Applied Eugenics Chaprter 2 Part 2 CHAPTER II! !MODIFICATION OF THE GERM-PLASM!
Changes in the
germ-cells along with changes in the body are not relevant to this discussion.
The mother's body, for example, is poisoned with alcohol, which is present in
large quantities in the blood and therefore might affect the germ-cells directly.
If the children subsequently born are consistently defective it is not an
inheritance of a body character but the result of a direct modification of the
!germ-plasm. The
inheritance of an acquired modification of the body can only be proved if some
particular change made in the parent is inherited as such by the child.
There is often a
failure to distinguish between the possible inheritance of a particular
modification, and the possible inheritance of indirect results of that
modification, or of changes correlated with it. This is a nice but crucial
point on which most popular writers are confused. Let us examine it through a
hypothetical case. A woman, not herself strong, bears a child that is weak. The
woman then goes in for athletics, in order better to fit herself for
motherhood; she
specialises on
tennis. After a few years she bears another child, which is much stronger and
better developed than the first. "Look," some one will say, "how
the mother has transmitted her acquirement to her offspring." We grant
that her improved general health will probably result in a child that is better
nourished than the first; but that is a very different thing from heredity. If,
however, the mother had played tennis until her right arm was over-developed,
and her spine bent; if
!these
characteristics were nowhere present in the ancestry and not seen in the first
child; but if the second child were born with a bent spine and a right arm of
exaggerated musculature, we would be willing to consider the case on the basis
of the inheritance of an acquired character.
Finally, data
are frequently presented, which cover only two generations--parent and child.
Indeed, almost all the data alleged to show the inheritance of acquired
characteristics are of this kind. They are of little or no value as evidence.
Cases covering a number of generations, where a cumulative change was visible,
would be of
!weight, but on
the rare occasions when they are forthcoming, they can be explained in some
other way more satisfactorily than by an appeal to the theory of Lamarck.[13]
If the evidence
currently offered to support a belief in the inheritance of acquired characters
is tested by the application of these "misunderstandings," it will at
once be found that most of it disappears; that it can be thrown out of court
without further formality. The Lamarckian doctrine is now held mainly by
persons who
have either
lacked training in the evaluation of evidence, or have never examined
critically the assumptions on which they proceed. Medical men and breeders of
plants or animals are to a large extent believers in Lamarckism, but the
evidence (if any) on which they rely is always susceptible of explanation in a
more reasonable way. It must not be forgotten that some of the ablest intellects
in the world have been assiduously engaged in getting at the truth in the case,
during the last half-century; and it is certainly worthy of consideration that
not in a single case has the transmission of an acquired body character ever
been proved
beyond dispute. Those who still hold a belief in it (and it is fair to say that
some men of real ability are among that number) too often do so, it is to be
feared, because it is necessary for the support
!of some
theoretical doctrine which they have formulated. Certainly there are few men
who can say that they have carefully examined the evidence in the case, and
accept Lamarckism because the evidence forces them to do so. It will be
interesting to review the various classes of alleged evidence, though we can cite
only a few cases from the great number available (most of them, however,
dealing with plants or lower animals).
!Nearly all the
evidence adduced can be put in one of these four classes:
Mutilations.
Diseases.
Results of use
or disuse.
!Physico-chemical
effects of environment.
!The case in
regard to mutilations is particularly clear cut and leaves little room for
doubt. The noses and ears of oriental women have been pierced for generations
without number, yet girls are still born with these parts entire. Circumcision
offers another test case. The evidence of laboratory experiments (amputation of
tails) shows no inheritance. It may be said without hesitation that mutilations
are not heritable, no matter how many generations undergo them.
!The
transmissibility of acquired diseases is a question involved in more of a haze
of ignorance and loose thinking. It is particularly frequent to see cases of
uterine infection offered as cases of the inheritance of acquired characters.
To use the word "heredity" in such a case is unjustified. Uterine
infection has no bearing whatever on the question.
Taking an
historical view, it seems fairly evident that if diseases were really
inherited, the race would have been extinct long ago. Of course there are
constitutional defects or abnormalities that are in the
germ-plasm and
are heritable: such is the peculiar inability of the
blood to
coagulate, which marks "bleeders" (sufferers from hemophilia, a
highly hereditary disease). And in many cases it is difficult to
!distinguish
between a real germinal condition of this sort, and an acquired disease.
While there is
most decidedly such a thing as the
inheritance of a
tendency to or lack of resistance to a disease, it is
not the result
of incidence of the disease on the parent. It is possible to inherit a tendency
to headaches or to chronic alcoholism; and it is possible to inherit a lack of
resistance to common diseases such as
malaria,
small-pox or measles; but actually to inherit a zymotic disease as an inherent
genetic trait, is impossible,--is, in fact, a
!contradiction
of terms.
!When we come to
the effects of use and disuse, we reach a much debated ground, and one
complicated by the injection of a great deal of biological theorising, as well
as the presence of the usual large amount of faulty observation and inference.
It will be
admitted by every one that a part of the body which is much used tends to
increase in size, or strength, and similarly that a part which is not used
tends to atrophy. It is further found that such changes are progressive in the
race, in many cases. Man's brain has steadily increased in size, as he used it
more and more; on the other hand, his canine teeth have grown smaller. Can this
be regarded as the
inheritance of a
long continued process of use and disuse? Progressive changes can be
satisfactorily accounted for by natural selection; retrogressive changes
!are susceptible
of explanation along similar lines. When an organ is no longer necessary, as
the hind legs of a whale, for instance, natural selection no longer keeps it at
the point of perfection.
The situation
remains the same, when purely mental processes, such as instincts, are
considered. Habit often repeated becomes instinctive, it is said; and then the
instinct thus formed by the individual is passed
on to his
descendants and becomes in the end a racial instinct. Most psychologists have
now abandoned this view, which receives no support from investigation. Such
prevalence as it still retains seems to be
!largely due to
a confusion of thought brought about by the use of the word
"instinctive" in two different senses,--first literally and then
figuratively.
A persistent
attempt has been made in America during recent years, by
!C. L. Redfield,
a Chicago engineer, to rehabilitate the theory of the inheritance of the
effects of use and disuse. He has presented it in a way that, to one ignorant
of biology, appears very exact and plausible; but his evidence is defective and
his interpretation of his evidence fallacious. Because of the widespread
publicity, Mr. Redfield's work has received, we discuss it further in Appendix
B.
!Since the
importance of hormones (internal secretions) in the body became known, it has
often been suggested that their action may furnish the clue to some sort of an
inheritance of modifications. The hormone might conceivably modify the
germ-plasm but if so, it would more likely be in some wholly different way.
!In general, we
may confidently say that there is neither theoretical necessity nor adequate
experimental proof for belief that the results of use and disuse are inherited.
When we come to
consider whether the effects of the environment are inherited, we attack a
stronghold of sociologists and historians.
Herbert Spencer
thought one of the strongest pieces of evidence in this category was to be
found in the assimilation of foreigners in the United States. "The
descendants of the immigrant Irish," he pointed out, "lose their
Celtic aspect and become Americanised.... To say that 'spontaneous variation,'
increased by natural selection, can have produced this
effect, is going
too far." Unfortunately for Mr. Spencer, he was basing his conclusions on
guesswork. It is only within the last few months that the first trustworthy
evidence on the point has appeared, in the careful
measurements of
Hrdlicka who has demonstrated that Spencer was quite wrong in his statement. As
a fact, the original traits persist with
!almost
incredible fidelity. (Appendix C.)
In 1911, Franz
Boas of Columbia University published measurements of the head form of children
of immigrants[14] which purported to show that American conditions caused in
some mysterious manner a change in the shape of the head. This conclusion in
itself would have been striking enough, but was made more startling when he
announced that the change worked both ways: "The East European Hebrew, who
has a very round head, becomes more long-headed; the south Italian, who in
Italy has an exceedingly long head, becomes more short-headed"; and
moreover this potent influence was alleged to be a subtle one "which does
not affect
the young child
born abroad and growing up in American environment, but which makes itself felt
among the children born in America, even a short time after the arrival of the
parents in this country." Boas' work was naturally pleasing to
sociologists who believe in the reality of the
"melting-pot,"
and has obtained widespread acceptance in popular literature. It has obtained
little acceptance among his
!fellow-anthropologists,
some of whom allege that it is unsound because of the faulty methods by which
the measurements were made and the incorrect standards used for comparison.
The many
instances quoted by historians, where races have changed after immigration, are
to be explained in most cases by natural selection
!under new
conditions, or by interbreeding with the natives, and not as the direct result
of climate. Ellsworth Huntington, the most recent and careful student of the
effect of climate on man,[15] finds that climate has a great deal of influence
on man's energy, but as far as inherited traits in general are concerned, he is
constantly led to remark how little heredity is capable of being changed.
Most members of
the white race have little toes that are partly atrophied, and considerably
deformed. In many cases one of the joints has undergone ankylosis--that is, the
bones have coalesced. It is confidently alleged that this is due to the
inheritance of the effects
!of wearing
tight shoes through many centuries. When it is found that the prehistoric Egyptians,
who knew not tight shoes, suffered from the same defect in a similar degree,
one's confidence in this kind of evidence is much diminished.
The
retrogression of the little toe in man is probably to be explained
like the
degeneration of the hind leg of the whale, as a result of the excess of
deteriorating variations which, when not eliminated by natural selection, lead
to atrophy. Since man began to limit the use of his feet
!to walking on
the ground, the little toe has had much less value to him.
!Breeders are
generally of the opinion that good care and feed bestowed on their stock
produce results in succeeding generations. This is in a way true, but it is due
merely to the fact that the offspring get better nourishment and therefore a
better start in life. The changes in breeds, the increase in milk yield, and
similar facts, often explained as due to inheritance of acquired characters,
are better explained as the results of selection, sometimes conscious,
sometimes quite unconscious.
!In short, no
matter what evidence we examine, we must conclude that inheritance of acquired
bodily characters is not a subject that need be reckoned with, in applied
eugenics.
!On the other
hand, there is a possible indirect influence of modifications, which may have
real importance in man. If the individual is modified in a certain way, in a
number of generations, even though such a modification is not transmitted to
his descendants, yet its continued existence may make possible, the survival of
some germinal variation bearing in the same direction, which without the
protecting influence of the pre-existing modification, would have been swamped
or destroyed.
Finally, it
should be borne in mind that even if physical and mental characters acquired
during a man's lifetime are not transmitted, yet there is a sort of
transmission of acquired characters which has been of immense importance to the
evolution of the race. This is the so-called "inheritance" of the
environment; the passing on from one generation to the next of the achievements
of the race, its accumulated social experience; its civilisation, in short. It
is doubtful whether any
!useful end is
gained by speaking of this continuance of the environment as
"heredity;" it certainly tends to confuse many people who are not
used to thinking in biological terms. Tradition is the preferable term.
There is much to
be said in favour of E. B. Poulton's
!definition,--"Civilisation
in general is the sum of those contrivances which enable human beings to
advance independently of heredity." Whatever wisdom, material gain, or
language is acquired by one generation may be passed on to the next. As far as
the environment is concerned, one generation stands on the shoulders of its
predecessor. It might simplify the task of eugenics if the same could be said
of biological heredity. But it can not. Each generation must "start from
scratch."
In August
Weismann's words, the development of a function in offspring begins at the
point where it began in his parents, not at the point
where it ended
in them. Biological improvement of the race (and such improvement greatly
fosters all other kinds) must be made through a selective birth-rate. There is
no short-cut by way of euthenics, merely.
!
We must now
consider whether there is any direct way of impairing good
!heredity. It is
currently believed that there are certain substances, popularly known as
"racial-poisons," which are capable of affecting the germ-plasm
adversely and permanently in spite of its isolation and protection. For example,
the literature of alcoholism, and much of the literature of eugenics, abounds
with statements to the effect that alcohol originates degeneracy in the human
race.
!The proof or
disproof of this proposition must depend in the last analysis on direct observation
and carefully controlled experiments. As the latter cannot be made feasibly on
man, a number of students have taken up the problem by using small animals
which are easily handled in laboratories. Many of these experiments are so
imperfect in method that, when carefully examined, they are found to possess
little or no value as evidence on the point here discussed.
Hodge, Mairet
and Combemale, for example, have published data which convinced them that the
germ-plasm of dogs was injured by the administration of alcohol. The test was
the quality of offspring
!directly
produced by the intoxicated animals under experiment. But the number of dogs
used was too small to be conclusive, and there was no "control":
hence these experiments carry little weight.
Ovize, Fêrê and Stockard have shown that the effect of
alcohol on hen's eggs is to produce malformed embryos. This, however, is a case
of influencing the development of the individual, rather than the
!germ-plasm.
Evidence is abundant that individual development can be harmed by alcohol, but
the experiments with eggs are not to the point of our present purpose.
At the
University of Wisconsin, Leon J. Cole has been treating male rabbits with
alcohol and reports that "what appear to be decisive results have already
been obtained. In the case of alcoholic poisoning of the male the most marked
result has been a lessening of his efficiency as a sire, the alcohol apparently
having had some effect on
!the vitality of
his spermatozoa." His experiment is properly planned and carried out, but
so far as results have been made public, they do not appear to afford
conclusive evidence that alcohol originates degeneracy in offspring.
The
long-continued and carefully conducted experiment of Charles R. Stockard at the
Cornell Medical College is most widely quoted in this connection. He works with
guinea-pigs. The animals are intoxicated daily, six days in the week, by
inhaling the fumes of alcohol to the point where they show evident signs of its
influence; their condition
may thus be
compared to that of the toper who never gets "dead drunk" but is
never entirely sober. Treatment of this sort for a period as long as three
years produces no apparent bad effect on the individuals; they
continue to grow
and become fat and vigorous, taking plenty of food and behaving in a normal
manner in every particular. Some of them have been killed from time to time,
and all the tissues, including the
!reproductive
glands, have been found perfectly normal. "The treated animals are, therefore,
little changed or injured so far as their behaviour and structure goes.
Nevertheless, the effects of the treatment are most decidedly indicated by the
type of offspring to which they give rise, whether they are mated together or
with normal individuals."
Before the
treatment is begun, every individual is mated at least once, to demonstrate its
possibility of giving rise to sound offspring. The crucial test of the
influence of alcohol on the germ-cells is, of
!course, the
mating of a previously alcoholized male with a normal, untreated female, in a
normal environment.
When the
experiment was last reported,[16] it had covered five years and four
generations. The records of 682 offspring produced by 571 matings were
tabulated, 164 matings of alcoholized animals, in which either the father,
mother, or both were alcoholic, gave 64, or almost 40%, negative results or
early abortions, while only 25% of the control matings failed
to give
full-term litters. Of the 100 full-term litters from alcoholic parents 18%
contained stillborn young and only 50% of all the matings resulted in living
litters, while 47% of the individuals in the litters
!of living young
died soon after birth. In contrast to this record 73% of the 90 control matings
gave living litters and 84% of the young in these litters survived as normal,
healthy animals.
We do not
minimise the value of this experiment, when we say that too much weight has
been popularly placed on its results. Compare it with the experiment with fowls
at the University of Maine, which Raymond Pearl reports.[17] He treated 19
fowls with alcohol, little effect on
the general
health being shown, and none on egg production. From their eggs 234 chicks were
produced; the average percentage of fertility of
the eggs was diminished
but the average percentage of hatch-ability of fertile eggs was increased. The
infant mortality of these chicks was
smaller than
normal, the chicks were heavier when hatched and grew more rapidly than normal
afterwards. No deformities were found. "Out of 12 different characters for
which we have exact quantitative data, the offspring of treated parents taken
as a group are superior to the
!offspring of
untreated parents in 8 characters," in two characters they are inferior
and in the remaining two there is no discernible difference. At this stage Dr.
Pearl's experiment is admittedly too small, but he is continuing it. As far as
reported, it confirms the work of Professor Nice, above mentioned, and shows
that what is true for guinea pigs may not be true for other animals, and that
the amount of dosage probably also makes a difference. Dr. Pearl explains his
results by the hypothesis that the alcohol eliminated the weaker germs in the
parents, and allowed only the stronger germs to be used for reproduction.
Despite the
unsatisfactory nature of much of the alleged evidence, we must conclude that
alcohol, when given in large enough doses, may sometimes affect the germ-plasm
of some lower animals in such a way as to deteriorate the quality of their
offspring. This effect is probably
an
"induction," which does not produce a permanent change in the bases
of heredity, but
will wear away in a generation or two of good surroundings. It must be
remembered that although the second-generation treated males of Dr. Stockard's
experiment produced defective offspring when mated with females from similarly
treated stock, they produced normal offspring when mated with normal females.
The significance of
this fact has
been too little emphasised in writings on "racial
poisons."
If a normal mate will counteract the influence of a "poisoned" one,
it is obvious that the probabilities of danger to any race from
!this source are
much decreased, while if only a small part of the race is affected, and mates
at random, the racial damage might be so small that it could hardly be
detected.
!There are
several possible explanations of the fact that injury is found in some
experiments but not in others. It may be, as Dr. Pearl thinks, that only weak
germs are killed by moderate treatment, and the strong ones are uninjured. And
it is probable (this applies more particularly to man) that the body can take
care of a certain amount of alcohol without receiving any injury therefrom; it
is only when the dosage passes the "danger point" that the
possibility of injury appears.
Alcohol has been
in use in parts of the world for many centuries; it was common in the Orient
before the beginning of historical knowledge. Now if its use by man impairs the
germ-plasm, then it seems obvious that the child of one who uses alcohol to a
degree sufficient to impair his
germ-plasm will
tend to be born inferior to his parent. If that child himself is alcoholic, his
own offspring will suffer still more, since
they must carry
the burden of two generations of impairment. Continuing this line of reasoning
over a number of generations, in a race where alcohol is freely used by most of
the population, one seems unable to escape from the conclusion that the effects
of this racial poison, if it
!be such, must
necessarily be cumulative. The damage done to the race must increase in each
generation. If the deterioration of the race could be measured, it might even
be found to grow in a series of figures representing arithmetical progression.
!It seems
impossible, with such a state of affairs, that a race in which alcohol was
widely used for a long period of time, could avoid extinction. At any rate, the
races which have used alcohol longest ought to show great degeneracy--unless
there be some regenerative process at work constantly counteracting this
cumulative effect of the racial poison in impairing the germ-plasm.
Such a
proposition at once demands an appeal to history. What is found in examination
of the races that have used alcohol the longest? Have
!they undergone
a progressive physical degeneracy, as should be expected?
By no means. In
this particular respect they seem to have become stronger rather than weaker,
as time went on; that is, they have been less and less injured by alcohol in
each century, as far as can be told.
Examination of
the history of nations which are now comparatively sober, although having
access to unlimited quantities of alcohol, shows that at an earlier period in
their history, they were notoriously drunken; and
the sobriety of
a race seems to be proportioned to the length of time in which it has had
experience of alcohol. The Mediterranean peoples, who have had abundance of it
from the earliest period recorded, are now relatively temperate. One rarely
sees a drunkard among them, although many individuals in them would never think
of drinking water or any other non-alcoholic beverage. In the northern nations,
where the experience of alcohol has been less prolonged, there is still a good
!deal of
drunkenness, although not so much as formerly. But among nations to whom strong
alcohol has only recently been made available--the American Indian, for
instance, or the Eskimo--drunkenness is frequent wherever the protecting arm of
government does not interfere.
!What bearing
does this have on the theory of racial poisons?
!Surely a
consideration of the principle of natural selection will make it clear that
alcohol is acting as an instrument of racial purification through the
elimination of weak stocks. It is a drastic sort of purification, which one can
hardly view with complacency; but the effect, nevertheless, seems clear cut.
!To demonstrate
the action of natural selection, we must first demonstrate the existence of
variations on which it can act. This is not difficult in the character under consideration--namely,
the greater or less capacity of individuals to be attracted by alcohol, to an
injurious degree.
As G. Archdall
Reid has pointed out,[18] men drink for at least three different reasons: (1)
to satisfy thirst. This leads to the use of a
!light wine or a
malt liquor. (2) To gratify the palate. This again usually results in the use
of drinks of low alcohol content, in which the flavor is the main
consideration. (3) Finally, men drink "to induce those peculiar feelings,
those peculiar frames of mind" caused by alcohol.
Although the
three motives may and often do coexist in the same individual, or may animate
him at different periods of life, the fact remains that they are quite
distinct. Thirst and taste do not lead to excessive drinking; and there is good
evidence that the degree of concentration and the dosage are important factors
in the amount of harm alcohol may do to the individual. The concern of
evolutionists,
!therefore, is
with the man who is so constituted that the mental effects of alcohol acting
directly on the brain are pleasing, and we must show that there is a congenital
variability in this mental quality, among individuals.
Surely an appeal
to personal experience will leave little room for doubt on that point. The
alcohol question is so hedged about with moral and ethical issues that those
who never get drunk, or who perhaps never even "take a drink," are
likely to ascribe that line of conduct to superior intelligence and great
self-control. As a fact, a dispassionate analysis
of the case will
show that why many such do not use alcoholic beverages to excess is because
intoxication has no charm for them. He is so
!constituted
that the action of alcohol on the brain is distasteful rather than pleasing to
him. In other cases it is variation in controlling satisfaction of immediate
pleasures for later greater good.
Some of the real
inebriates have a strong will and a real desire to be sober, but have a
different mental make-up, vividly described by William James:[19] "The
craving for drink in real dipsomaniacs, or for opium and chloral in those
subjugated, is of a strength of which normal persons
!can have no
conception. 'Were a keg of rum in one corner of the room, and were a cannon
constantly discharging balls between me and it, I could not refrain from
passing before that cannon in order to get that rum. If a bottle of brandy
stood on one hand, and the pit of hell yawned on the other, and I were
convinced I should be pushed in as surely as I took one glass, I could not refrain.'
Such statements abound in dipsomaniacs' mouths." Between this extreme, and
the other of the man who is sickened by a single glass of beer, there are all
intermediates.
Now, given an
abundant and accessible supply of alcohol to a race, what happens? Those who
are not tempted or have adequate control, do not drink to excess; those who are
so constituted as to crave the effects of alcohol (once they have experienced
them), and who lack the ability to deny themselves the immediate pleasure for
the sake of a future gain, seek to renew these pleasures of intoxication at
every opportunity; and the well attested result is that they are likely to
drink themselves to
!a premature
death.
Although it is a
fact that the birth-rate in drunkard's families may be and often is larger than
that of the general population,[20] it is none the less a fact that many of the
worst drunkards leave no or few offspring. They die of their own excesses at an
early age; or their conduct makes them unattractive as mates; or they give so
little care to their children that the latter die from neglect, exposure or
accident.
As these
drunkards would tend to hand down their own inborn peculiarity, or weakness for
alcohol, to their children, it must be obvious that
their death
results in a smaller proportion of such persons in the next generation. In
other words, natural selection is at work again here, with alcohol as its
agent. By killing off the worst drunkards in each generation, nature provides
that the following generation shall contain fewer people who lack the power to
resist the attraction of the effect
of alcohol, or
who have a tendency to use it to such an extent as to
injure their
minds and bodies. And it must be obvious that the speed and efficacy of this
ruthless temperance reform movement are proportionate to the abundance and
accessibility of the supply of alcohol. Where the supply is ample and
available, there is certain to be a relatively high death-rate among those who
find it too attractive, and the average of
!the race therefore
is certain to become stronger in this respect with each generation. Such a
conclusion can be abundantly justified by an appeal to the history of the
Teutonic nations, the nations around the Mediterranean, the Jews, or any race
which has been submitted to the test.
There seems
hardly room for dispute on the reality of this phase of
natural
selection. But there is another way in which the process of strengthening the
race against the attraction and effect of alcohol may be going on at the same
time. If the drug does actually injure the germ-plasm, and set up a
deterioration, it is obvious that natural
selection is
given another point at which to work. The more deteriorated would be eliminated
in each generation in competition with the less deteriorated or normal; and the
process of racial purification would then go on the more rapidly. The fact that
races long submitted to the action of alcohol have become relatively resistant
to it, therefore,
!does not in
itself answer the question of whether alcohol injures the human germ-plasm.
Much more
observation and measurement must be made before a generalisation can be safely
drawn, as to whether alcohol is or is not a racial poison, in the sense in
which that expression is used by eugenists. It has been shown that the evidence
which is commonly
!believed to
prove beyond doubt that alcohol does injure the germ-plasm, is mostly
worthless. But it must not be thought that the authors intend to deny that
alcohol is a racial poison, where the dosage is very heavy and continuous. If
we have no good evidence that it is, we equally lack evidence on the other
side. We wish only to suggest caution against making rash generalisations on
the subject which lack supporting evidence and therefore are a weak basis for
propaganda.
So far as
immediate action is concerned, eugenics must proceed on the basis that there is
no proof that alcohol as ordinarily consumed will injure the human germ-plasm.
To say this is not in any way to minify the evil results which alcohol often has
on the individual, or the disastrous consequences to his offspring,
euthenically. But nothing is to be gained by making an assumption of
"racial poisoning," and acting
on that
assumption, without evidence that it is true; and the temperance movement would
command more respect from genetics if it ceased to allege proof that alcohol
has a directly injurious effect on the race, by
!poisoning the
human germ-plasm, when no adequate proof exists.
How, then, can
one account for the immense bulk of cases, some of which come within everyone's
range of vision, where alcoholism in the parent
is associated
with defect in the offspring? By a process of exclusion,
we are driven to
the explanation already indicated: that alcoholism may be a symptom, rather
than a cause, of degeneracy. Some drunkards are drunkards, because they come of
a stock that is, in a way, mentally defective; physical defects are frequently
correlated in such stocks; naturally the children inherit part or all of the
parental defects including, very likely, alcoholism; but the parent's
alcoholism, we repeat, must not be considered the cause of the child's defect.
The
!child would
have been defective in the same way, regardless of the parent's beverage.
It follows,
then, as a practical consequence for eugenics, that in the
light of present
knowledge any campaign against alcoholic liquors would be better based on the
very adequate ground of physiology and economics, than on genetics. From the
narrowest point of view of genetics, the way
to solve the
liquor problem would be, not to eliminate drink, but to eliminate the drinker:
to prevent the reproduction of the degenerate stocks and the tainted strains
that contribute most of the chronic alcoholics. We do not mean to advocate this
as the only proper basis for
the temperance
campaign, because the physiological and economic aspects are of sufficient
importance to keep up the campaign at twice the
present
intensity.[23] But it is desirable to have the eugenic aspect of the matter
clearly understood, and to point out that in checking the production of
defectives in the United States, eugenics will do its share, and a big share,
toward the solution of the drink problem, which
!is at the same
time being attacked along other and equally praiseworthy lines by other people.
!The germ-plasm
is so carefully isolated and guarded that it is almost impossible to injure it,
except by treatment so severe as to kill it altogether; and the degeneracy with
which eugenists are called on to deal is a degeneracy which is running along
from generation to generation and which, when once stopped by the cessation of
reproduction, is in little danger of being originated anew through some racial
poison.
!Through these
facts, the problem of race betterment is not only immensely simplified, but it
is clearly shown to be more a matter for treatment by the biologist, acting
through eugenics, than for the optimistic improver of the environment.
There is another
way in which it is widely believed that some such result as a direct influence
of the germ-plasm can be produced: that is through the imaginary process known
as maternal impression, prenatal influence, etc. Belief in maternal impressions
is no novelty. In the
!book of
Genesis[24] Jacob is described as making use of it to get the better of his
tricky father-in-law. Some animal breeders still profess faith in it as a part
of their methods of breeding: if they want a black calf, for instance, they
will keep a white cow in a black stall, and express perfect confidence that her
offspring will resemble midnight darkness. It is easy to see that this method,
if it "works," would be a potent instrument for eugenics. And it is
being recommended for that reason. Says a recent writer, who professes on the
cover of her book to give a "complete and intelligent summary of all the
principles of eugenics":
"Too much
emphasis can not be placed upon the necessity of young people making the proper
choice of mates in marriage; yet if the production of superior children were
dependent upon that one factor, the outlook would be most discouraging to
prospective fathers and mothers, for weak traits of character are to be found
in all. But when young people learn that by
a conscious
endeavour to train themselves, they are thereby training their unborn children,
they can feel that there is some hope and joy in parentage; that it is
something to which they can look forward with delight and even rapture; then
they will be inspired to work hard to attain the best and highest that there is
in them, leading the lives
that will not
only be a blessing to themselves, but to their succeeding
!generation."
!The author of
this quotation has no difficulty in finding supporters. Many physicians and
surgeons, who are supposed to be trained in scientific methods of thought, will
indorse what she says.
!Is there, or is
there not, a short cut to race betterment? Everyone interested in the welfare
of the race must feel the necessity of getting at the truth in the case; and
the truth can be found only by rigorously scientific thought.
!Let us turn to
the observed facts. This sample is taken from the health department of a
popular magazine, quite recently issued:
"Since
birth my body has been covered with scales strikingly resembling the surface of
a fish. My parents and I have expended considerable money on remedies and
specialists without deriving any permanent benefit. I bathe my entire body with
hot water daily, using the best quality of
!soap. The
scales fall off continually. My brother, who is younger than myself, is afflicted
with the same trouble, but in a lesser degree. My sister, the third member of
the family, has been troubled only on the knees and abdomen. My mother has
always been quite nervous and susceptible to any unusual mental impression. She
believes that she marked me by craving fish, and preferring to clean them
herself. During the prenatal life of my brother, she worried much lest she
might mark him in the same way. In the case of my sister she tried to control
her mind."[25]
Another is taken
from a little publication which is devoted to eugenics.[26] As a "horrible
example" the editor gives the case of Jesse Pomeroy, a murderer whom older
readers will remember. His father, it appears, worked in a meat market. Before
the birth of Jesse, his mother went daily to the shop to carry a luncheon to
her husband, and her eyes naturally fell upon the bloody carcases hung about
the walls.
!Inevitably, the
sight of such things would produce bloody thoughts in the mind of the unborn
child!
These are
extreme cases; we quote from a medieval medical writer another case that
carries the principle to its logical conclusion: A woman saw a Negro,--at that
time a rarity in Europe. She immediately had a sickening suspicion that her
child would be born with a black skin. To obviate the danger, she had a happy
inspiration--she hastened home and washed her body all over with warm water.
When the child appeared, his skin was found to be normally white--except
between the fingers and toes, where
!it was black.
His mother had failed to wash herself thoroughly in those places!
!Of course, few
of the cases now credited are as gross as this, but the principle involved
remains the same.
We will take a
hypothetical case of a common sort for the sake of clearness: the mother
receives a wound on the arm; when her child is
born it is found
to have a scar of some sort at about the same place on the corresponding arm.
Few mothers would fail to see the result of a
maternal
impression here. But how could this mark have been transmitted?
!This is not a
question of the transmission of acquired characters through the germ-plasm, or
anything of that sort, for the child was already formed when the mother was
injured. One is obliged, therefore, to believe that the injury was in some way
transmitted through the placenta, the only connection between the mother and
the unborn child; and that it was then reproduced in some way in the child.
!Here is a
situation which, examined in the cold light of reason, puts a heavy enough
strain on the credulity. Such an influence can reach the embryo only through
the blood of the mother. Is it conceivable to any rational human being, that a
scar, or what not, on the mother's body can be dissolved in her blood, pass
through the placenta into the child's circulation, and then gather itself
together into a definite scar on the infant's arm?
!There is just
as much reason to expect the child to grow to resemble the cow on whose milk it
is fed after birth, as to expect it to grow to resemble its mother, because of prenatal
influence, as the term is customarily used, for once development has begun, the
child draws nothing more than nourishment from its mother.
Of course we are
accustomed to the pious rejoinder that man must not expect to understand all
the mysteries of life; and to hear vague talk about the wonder of wireless
telegraphy. But wireless telegraphy is something very definite and
tangible--there is little mystery about it.
!Waves of a
given frequency are sent off, and caught by an instrument attuned to the same
frequency. How any rational person can support a belief in maternal impressions
by such an analogy, if he knows anything about anatomy and physiology, passes
comprehension.
!Now we are far
from declaring that a reason can be found for everything that happens. Science
does not refuse belief in an observed fact merely because it is unexplainable.
But let us examine this case of maternal impressions a little further. What can
be learned of the time element?
Immediately
arises the significant fact that most of the marks, deformities and other
effects which are credited to prenatal influence must on this hypothesis take
place at a comparatively late period in the antenatal life of the child. The
mother is frightened by a dog; the
!child is born
with a dog-face. If it be asked when her fright occurred, it is usually found
that it was not earlier than the third month, more likely somewhere near the
sixth.
But it ought to
be well known that the development of all the main parts of the body has been
completed at the end of the second month. At that time, the mother rarely does
more than suspect the coming of the child, and events which she believes to
"mark" the child, usually occur after the fourth or fifth month, when
the child is substantially formed, and
it is impossible
that many of the effects supposed to occur could
actually occur.
Indeed, it is now believed that most errors of development, such as lead to the
production of great physical defects, are due to some cause within the embryo
itself, and that most of them take place in the first three or four weeks, when
the mother is by no
!means likely to
influence the course of embryological development by her mental attitude toward
it, for the very good reason that she knows nothing about it.
Unless she is
immured or isolated from the world, nearly every expectant mother sees many
sights of the kind that, according to popular
tradition, cause
"marks." Why is it that results are so few? Why is it
!that women
doctors and nurses, who are constantly exposed to unpleasant sights, have
children that do not differ from those of other mothers?
Darwin, who knew
how to think scientifically, saw that this is the logical line of proof or
disproof. When Sir Joseph Hooker, the botanist and geologist who was his closest
friend, wrote of a supposed case of maternal impression, one of his kinswomen
having insisted that a mole which appeared on her child was the effect of
fright upon herself for having, before the birth of the child, blotted with
sepia a copy of Turner's Liber Studiorum that had been lent her with special
injunctions to be careful, Darwin[27] replied: "I should be very much
obliged, if at any future or leisure time you could tell me on what you ground
your doubtful belief in imagination of a mother affecting her offspring. I have
attended to the several statements scattered about,
!but do not
believe in more than accidental coincidences. W. Hunter told my father, then in
a lying-in hospital, that in many thousand cases he had asked the mother,
before her confinement, whether anything had affected her imagination, and
recorded the answers; and absolutely not one case came right, though, when the
child was anything remarkable, they afterwards made the cap to fit."
!Any doctor who
has handled many maternity cases can call to mind instances where every
condition was present to perfection, for the production of maternal impression,
on the time-honored lines. None occurred. Most mothers can, if they give the
matter careful consideration, duplicate this experience from their own. Why is
it that results are so rare?
!That Darwin
gave the true explanation of a great many of the alleged cases is perfectly
clear to us. When the child is born with any peculiar characteristic, the
mother hunts for some experience in the preceding months that might explain it.
If she succeeds in finding any experience of her own at all resembling in its
effects the effect which the infant shows, she considers she has proved
causation, has established a good case of prenatal influence.
!It is not
causation; it is coincidence.
If the
prospective mother plays or sings a great deal, with the idea of giving her
child a musical endowment, and the child actually turns out to have musical
talent, the mother at once recalls her yearning that
such might be
the case; her assiduous practice which she hoped would be of benefit to her
child. She immediately decides that it did benefit
!him, and she
becomes a convinced witness to the belief in prenatal culture. Has she not
herself demonstrated it?
She has not. But
if she would examine the child's heredity, she would probably find a taste for
music running in the germ-plasm. Her study and practice had not the slightest
effect on this hereditary disposition; it
!is equally
certain that the child would have been born with a taste for music if its
mother had devoted eight hours a day for nine months to cultivating thoughts of
hatred for the musical profession and repugnance for everything that possesses
rhythm or harmony.
!It necessarily
follows, then, that attempts to influence the inherent nature of the child,
physically or mentally, through "prenatal culture," are doomed to
disappointment. The child develops along the lines of the potentialities which
existed in the two germ-cells that united to become its origin. The course of
its development can not be changed in any specific way by any corresponding act
or attitude of its mother, good hygiene alone need be her concern.
!It must
necessarily follow that attempts to improve the race on a large scale, by the
general adoption of prenatal culture as an instrument of eugenics, are useless.
Indeed, the
logical implication of the teaching is the reverse of
!eugenic. It
would give a woman reason to think she might marry a man whose heredity was
most objectionable, and yet, by prenatal culture, save her children from paying
the inevitable penalty of this weak heritage. The world has long shuddered over
the future of the girl who marries a man to reform him; but think what it means
to the future of the race if a superior girl, armed with correspondence school
lessons in prenatal culture, marries a man to reform his children!
Those who
practice this doctrine are doomed to disillusion. The time they spend on
prenatal culture is not cultivating the child; it is merely perpetuating a
fallacy. Not only is their time thus spent
!wasted, but
worse, for they might have employed it in ways that really would have benefited
the child--in open-air exercise, for instance.
!To
recapitulate, the facts are:
!That there is,
before birth, no connection between mother and child, by which impressions on
the mother's mind or body could be transmitted to the child's mind or body.
That in most
cases the marks or defects whose origin is attributed
to maternal
impression, must necessarily have been complete long before the incident
occurred which the mother, after the child's birth,
!ascribes as the
cause.
That these
phenomena usually do not occur when they are, and by
!hypothesis
ought to be, expected. The explanations are found after the event, and that is
regarded as causation which is really coincidence.
Pre-natal care
as a euthenic measure is of course not only legitimate
but urgent. The
embryo derives its entire nourishment from the mother; and its development
depends wholly on its supply of nourishment.
Anything which
affects the supply of nourishment will affect the embryo in a general, not a
particular way. If the mother's mental and physical condition be good, the
supply of nourishment to the embryo is likely to be good, and development will
be normal. If, on the other hand, the mother is constantly harassed by fear or
hatred, her physical health
!will suffer,
she will be unable properly to nourish her developing offspring, and it may be
its poor physical condition when born, indicates this.
Further, if the
mother experiences a great mental or physical shock, it may so upset her health
that her child is not properly nourished, its development is arrested, mentally
as well as physically, and it is born defective. H. H. Goddard, for example,
tells[28] of a high-grade imbecile in the Training School at Vineland, N. J.
"Nancy belongs to a thoroughly normal, respectable family. There is
nothing to account for the condition unless one accepts the mother's theory.
While it sounds somewhat like the discarded theory of maternal impression, yet
it is not
impossible that
the fright and shock which the mother received may have interfered with the
nutrition of the unborn child and resulted in the mental defect. The story in
brief is as follows. Shortly before this
!child was born,
the mother was compelled to take care of a sister-in-law who was in a similar
condition and very ill with convulsions. Our child's mother was many times
frightened severely as her sister-in-law was quite out of her mind."
!It is easily
understandable that any event which makes such an impression on the mother as
to affect her health, might so disturb the normal functioning of her body that
her child would be badly nourished, or even poisoned. Such facts undoubtedly
form the basis on which the airy fabric of prenatal culture was reared by those
who lived before the days of scientific biology.
Thus, it is easy
enough to see the real explanation of such cases as
those mentioned
near the beginning of this discussion. The mothers who fret and rebel over
their maternity, she found, are likely to bear
!neurotic
children. It is obvious (1) that mothers who fret and rebel are quite likely
themselves to be neurotic in constitution, and the child naturally gets its
heredity from them: (2) that constant fretting and rebellion would so affect
the mother's health that her child would not be properly nourished.
When, however,
she goes on to draw the inference that "self-control, cheerfulness and
love ... will practically insure you a child normal in physique and
nerves," we are obliged to stop. We know that what she says is not true.
If the child's heredity is bad, neither self-control, cheerfulness, love, nor
anything else known to science, can make that
!heredity good.
At first
thought, one may wish it were otherwise. There is something inspiring in the
idea of a mother overcoming the effect of heredity by the sheer force of her
own will-power. But perhaps in the long run it is as well; for there are
advantages on the other side. It should be a satisfaction to mothers to know
that their children will not be marked or injured by untoward events in the
antenatal days; that if the
!child's heredity can not be changed for the better, neither can it be changed for the
worse.
The prenatal
culturists and maternal-impressionists are trying to place on her a
responsibility which she need not bear. Obviously, it is the mother who is most
nearly concerned with the bogy of maternal impressions, and it should make for
her peace of mind to know that it is nothing more than a bogy. It is important
for the expectant mother to keep herself in as nearly perfect condition as
possible, both physically
and mentally.
Her bodily mechanism will then run smoothly, and the child will get from her
blood the nourishment needed for its development.
!Beyond that
there is nothing the mother can do to influence the development of her child.
There is another
and somewhat similar fallacy which deserves a passing word, although it is of
more concern to the livestock breeder than to
the eugenist. It
is called telegony and is, briefly, this: that conception by a female results
in a definite modification of her
germ-plasm from
the influence of the male, and that this modification will be shown in the offspring
she may subsequently bear to a second male. The only case where it is often
invoked in the human race is in miscegenation. A white woman has been married
to a Negro, for instance, and has borne one or more mulatto offspring.
Subsequently, she mates with a white man; but her children by him, instead of
being pure white,
!it is alleged,
will be also mulattoes. The idea of telegony, the persistent influence of the
first mating, may be invoked to explain this discrepancy.
It is a pure
myth. There is no good evidence[29] to support it, and there is abundant
evidence to contradict it. Telegony is still believed by many animal breeders,
but it has no place in science. In such a case as the one quoted, the
explanation is undoubtedly that the supposed father is not the real one; and
this explanation will dispose of all
!other cases of
telegony which can not be explained, as in most instances they can be, by the
mixed ancestry of the offspring and the innate tendency of all living things to
vary.
Now to sum up this
long chapter. We started with a consideration of the germ-plasm, the physical
basis of life; pointing out that it is
continuous from
generation to generation, and potentially immortal; that it is carefully
isolated and guarded in the body, so that it is not
!likely to be
injured by any ordinary means.
One of the
logical results of this continuity of the germ-plasm is that
!modifications
of the body of the parent, or acquired characters, can hardly be transferred to
the germ-plasm and become a part of the inheritance. Further the experimental
evidence upholds this position, and the inheritance of acquired body characters
may be disregarded by eugenics, which is therefore obliged to concern itself
solely with the material already in existence in the germ-plasm, except as that
material may be changed by variation which can neither be predicted nor
controlled.
The evidence
that the germ-plasm can be permanently modified does not warrant the belief;
and such results, if they exist at all, are not
!large enough or
uniform enough to concern the eugenist.
Pre-natal
culture and telegony were found to be mere delusions. There is no justification
for hoping to influence the race for good through the action of any kind of
external influences; and there is not much danger of influencing it for ill
through these external influences. The
!situation must
be faced squarely then: if the race is to be improved, it must be by the use of
the material already in existence; by endeavour to change the birth-and
death-rates so as to alter the relative proportions of the amounts of good and
bad germ-plasm in the race. This is the only road by which the goal of eugenics
can be reached.
CALEB SALEEBY’S Parenthood & Race Culture: An Outline of Family Eugenics
