The answer to such criticism is first of all that racial inferiority and superiority are by no means self-evident truths. Secondly, the belief in race inequalities is founded in emotion and action and then justified by reasoning. That is, the belief is rationalized, not primarily inferred by pure reason. It may be true, but it is not proved true.
As to what is self-evident, there is nothing so misleading as direct observation. We see the sun move and the earth stand still. It is “self-evident” that the sun revolves around the earth. Yet after thousands of years the civilized portion of mankind finally came to believe that it was the earth that spun. Science had no perverse interest, no insidious motive, in advocating the Copernican instead of the Ptolemaic system; in fact, was driven to its new belief gradually and reluctantly. It was pre-scientific humanity, with its direct, homespun, every-day observation, which had really prejudged the matter, and which, because it had always assumed that the earth was flat and stationary, and because every idiot could see that it was so, long combated the idea that it could be otherwise.
As to opinions founded in emotion and subsequently rationalized, instead of being evolved by pure reason from evidence, it may suffice to quote from a famous book on herd instinct, as to the relation of mass opinion and science:
“When, therefore, we find ourselves entertaining an opinion about the basis of which there is a quality of feeling which tells us that to inquire into it would be absurd, obviously unnecessary, unprofitable, undesirable, bad form, or wicked, we may know that that opinion is a non-rational one, and probably, therefore, founded upon inadequate evidence.
“Opinions, on the other hand, which are acquired as the result of experience alone do not possess this quality of primary certitude. They are true in the sense of being verifiable, but they are unaccompanied by that profound feeling of truth which belief possesses, and, therefore, we have no sense of reluctance in admitting inquiry into them. That heavy bodies tend to fall to the earth and that fire burns fingers are truths verifiable and verified every day, but we do not hold them with impassioned certitude, and we do not resent or resist inquiry into their basis; whereas in such a question as that of the survival of death by human personality we hold the favorable or the adverse view with a quality of feeling entirely different, and of such a kind that inquiry into the matter is looked upon as disreputable by orthodox science and as wicked by orthodox religion. In relation to this subject, it may be remarked, we often see it very interestingly shown that the holders of two diametrically opposed opinions, one of which is certainly right, may both show by their attitude that the belief is held instinctively and non-rationally, as, for example, when an atheist and a Christian unite in repudiating inquiry into the existence of the soul.”
Take the attitude of the average Californian or Australian about the Mongolian; of the Texan about the Mexican; of the Southerner about the Negro; of the Westerner about the local tribes of Indians; of the Englishman about the Hindu—is not their feeling exactly described by the statement that inquiry into the possibility of racial equality would be “unnecessary,” “absurd,” or evilly motivated; and that their belief in race superiority rests on an “a priori synthesis of the most perfect sort,” and possesses “the quality of primary certitude”?
In short, the apparently theoretical beliefs held as to race capacity by people who are actually confronted by a race conflict or problem are by no means the outcome of impartial examination and verification, but are the result of the decisions taken and emotions experienced in the course of acts performed toward the other race. The beliefs rest ultimately on impulse and feeling; their reasoned support is a subsequent bolstering up. Of course, the fact that a belief springs from emotion does not render that belief untrue, but does leave it scientifically unproved, and calling for investigation.
These conclusions may vindicate inquiry into the relative capacity of races from the charge of being finespun, insidious, impractical, or immoral.
35. Plan of Inquiry
In approach to the problem, a consideration stands out. If the human races are identical in capacity, or if, though not absolutely alike, they average substantially the same in the sum total of their capacities, then such differences as they have shown in their history or show in their present condition must evidently be the result mainly of circumstances external to heredity. In that case, knowledge of the historical or environmental circumstances, and analysis of the latter, become all-important to understanding. On the other hand, if hereditary racial inequalities exist, one can expect that the historical or cultural influences, however great they may be, will nevertheless tend to have their origin in the hereditary factors and to reinforce them. In that case, differences between two groups would be due partly to underlying heredity and partly to overlying cultural forces tending on the whole in the same direction. Yet even in that case, before one could begin to estimate the strength of the true racial factors, the historical ones would have to be subtracted. Thus, in either event, the first crux of the problem lies in the recognition and stripping off of cultural, social, or environmental factors, so far as possible, from the complex mass of phenomena which living human groups present. In proportion as these social or acquired traits can be determined and discounted, the innate and truly racial ones will be isolated, and can then be examined, weighed, and compared. Such, at any rate, is a reasonable plan of procedure. We are looking for the inherent, ineradicable elements in a social animal that has everywhere built up around himself an environment—namely, his culture—in which he mentally lives and breathes. It is precisely because in the present inquiry we wish to get below the effects of culture that we must be ready to concern ourselves considerably with these effects, actual or possible.