996 



SCIENCE. 



[N. S. Vol. XIV. No. 365. 



CURRENT QUESTIONS IN ANTHROPOLOGY* 

 No idea is more firmly fixed in the mind 

 of the average man than that of monogene- 

 sis— t. 6., the idea that all mankind sprang 

 from a single pair, and hence came up in a 

 single center. Nor is the prevalence of the 

 idea surprising ; engendered by the associa- 

 tions of family life, fostered by honorable 

 regard for worthy ancestors, and nourished 

 by tradition, it grows into a natural intui- 

 tion ; and when intensified by the teachings 

 of biology (whence most modern thinkers 

 derive early lessons), it readily matures in 

 a postulate so simple and so strong that 

 few anthropologists take the trouble to ques- 

 tion its validity. Yet once the question is 

 raised, the postulate is seen to be gratui- 

 tous ; in the present state of knowledge it 

 may not be either afiirmed or denied with 

 confidence ; but it must be recognized that 

 the intuitive idea of monogenesis is not 

 supported by a single observation in the 

 domain of anthropology, and is opposed by 

 the great body of observations on human 

 development. The first corollary of the 

 monogenetic postulate is that mankind dif- 

 ferentiate— -that they differentiated in the 

 beginning, that they are differentiating now, 

 or that they differentiated at some inter- 

 mediate stage, one or all ; in any event, that 

 the course of human development is one of 

 progressive differentiation. Of course, if 

 the postulate were a direct inference or a 

 generalization, this mode of statement 

 would be reversed ; in that case it would 

 be necessary to say that certain observed 

 facts of differentiation lead to an inference 

 of differentiation in general, and point to a 

 law of monogenesis ; but it cannot be too 

 strongly emphasized that the notion of 

 monogenesis in the human realm does not 

 represent observation, generalization, in- 

 ference or other inductive procedure from 



* Abstract of address before Section H, Denver 

 Meeting, American Association for the Advancement 

 of Science. 



fact to interpretation — it is a pure assump- 

 tion, imported into anthropology from other 

 realms of thought, introduced as a full- 

 grown foundling, and ever at war with the 

 legitimate offspring of the science of man. 



The great fact attested by all observation 

 on human development, and susceptible of 

 verification in every province and people, is 

 that mankind arenotdifferentiating ineither 

 physical or psychical aspects, but are con- 

 verging, integrating, blending, unifying, both 

 as organisms and as superorganic groups. 

 The population of the world is steadily in- 

 creasing, but the number of races is not; 

 while the number of distinct peoples is pro- 

 gressively decreasing and the racial bound- 

 aries are slowly but surely melting away. 

 This present condition is in accord with the 

 past so far as history runs ; races have not 

 come up, tribes have not multiplied, but 

 distinct peoples have coalesced, dialects and 

 languages have blent into common tongues, 

 throughout the known world — indeed, the 

 processes of integration have been so char- 

 acteristic of human progress throughout the 

 historical period that it is now possible to 

 enounce, if not to establish, the proposition 

 that peoples are preeminent in proportion 

 to the complexity of their blood and culture. 

 These salient facts of the present and of the 

 recorded past fall naturally into a general- 

 ization of integral or convergent develop- 

 ment, which in turn points toward a hypothe- 

 sis of polygenesis. The major indications 

 are supported by minor ones too numerous 

 for easy counting ; and the burden of the 

 testimony is amply sufficient to compel the 

 open-minded anthropologist to tolerate the 

 polygenetic hypothesis, if not to accept it 

 as a working platform alternative with that 

 of the monogenesis so long yet so gratui- 

 tously assumed. 



Several students, like Keane in recent 

 publications, have, indeed, held that the 

 black, brown, yellow and white races can- 

 not have sprung from common parents; 



