A fair number of studies in behavioral genetics purport to show that at least some kinds of “criminality” are highly heritable. On first encounter, such claims are bound to seem provocative. They conjure up the frightening specter of malevolent authorities using genetic screening to determine who the likely criminals are from birth. On a more theoretical level, such results appear to challenge assumptions about the causal determinants of criminal behavior. It is widely assumed, on both the left and the right, that criminals are largely made, though made in different ways, and not born. The left assumes that criminals are made by poverty, deprivation, abuse, neglect, ignorance and the like, whereas the right assumes that criminals are made by insufficient social sanctions against criminal conduct. Of course, even if criminality is partly heritable, it does not follow that such “environmental” factors play no role in “making” criminals. But if criminality is largely heritable, then it just may be that such factors play less of a role than one might pretheoretically have imagined.

In fact, though, it is easy to overestimate both the sociopolitical consequences and the theoretical significance of the supposed heritability of criminality. Consider briefly the sociopolitical consequences of such results. Just for the sake of argument, suppose that we one day discover just what gene or assemblage of genes is responsible for an increased liability to criminality. And suppose that a test that detects the presence or absence of that gene or assemblage of genes is developed.