Cole: Biological Eugenics 



311 



of the possible combinations under the 

 conditions most favorable for bringing 

 them about: 



Certain conditions, such for example 

 as certain striking defects or abnor- 

 malities, may depend upon the presence 

 or absence of a single factor, and it 

 might be comparatively simple to deal 

 with such cases singly. But the diffi- 

 culty of dealing with any considerable 

 number, especially in the case of man 

 where conditions are very different from 

 those of animal or plant experimentation, 

 may be readily appreciated. It might 

 be possible by prohibiting by law 

 certain marriages and encouraging others 

 to breed a race of mankind free from the 

 diathesis toward a particular disease, let 

 us say; but think of the number of 

 diseases alone with which man has to 

 contend and consider again the above 

 table. And then tell me how soon 

 eugenics is going to produce an "ideal 

 race," made to order, as the news- 

 papers would have us believe is its aim. 



Such speculations may do for the 

 visionary who likes to speculate what 

 the world may be like a century or 

 twenty centuries hence ; but the practical 

 eugenist is merely trying to determine 

 how what knowledge we have gained to 

 the present may be turned to the best 

 advantage for race improvement as 

 distinguished from individual ameliora- 

 tion. At the present time it would 

 seem that we are in a position to apply 

 certain phases of restrictive eugenics 

 with comparative certainty of results, 

 such for example as the cutting off of 

 those definitely defective lines of ger- 

 minal protoplasm which are beyond 

 hope of hereditary improvement. 



POSSIBILITY OF SEGREGATION. 



As to the methods which shall be 

 •employed, it is coming, I think, to be 

 generally conceded that ]3ermanent seg- 

 regation, at least during the period of 

 reproductive capacity, is going to prove 

 the most feasible if not the most effective 

 of restrictive eugenic measures. But we 



must be certain of whom it is necessary 

 to segregate. The recent advance of 

 knowledge in this line has been con- 

 siderable, but it is only a beginning, and 

 I mtist say that it is due more to the 

 work of biologists than of physicians. 

 Experimental breeding of plants and 

 animals has supplied the keys which 

 have unlocked some of the puzzles of 

 human inheritance, but what we need 

 now are more facts, the facts which can 

 be gathered from the hospitals and 

 asylums, from vital statistics and from 

 the case records of practitic>ners. But 

 these facts must be gathered with a 

 fullness and accuracy, and with a view 

 to the purpose they are to serve, which 

 has not been customary in the past. It 

 is a deplorable fact that comparatively 

 few medical men have very clear ideas 

 of heredity, or indeed evince much in- 

 terest in the subject, and few realize 

 its importance. 



I have not had time in this discourse 

 to touch upon specific diseases, opera- 

 tions and charitable procedures, and to 

 discuss their relation to the question in 

 hand as I should like to have done. It 

 has no doubt occurred to many of you 

 to ask, however, suppose we grant the 

 necessity of restricting the reproduction 

 of the obviously unfit, what about 

 operations in other cases, the treatment 

 of endemic and epidemic diseases, and 

 the like? Is removing the appendix or 

 the tonsils or the turbinal bones going to 

 be to the race like the drug habit to 

 the individual — once begun, having to be 

 continued in ever-increasing doses." It 

 may be. It is possible that the popular 

 idea of the predicted "hairless, tooth- 

 less race" may not be so far from the 

 mark, or at least that this type shall 

 increase in numbers unless sentiment 

 against it becomes so strong as to be- 

 come a selective factor. I wish merely 

 to point out that the fiUing and crowning 

 of our teeth is not going to insure better 

 teeth for the next generation any more 

 than wearing a set of false ones would; 

 if selection is eliminated, the individuals 

 of the next generation will have to take 

 their chance of inheriting a better or a 

 worse dental battery than their parents. 

 My point is simply, that if the inheri- 

 tance of the factors concerned were 



