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An interesting subordinate inquiry may be, how far such mental differences are inverted in cases where there is inversion of social and domestic relations; as among those Khasi Hill-tribes, whose women have so far the upper hand that they turn off their husbands in a summary way if they displease them. Mental modifiability in the two sexes.
At present I need only remark that in this respect there was a close coincidence between Owen and the Utilitarians. Both of them really aimed at an improvement of social conditions on a scientific method; and both justified their hopes by the characteristic belief in the indefinite modifiability of human nature by external circumstances.
These former types of tendencies differ from the latter in complexity of situation and response, in definiteness of response, in variability amongst individuals of the same family, and in modifiability; but in the essential element they do not differ from the more evident inborn tendencies.
Every one who has studied cattle-breeding, or turned pigeon-fancier, or "pomologist," must have been struck by the extreme modifiability or plasticity of those kinds of animals and plants which have been subjected to such artificial conditions as are imposed by domestication.
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