UNIVERSITY OF VIRGINIA PUBLICATIONS 



BULLETIN OF THE PHILOSOPHICAL SOCIETY 



SCIENTIFIC SECTION 



Vol. I, No. 12, pp. 293-317 July, 1912 



STUDIES IN HUMAN HEREDITY. 



H. E. JORDAN. 



CONTENTS. 



1. In-troduction 293 



2. Lef t-handedness . ■ 294 



3. Pulmonary Tuberculosis 308 



4. Cancer 310 



5. Hermaphroditism 313 



6. Onyxis 313 



7. Nephritis , 315 



8. Melancholia 315 



9. Thumb-prints 316 



INTRODtrCTION. 



This paper is the outgrowth of several years' effort to collect further 

 data with reference to the inheritance of left-handedness. With respect 

 to left-handedness it represents simply a second contribution from an inves- 

 tigation still in progress. My chief object is to record here my results in 

 the form of pedigree charts, and to give a brief discussion of them in the 

 light of my earlier observations and conclusions, in an attempt to attain 

 to more definite knowledge concerning the causes underlying and the prin- 

 ciples governing hereditary left-handedness. Incidentally data have 

 aecmnulated relative to certain other human characteristics and pathologic 

 conditions, including pulmonary tuberculosis, cancer, hermaphroditism, 

 onyxis, nephritis, melancholia, and thumb-prints. No one of these by 

 itself would perhaps have much import. However, the consistent evidence 

 of the mass seems significant from the standpoint of human inheritance, 

 and its eugenic bearing. If pathologic conditions are determined even in 

 part bj^ hereditary constitutional bases, then methods looking to permanent 

 racial cure, i.e., complete eradication, must reckon more intelligently and 

 widely with the hereditary aspect of disease. 



293 



