The groundwork of eugenics / by Karl Pearson.

  • Pearson, Karl, 1857-1936.
Date:
1912
Catalogue details

Licence: Attribution-NonCommercial 4.0 International (CC BY-NC 4.0)

Credit: The groundwork of eugenics / by Karl Pearson. Source: Wellcome Collection.

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    24 THE GROUNDWORK OF EUGENICS rate—which led man in his younger days irresistibly along the path of progress. There are religious faiths which look upon pain as a divinely administered good—as a beneficial discipline. May not something of the same kind be realised by those who stand on the firm platform of evolutionary science in the fiftieth year of its life ì Death, not the random archer of mediaeval notion, but the skilful marksman whose aim is planned, has been in the past, and may perhaps long continue to be, the chief source of human progress as a whole. On the martyrdom of men is built the triumph of mankind. I have wandered somewhat from my point—the unstable character of human society owing to the selective death-rate —but I would impress upon you the fact that unless the eugenist realises the vastness of the forces at present at work moulding human life, he cannot hope to take definite action—an action based upon firm knowledge—when he comes to the criticism of present social tendencies. I The eugenist as far as lies in his power has to replace ^the selective death-rate by a selective birth-rate. The past /has depended for progress on Natural Selection, can the 1 future depend for progress on Reproductive Selection ? My aim to-day is to insist on the gigantic part these two forces play in the evolution of human communities. You may not unreasonably say that I have so far talked much about the selective death-rate but given you no proof that natural selection really plays a part in human develop¬ ment. I gave the proof many years ago as a modest reply to Lord Salisbury's famous Oxford address asserting that nobody had seen Natural Selection at work. Of course no biologist paid any attention to my proof at the time, and it remained the special knowledge of biometricians, until Professor Ploetz of Munich turned it up recently (1909) and reasserted its correctness.