Heredity and Eugenics.

Abstract

THE third and last number of The Mendel Journal contains an interesting article on the alternative heredity of mental traits, by Dr. Frederick Adams Woods, of the Massachusetts Institute of Technology. Dr. Woods's previous studies of heredity as exemplified in Royal families attracted a great deal of attention, and the present short paper based on the same class of material is well worthy of study. He advances the argument that the contrasts shown in the characters of children born of the same parents and brought up in the same environment are evidence for, and not against, the inheritance of mental traits. Those who would insist, as many do, that psychical characters are wholly the expression of the environment will find these contrasts very difficult to explain, but to their opponents who attribute the preponderating influence to heredity they present no difficulties, since the possibility of alternative inheritance has never been disputed. Among the other contents of the number is an article on primitive eugenics, by Mr. E. Torday, in which the eugenical value of the customs of certain central African tribes is pointed out and their good effects described.