Jan A Witkowski and John R Inglis (eds), Davenport’s dream: 21st century reflections on heredity and eugenics, New York, Cold Spring Harbor Laboratory Press, 2008, pp. xiii, 298, $55.00 (hardback 978-0-87969-756-3).

Abstract

In 1911 Charles Benedict Davenport published the first edition of Heredity in relation to eugenics. Grounded firmly in the belief that a multitude of physical, mental and even career-related (e.g. seafaring) traits followed a pattern of Mendelian inheritance, the American scientist’s book was a principal guide to eugenic studies in the early twentieth-century. However, by the mid-1940s his text had become regarded as at best misguided, at worst a resource for earlier US sterilization programmes, and even Nazi race policies. Moreover, “even by the standards of his own day”, Davenport’s science of heredity was “usually dubious and often plain wrong”, the Cold Spring Harbor Laboratory he helped found amounting “scientifically to much less than it might have been”. (D J Kevles, In the name of eugenics, 2nd ed., Cambridge, MA, 1995, p. 48). Davenport’s Dream, edited by Jan Witkowski and John Inglis (both scientists at Cold Spring Harbour Laboratory), brings Heredity in relation to eugenics to light again, a facsimile of it accompanying ten essays written by eminent voices in the field of genetics, opening with James Watson’s discussion of ‘Genes and Politics’. As a key document in the history of biology and of the eugenics movement in America, Witkowski and Inglis consider Davenport’s book worthy of reconsideration; however, the most compelling reason they identify is that problems he attempted to tackle, moral and ethical issues the eugenics movement highlighted, remain of public interest today and subject to “cautious scientific enquiry” (p. viii). Furthermore, increasingly sophisticated knowledge and techniques—not least the completion of the Human Genome Project—have changed the scale of debate about use of DNA-related information: from efforts to improve a race, to those aimed at individual genetic constitutions. Read together, these essays—each written with reference to Davenport’s work—combine to produce an exposition on aspects of modern genetics, some highly technical, such as mitochondrial DNA technology. The presence of the original text itself is therefore crucial, helping to embed often complex accounts of, and justifications for, modern genetic research in an historical context. That said, nearly all the authors are scientists. The effect overall is to showcase articulate, considered, frequently persuasive claims, yet each with a pronounced pro-science bias. Lewis Wolpert’s closely argued contribution, the last (intentionally?), is especially robust in its placement of human nature within the reach of genetic manipulation. The media’s tendency towards “genetic pornography” and “moral masturbators’” objections to human cloning both earn his rebuke in what is a resolutely positivist polemic. Although indubitably erudite and informative, Wolpert’s contention, that “reliable scientific knowledge” (as opposed to “unreliable” knowledge or the technology to which “reliable” knowledge is applied) is “value-free” (p. 189) denotes a strangely ahistorical position, at odds with a volume intended to inform and enrich contemporary issues in genetic research by offering direct comparison and reference to a principal source. An earlier entry does offer slightly less staunch conclusions. ‘Genes in mind’ is Lindsey Kent and Simon Baron-Cohen’s attempt to disentangle the nature (genetics)/nurture (environment) controversy with reference to current scientific explanation of the nature of human mind. Unlike other essays, theirs is especially explicit in admitting the limitations of genetics so far: that concerning behaviour and personality, genes’ known influence “is only modest for many traits”; genetics “may lead to some important medical breakthroughs” (my emphases). Hence they conclude that further investment of time and money is warranted less for tangible outcomes, more for intellectual advance: “to teach us how we—and our brains—are made … the pursuit of such knowledge is worthwhile in its own right” (p. 156). By adopting a light touch—a brief preface, then short introductory pieces preceding each essay—the editors permit the contributors and their particular, mainly pro-research agendas to dominate. This does not make for an especially fluent read, or, as suggested above, a balanced account. None the less, echoing another review (R Pollack, ‘Thoughts on humane genetics’, Science, 2008, 321: 492–3), this is an important work and useful general teaching aid in science, medicine, law and ethics. It demonstrates contemporary scientific justification for continued and appropriate use of genetic information, despite and readily cognisant of past abuses.