Folk ideas about heredity are a particularly powerful cultural tool, but they are not unique to pre-modern societies. Even contemporary science has its own cultural ideologies about heredity, which are often difficult to disentangle from the complex data and high technology that we believe produces objective, value-free glimpses of nature.
人们对遗传问题的看法是一种非常有力的文化武器，但这种武器却并非为近代社会所独有。即便是现代科学也不乏遗传方面的文化观念，而这些观念很难与复杂的资料和高科技完全分开，人们相信这些科技手段使我们能够客观、不存偏见地认识这个世界。