AS THE BIOLOGIST SEES IT 



possible; much more, they have seriously 

 hurt the repute of the really good idea it 

 stands for. To be well born is certainly an 

 excellent thing to achieve; anyone con- 

 templating being born would like to 

 arrange it. Racial well-being is certainly 

 an advantageous thing for a race; any 

 people would like to possess it. Well, 

 eugenics means these things, not surgi- 

 cal sterilization of men or women, state 

 controlled breeding of children, abolish- 

 ment of love, or any or all of these or the 

 other special exaggerations or ugly fancies 

 which have been made synonyms of 

 eugenics by humorists, scoffers, or cranks. / 

 Eugenics bases its claim as a subject V 

 for reasonable and sympathetic considera- 

 tion on two grounds: first, the acknowl- 

 edged power or influence of heredity for 

 good or ill in helping to determine hu- 

 man fate; and, second, the acknowledged 

 power which we have in education for 

 encouraging good and discouraging bad 

 human heredity. The great recent in- 

 crease in extent and precision of our 

 85 



