March 13, 1963

Dr. Rabert §. Morison, Sirector
Medical and Natural Sciences
The Rockefeller Foundation

TIT West 50th Street

New York 90, Mew York

fear Bob:'

! was very pleased by your letter and especially by the essays, which |
aa now returning. Your book for teenagers has a lot of wisdom, both for
sclence end for history, and | hope It will not be overlooked as an
important contribution to serlous criticism because of its professed
audlence.

You ralse so many issues -- really all the Issues == that there might

be little purpose in pursulng a discussion of them through such a clumsy
medium as correspondence. 1! found nothing In your writing that | dis~
agreed with, unless it was some position that | have held at some time
and have since, at least for the manent, altered only In raspect of
emphasis. | might comment on perhaps two points In some detall:

1. % would now put far more emphasis on the importance of culture in
defining the bounds and aspirations of human existence even than you do.
it fs well enough to talk about the cultural relativism of values, but

| think we delude ourselves In thinking that we can stand outside our

own culture and pretend to evaluate It on some more cosmically objective
basis. |! am proposing that culture defines even such things as consclous=
ness, individuality, as well as what we call scientific reasoning, esthetics
and morals. It is culture that makes us human (the genotype has made this
possible) and if there are goals of human existence, It is culture that
frames them. The relativists have been saying this for a long time, but
in a more pejorative sense, somehow Inferring that the cultural okigin of
our value system makes [t less meaningful.

2, On statistical responsibllity. If the function of an ethical system
Ts to minimize the number of deaths tn England and Wales, your argument
would be Incontestible. its function as 1 see it is to make society
possible and maaningful and to provide for self-respect. 1 think we must
learn to make a very clear distinction between sins of amission and statis«
tical responsibility, and those of personal culpability. After all, 1 could
put it to you, parsonally, that it is within your power to achledwea sub-
stantial reduction in infant mortality in England or anywhere else that you
chose to devote your unremitting efforts. Perhaps none of us would be so
lenient with himself, but certainly 1 would not call you to account for
this crime of omission. There is, after all, an Infinite array of such
Dr. Robert $. Morison March 13, 1963
. Page 2

crimes -- we will not soon reach absolute perfection «=~ and | wonder If we
really advance the cause of moral responsibility by over-stressing them.
This Is now a criticism of a proposition | have put forward myself, for
exaeple, that It was as immoral to not investigate antimutagenic chemicals
that could alleviate spontaneous mutation and to apply existing knowledge

on a large scale as It was to caamlt the positive act of Increasing back=
round radioactivity.

Any such discussion of problems along these lines always tends to leave me
beth helpless and hopeless with respect 60 the specific contribution that

| am personally qualified to make or discuss. 1 do, however, repeatedly
come back to one particular conclusion, thet many of the problems we foresee
are the result not only of too much technology, but an Imbalance In It, and
that as scientists we have the particular responsibllity of pointing out
those discrepancies which are amenable to technological attack. in all, the
University emerges as a more and more badly needed organ for the accomplish-
ment of these social functions, but where will we find one?

Slacerely yours,

Joshua Lederberg
Professor of Genetics