480 



SCIENCE 



[N. S. Vol. XXXIII. No. 848 



directly may cause movements in both the 

 other sets of organs. We have here as a 

 matter of fact a number of reflexes which 

 mutually reinforce one another. Suppose 

 that in the chick the sight-pecking response 

 and the taste-swallowing response are re- 

 lated as the feeding reflexes demonstrably 

 are in the crayfish; the second response 

 would thus tend to reinforce the first, and 

 if this tendency persisted we would have a 

 case of learning by experience. 



Animals in the course of their instinctive 

 responses encounter stimuli which bring 

 about other responses. These become asso- 

 ciated. According to the nature of the 

 nervous pathways involved, there may be 

 reinforcement of or interference with 

 the original reaction. Experience brings 

 about an extension of the range of adapta- 

 tions by the assimilation of congruent re- 

 actions and the elimination of acts whose 

 secondary consequences are in the nature 

 of antagonistic and thereby inhibitory re- 

 sponses. Such we may say, by way of 

 expressing a tentative view-point, is the 

 nature of primitive intelligence. 



But it will be seen that the capacity to 

 form new adaptations rests upon the pri- 

 mary adaptiveness of the instinctive reac- 

 tions. The power of formation of associa- 

 tions alone would never lead to improve- 

 ment. The adaptiveness of intelligence is 

 based upon the adaptiveness of instinct; it 

 may be said that intelligence is a means of 

 enabling an animal to live its life more 

 completely and successfully, but instinct 

 furnishes the fundamental springs of ac- 

 tion. Even complex creatures like our- 

 selves form no exception to this rule. 



S. J. Holmes 



Univeesitt of Wisconsin 



TSE GALTON CEAIB OF EUGENICS 

 We have noted that Sir Francis Galton, 

 F.E.S., who died on January 17, aged 88, had 



left his residuary estate to the University of 

 London for work in eugenics. This residuary 

 estate will amount to about £45,000. In his 

 will Sir Francis Galton describes the scope of 

 his new foundation as follows: 



I devise and bequeath all the residue of my 

 estate and effects, both real and personal, unto the 

 University of London for the establislunent and 

 endowment of a professorship at the said univer- 

 sity to be known as ' ' The Galton Professorship 

 of Eugenics, ' ' with a laboratory or office and 

 library attached thereto. And I declare that the 

 duty of the professor shall be to pursue the study 

 and further the knowledge of national eugenics — 

 that is, of the agencies under social control that 

 may improve or impair the racial faculties of 

 future generations physically and mentally. And 

 for this purpose I desire that the university shall, 

 out of the income of the above endowment, pro- 

 vide the salaries of the professor and of such 

 assistants as the senate may think necessary, and 

 that the professor shall do the following acts and 

 things, namely: 



1. Collect materials bearing on eugenics. 



2. Discuss such materials and draw conclusions. 



3. Form a central office to provide information, 

 under appropriate restrictions, to private individ- 

 uals and to public authorities concerning the laws 

 of inheritance in man, and to urge the conclusions 

 as to social conduct which follow from such laws. 



4. Extend the knowledge of eugenics by all or 

 any of the following means, namely: (a) pro- 

 fessorial instruction; (b) occasional publications; 

 (c) occasional public lectures; (d) experimental 

 or observational work which may throw light on 

 eugenic problems. 



He shall also submit from time to time reports 

 of the work done to the authorities of the said 

 university. 



I also declare that the said university shall be 

 at liberty to apply either the capital or income of 

 the said moneys for any of the purposes aforesaid, 

 but it is my hope that the university will see fit 

 to preserve the capital thereof wholly or almost 

 wholly intact, not encroaching materially upon it 

 for cost of bunding, fittings or library. Also that 

 the university wiU supply the laboratory or office 

 at such place as its senate shall from time to time 

 determine, but preferably in the first instance in 

 proximity to the Biometric Laboratory. I state 

 these hopes on the chance of their having a moral 

 effect upon the future decisions of the senate of 

 the university, but they are not intended to have 



