Eugenics and Genetics 
made clear by Muller, over a much longer period of time in 
very different circumstances. Consequently, we should not 
necessarily gO ON as we are. 
Are the methods for improvement which we have at our 
disposal effective? Now there are difficult technical questions 
here, but my point, which Huxley made rather strongly, is 
that we are likely to achieve a considerable improvement—not 
perhaps as fast as we could do by other methods or even as 
fast as may turn out to be necessary—by using a very primitive 
knowledge of genetics; that is, by simply taking the people with 
the qualities we like, and letting them have more children. 
Nobody is suggesting, at least it would be foolish if they did, 
that we should have enormous numbers of people all with one 
father; one should have a wide selection of donors and so get 
diversification. The difficulty I see concerns the techniques 
that are socially possible, in the present social context, and in 
the social context of the next twenty or thirty years—a context 
which will change and which to some extent our views may 
help to change. For example, psychological problems may 
arise in families with children who are not the children of the 
father. Whereas I reject utterly arguments about natural law, 
I am much concerned that evidence on the psychological 
problems in such families should be collected. We already have 
examples of families where the father is infertile and the 
mother has had a child by artificial insemination by a donor; 
I understand that the disturbance to family life is often not 
great in such cases. I agree entirely with Huxley that what is 
wanted here is some sort of limited programme to try and find 
the difficulties. Let us define our broad aims and then tackle 
the practical details. 
Medawar: J agree with a good deal of what Crick has just 
said, but I think we ought to be warned by the very diversity 
of opinion in this room. We all have a pretty good opinion of 
our own intellect and our worthiness to be sperm donors. But 
our opinions are extremely diverse, and my feeling at the 
moment is that human beings are simply not to be trusted to 
formulate long-term eugenic objectives—least of all Roman 
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