Scientific a priori tests of fitness to propagate, such as may be developed by the aid of family records or medical and psychological examinations, will probably be found of increasing value in eliminating the definitely degenerate by segregation or sterilization. It is not probable, however, that they can ever meet the more general need of a competitive standard of biological competence.
There are two fundamental and possibly permanent reasons why we cannot select our hereditary types artificially: first, because we are not likely to agree as to just what types are desirable, and, second, because if we did agree there is no practicable method of ascertaining the individuals belonging to these types and controlling their propagation.
Selective breeding is a comparatively simple matter with domestic animals, where what we seek is a definite and easily ascertained trait like length or fineness of wool in sheep, weight in hogs or beef-cattle, speed or strength in horses, laying capacity in fowls, and so on. But in the case of man we do not know just what we want, and probably never shall. We should not dare to set up a standard of physical vigor, for fear of excluding psychical powers of more value; and the social and moral traits which we might desire to increase do not manifest themselves with certainty until rather late in life.
Moreover, it is clear that the desirable thing in human life is not one good type but many, a diversity of types corresponding to multifarious and unforeseeable functions. It is most unlikely that we shall ever assume to define these types in advance.
These difficulties seem so insuperable that it is hardly necessary to go on and show that, owing to the great share which environment has in producing desirable types of character, it is difficult to see how we could be sure what individuals lacked the requisite hereditary capacity. Galton’s view that success is a fair test has little following, and no other test is at hand. I conclude, then, that the sphere of a scientific eugenics, which shall deliberately select some types for propagation and reject others, should probably not extend much beyond the suppression of clearly marked kinds of degeneracy.
It would seem that we must rely for our standards mainly upon the actual test of social struggle, acting either through economic misery or through some kind of moral pressure, in the nature of custom or public opinion, which shall discourage from raising families those who do not “make good,” and require a greater fecundity from those who do.
In the past we have made use, unconsciously, of misery, which was rendered the more unjust and indiscriminate by the fact that those subject to it were held in a lower class, having little real opportunity to show their fitness for a higher condition. We seek to do away with this, not only because of the injustice and indiscrimination, but also because degradation impairs the whole state of society. At the same time we must admit the possibility that we may make a bad situation worse by abolishing the only selective agent we have.
Our chief reliance, apparently, must be upon substituting custom and social pressure for misery in restricting the propagation of those who cannot maintain their families at a normal standard of living. Experience seems to show that the voluntary check easily comes into operation along with the growth of intelligence and social ambition—so easily that it is already carried to excess by the well-to-do in most countries, and in at least one country—France—by the bulk of the people. It appears not at all Utopian to think that this mild and indirect check may in time not only take the place of destructive misery, but prove more effective as a method of selection.
Meanwhile we have a difficult problem in that class of people who are poor stock, but not so definitely degenerate that it is practicable to interfere and prevent their propagation. Almost every village has such a problem in the irresponsible procreation of families whom the community knows to be incompetent. I have received trustworthy accounts of many such from students.
It will appear to some that the whole plan of improvement breaks down at this point through the inadequacy of social pressure to limit natural increase. But we have come a long way since Malthus, and in a general view of the situation it appears probable, though not demonstrable, that social pressure will more and more meet the problem. A reasonable view of irresponsible procreation is that it is confined chiefly to those families which, through neglect, have not learned to feel the cogency of higher standards of life, and that the best way to deal with it is to make those standards universal. To fall back upon misery and vice for elimination would probably, by increasing irresponsibility, make matters worse rather than better. In other words, while the plan of dealing with the whole situation by opportunity, standards, and moral control is not free from difficulties, it is more promising, even at its weakest point, than a policy of neglect.