Nevertheless, anthropology has been able to teach certain facts that are of importance in our common every-day life. Owing to the breadth of its outlook, anthropology teaches better than any other science the relativity of the values of civilization. It enables us to free ourselves from the prejudices of our civilization, and to apply standards in measuring our achievements that have a greater absolute truth than those derived from a study of our civilization alone. The differences between our civilization and another type in which perhaps less stress is laid upon the rationalistic side of our mental activities and more upon the emotional side, or in which the outer manifestations of culture, as expressed in manner and dress, differ from ours, appear less as differences in value than as differences in kind. This broader outlook may also help us to recognize the possibility of lines of progress which do not happen to be in accord with the dominant ideas of our times.
Anthropology may also teach a better understanding of our own activities. We pride ourselves on following the dictates of reason and carrying out our carefully weighed convictions. The fact which is taught by anthropology,—that man the world over believes that he follows the dictates of reason, no matter how unreasonably he may act,—and the knowledge of the existence of the tendency of the human mind to arrive at a conclusion first and to give the reasons afterwards, will help us to open our eyes; so that we recognize that our philosophic views and our political convictions are to a great extent determined by our emotional inclinations, and that the reasons which we give are not the reasons by which we arrive at our conclusions, but the explanations which we give for our conclusions.
An important lesson is also taught by the course the general development of society has taken. Primitive social units were small, and the members possessed a strong feeling of solidarity among themselves and of hostility against all aliens. The social units have been increasing in size through all ages. Greater individual freedom was allowed to the members of the groups, and the feeling of hostility against strangers weakened. We are still in the middle of this development; and the history of mankind shows that any policy which oversteps the limits of necessary self-protection and seeks advancement of one nation by a policy disregarding the interests of others is bound to lose in the long-run, because it represents an older type of thought that is gradually disappearing.
I cannot leave my subject without saying a word in regard to the help that anthropological methods may render in the investigation of problems of public hygiene, of race-mixture, and of eugenics. The safe methods of biological and psychological anthropometry and anthropology will help us to remove these questions from the sphere of heated political discussion and to make them subjects of calm scientific investigation.
I have tried to outline in this imperfect picture the methods, aims, and hopes of anthropology. The definite facts that I could lay before you are few, and even the ground-work of the science appears hardly laid. Still I hope that the view of our ultimate aims may have engendered the feeling that we are striving for a goal which is bound to enlighten mankind, and which will be helpful in gaining a right attitude in the solution of the problems of life.
Transcriber’s Note
Words may have inconsistent hyphenation in the text. These have been left unchanged, as were obsolete and alternative spellings.