SCIENTISTS’ DISCOVERY.

Hokitika Guardian, 2 May 1923, Page 2

SCIENTISTS’ DISCOVERY.

EXPERIAI ENTS IN HEREDITY AUSTRALIAN ANI) N.Z. CABLE ASSOCIATION. (Received this dav at 9.45 a.m.) LONDON, May 1. Doctor Ivammerer, a well known Vienna specialist, lecturing before the Cambridge University Natural History Society, declared it was possib'e by experimenting on human beings, vo make genius hereditary just as acquired characteristics in animals ueie transmitted to succeeding generations. The now development wou'd entirely supersede eugenics, the results (if which were usually negative. His experiments showed that had qualities can he. minimised and good qualities cultivated, but parents must he normal healthy people, with a full sense of their responsibilities to theii children. It would he as easy to hand down acquired vices as acquired virtues. The lecturer added that he had not yet experimented with human beings, hut lie had clearly established the theory with animals. Dr Hammerer also claimed he had developed eyes in sightless newt (a lizardlike animal living in ponds) by exposing the animal to a rod light, five years after birth, whereas daylight caused a dark pigment to form over the eyes. The red light allowed optic develop merit. Cambridge exports say Katmnerer’s work is the greatest advance in biological science in recent years and is a striking development of the work of Darwin on tho evolution and mendel on heredity.