Page:Popular Science Monthly Volume 83.djvu/41

Rh effect. But to punish the organism for an anti-social or "bad" reaction just because it is "bad" and in proportion to its badness (as we habitually do in the courts) is just as reasonable as the act of the little child who flogs his broken hobby horse because it no longer goes.

When a crime is committed society's first query is: Who is culpable? Let us find him and he shall be punished. The police officer bribed the gunman to slay the Jew. Who is culpable? The gunman? He reacted to the bribe in a fashion that was predetermined from his make-up and training. In his sordid way the policeman knew whom he could bribe. We can not blame the gunman any more than we blame the tiger. The police officer, then? No, he reacted to the stimulus of greed and fear that was predetermined from his make-up and training; the bear at bay would do the same. The responsibility goes hack to society that permits the combinations to be made that react in this fashion and after such combinations are made fails to protect itself against their reactions. But, if these offenders are not culpable may they not be freed? By no means. These organisms are, as their product proves, bad; send them to the scrap heap. In general, if the trespasser has been apprehended, consider both the stimulus and the reaction. If it appears probable that there are undeveloped inhibitors the state should supply the training that may develop them. If not, the person should be permanently segregated from society, while his life should be made as happy and useful as possible; or else he should be entirely cut off. Especially should he not be permitted to reproduce his defects.

A word as to the rewards that society gives to those who are its effective and good members. Wages, salaries, profits, honors are such rewards. Because I am only half as good to society as another I get only half the reward. May I therefore complain? No, society is justified in making distinctions in its rewards. But I have no claim on a reward for attaining which I have done nothing except what I could not help doing; that I am good in any degree is no virtue of mine. Yet, from another point of view, the organism that is I has a virtue in so far as it reacts socially, and it may well call society's attention to the importance to society of its output and, in that measure, of the importance to society that it should be adequately supported. The man who invented a machine for making horseshoe nails made a fortune out of it, but he had no claim to that fortune; his germ-plasm had the determiners for inventiveness—his father also made machinery and was even interested in horseshoe nails. Society should certainly see that so good an inventor is properly supported. Indeed, society should see that the prize of special reward is held up before those who need its stimulus; but society may well fix a limit to such special rewards and not permit profits beyond such a limit. The successful lawyer and physician have no absolute claim to their large fees. Society in general recognizes the