the so-called social sciences and 

 the natural and physical sciences that has an important bearing here. 

 It is not that there is anything unnatural about the social sciences. 

 Man is a part of nature, and the studj^ of human society is just as 

 truly natural science in the real sense of the term as any other study. 

 The difference arises from the peculiar factors and particular func- 



