The Doctrine of Evolution: Its Basis and Its ScopeCrampton, Henry Edward
Science
The Doctrine of Evolution: Its Basis and Its Scope
Crampton, Henry Edward
Evolution
Heredity of mental qualities has also been demonstrated notably by Galton,
Pearson, Woods, and Thorndike, who have also shown that the strength of
inheritance in the case of mental traits is approximately the same as for
physical characteristics like stature and eye-color. Just as a worker-bee
inherits a specific form of nervous system which cooeperates with the other
equally determined organic systems, wherefore the animal is forced to
perform "instinctively" its peculiar specialized tasks, so the mental
capacity of a human being is largely determined by congenital factors.
Upon these primarily depends his success or failure. It is quite true that
environment has a high degree of influence, so great indeed that some
speak of a "social heredity"; they mean by this phrase that the mental
equipment of an individual is determined by the things he finds about him,
or learns from others without having to invent or originate them himself.
Thus a Zulu boy acquires the habits of a warrior and a huntsman when he
grows up in his native village, although he would undoubtedly develop
quite different aptitudes if he should be taken as an infant to a city of
white men. Nevertheless his mental machinery itself would be no less
surely determined by heredity, even though the things with which it dealt
would be provided by an alien environment.
Our present knowledge of the nature and history of human mentality enables
us to learn many lessons that have a direct practical value, although it
is impossible under the present limitations to give them the full
discussion they deserve. Starting from the dictum that physical
inheritance provides the mechanism of intellect, education and training of
any kind prove to be effective as agents for developing hereditary
qualities or for suppressing undesirable tendencies. Just as wind-strewn
grains of wheat may fall upon rock and stony soil and loam, to grow well
or poorly or not at all according to their environmental situations, so
children with similar intellectual possibilities would have their growth
fostered or hampered or prevented by the educational systems to which they
were subjected. But the common-sense of science demonstrates that the
mental qualities themselves could not be altered _in nature_ by the
circumstances controlling their development any more than the hereditary
capability of the wheat grains to produce wheat would be altered by the
character of the ground upon which they fell. Education and training thus
find their sphere of usefulness is developing what it is worth while to
bring out, and inhibiting the growth of what is harmful. That heredity in
mental as well as in physical aspects provides the varying materials with
which education must deal is a fundamental biological fact which is too
often disregarded. It would be as futile for an instructor to attempt the
task of forcing the children in a single schoolroom into the same mental
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
Reviews
Reviews
No reviews yet
Be the first to share your thoughts on this work.
Elsewhere in the archive
Join the Discussion
Join the discussion
Sign in to leave a comment or review.
Sign InorCreate an account