president's address. SECTION Qi. 521 



.quotes Mr. Punnett to the effect that '• Permanent progress is a ques- 

 tion of breeding rather than of pedagogics ; a matter of gametes, not 

 •of training. As our knowledge of heredity clears and the mists of 

 superstition are dispelled, tliere gi-ows upon us with an ever-increasing 

 and relentless force the conviction that the creature is not made, but 

 boi'n."t Thus race, and reproduction from its best elements, are, 

 according to the students of eugenics, matters of even more transcend- 

 ing importance than formal education. If it be known that faculty 

 comes by birth rather than by education, it will naturally greatly 

 affect public policy and public opinion. 



Two remarks will confirm the sigiiificance of the ideals of the 

 advocates of practical eugenics. Professor Pearson points out that 

 25 per cent, of the married couples of Great Britain produce 50 per 

 cent, of the next generation, and that consequently much depends 

 upon the physical and psychical character of that 25 per cent. And 

 he states also that there"^ is no escape from the general result that 

 the ratio of defectives, including deaf and dumb, lunatics, epileptics, 

 paralytics, crippled and deformed, debilitated and infirm has increased 

 of late. 



It will be evident, on reflection, that we sliall do well in this 

 young country, where we have the British race transplanted, to watch 

 the evolution of the people in an appropriate manner, and a begin- 

 ning, it is hoped, will shortly be made by the systematic examination 

 of school children from an anthropometi-ic and hygienic point of view. 



EcoxoMic Statistics (B). 

 li. Productive Activities. — Turning now to the economic side of 

 our subject, it may be remarked that a sound estimate of the measure 

 <'f productive activity of any people is a desideratum of the first order 

 in this branch of statistics. For obvious reasons, this should be 

 measured, where possible, both in quantity and in value, since for the 

 resolution of certain questions the one element, say quantity, is of the 

 first order of importance, while for the resolution of other questions, 

 money value is the important element. To attain a suflficient precision 

 in statistics of this kind, in the pastoral, agricultural, or manufac- 

 turing industries, is, of course, no easy task, but is worthy of con- 

 siderable effort. 



15. Political Aspects of Produciive Activity. — The relative scale 

 ■of development of the pastoral, agi-icultural, and manufacturing 

 activity of any people and changes therein, using these terms in their 

 widest sense, must engage the attention of any statistician who 

 recognises the real nature of his function. And it is evident, there- 

 fore, that^the mode of occuj)ation of land, and changes in the mode 

 of occupation, should constitute part, of the complete data. 



Satisfactory statistics would embrace the following: or analogous 

 items in all industries, viz. : — 



(«) Numbers permanently and numbers partially occupied in 

 the industry grouped as to sex and age, with the total time 

 devoted thereto : 

 (b) Capital outlay involved (land, buildings, plant, machinery, 

 &c.); 



i Heredity, 1908, p. GO. 



