Page:Popular Science Monthly Volume 85.djvu/156

152 run be well to develop as fast as possible a world-wide cultural uniformity. I am well aware of the objections that some have to this. They fear that such a dissemination of culture will deprive the whites of their power over many subject races, and may in course of time even give these races the ascendency over the whites. It is true that such uniformity of culture will quite probably lead to the emancipation of these subject races, but this will in all probability be to the benefit of these races and may also prove to be to the benefit of the whites as well. Furthermore, it is hard to believe that such uniformity of culture could ever lead to the subjection of the whites, because the very fact of uniformity would imply equality between the races of the world.

When we turn to the question of a final racial amalgamation, it is hard indeed to draw any practical deductions. There is a great deal of difference of opinion as to the advisability of miscegenation or the crossing of races. It is, of course, to a considerable extent a question of whether the races being crossed are equal in capacity or whether the one is superior to the other. If they are equal it would appear as if there should be no loss as a result of the crossing and if anything a gain. If the one is superior to the other it may lose as a result of the crossing but, on the other hand, the inferior one ought to gain so that the loss ought not to be greater than the gain. However, we have seen that it is hard to determine whether any race is materially superior or inferior to the other races biologically and psychologically so that it may be that the races should be regarded as being practically on an equality for purposes of crossing. But regardless of the question as to whether the races being crossed are equal or not there is the further consideration as to whether their characteristics are such as to make a happy combination. We can not judge very well as to that now but Mendelian investigation may furnish us a basis for judging in course of time.

Non-biological writers usually regard human hybridism as a bad thing when it is the result of a crossing between a so-called superior and a so-called inferior race. Their opinion is based upon the fact that these half-breeds are frequently failures in society. But such failure is usually due to social factors though these writers attribute it to the inborn traits of the half-breeds. Biologists regard hybridism in general as a good thing in the animate world at large and as an important factor in organic evolution. Biologists who have discussed human problems and anthropologists who are well grounded in biology have usually regarded human hybridism as a good thing and as an important factor in human mental and social evolution. So that it is probably true that human hybridism in general is a good thing. However it would not be safe to argue from such a general principle in every specific case. It may be that under some conditions such as have been suggested above miscegenation is not a good thing. Furthermore it is true that if a