Anthropology is defined as the field of study that digs into the various aspects that makes people human. These different aspects of humanity consider the past to see how people of multiple groups lived. Physical anthropology, also known as biological anthropology studies the physiological and behavioral aspects of human beings, particularly from the evolutionary perspective (Jurmain, Kilgore, Trevathan & Bartelink, 2016) . Franz Boas was vital in the advancement of physical anthropology due to his cultural relativism theory. The culture study is an essential bridge from individualistic views to pluralistic views. However, before the 20th century, and prior to the German Holocaust, the Western world predominantly viewed Western culture as being dominant over all cultures. This view morally justified the propagation of Western culture to the debarment of different cultures until Franz Boas changed how the West viewed culture (Jurmain, Kilgore, Trevathan & Bartelink, 2016) . He produced a scientific understanding of humans, which dispelled the belief that any culture was dominant over another.
Having worked with a team of explorers in Northern Canada in the remote Baffin Island, Boas extensively studied the indigenous people in the Island. He discovered that all societies, regardless of their geographical dispensation, believe that their culture is the superior one (Jurmain, Kilgore, Trevathan & Bartelink, 2016) . This led to Boas defining the "Cultural Relativism Theory," which states that the only culture a society truly acknowledges is their own culture. The argument made sense of the pressing Western cultural racism, and it equally elevated other societies by making the Western world understand their bias (Jurmain, Kilgore, Trevathan & Bartelink, 2016) . His efforts in assessing the scientific racist ideas by the West, extensively assessed the physical characteristics of different populations, which included cranial knowledge and brain capacity.
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Franz Boas' theory played an integral part in pioneering a program of research among all the fields of anthropology which have over the century continued to challenge the scientific racist beliefs whenever they suffice. His research on the brain capacity has demonstrated over time that racist ideas have no basis in fact since human groups do not fit in any neat categories (Scupin, 2016) . Boas was instrumental in proving that race does not influence intelligence and that instead intelligence, which is defined as the capacity to process and evaluate information, is influenced by a person's brain capacity. Intelligence varies among individuals, even in the same setting, creating the dilemma on relativism. The acceptance of cultural relativism was instrumental in leading to the acceptance of ethical relativism, the notion that the values or morality of one society cannot be imposed on the other (Scupin, 2016) . By stating that every community has a right to hold in high regard its cultural values, Boas created the dilemma of cultural interchange.
Ethical relativists held that since anthropologists, led by Boas, had not revealed any collective moral values which were practical across cultures, each culture's values were binding with regard to that community's conditions and circumstances. No society, therefore, should claim any moral or ethical superiority over another (Scupin, 2016) . It is essential to observe that while Boas was instrumental in making light of the scientific racist beliefs, particularly of the Western culture, he equally played a significant role in creating the foundation upon which a resolution to the problem of relativism would be debated. His other contributions and achievements include his study of changes in body form among immigrant children in New York, to which he observed that the environment affects one's physical features (Scupin, 2016) . As a scholar, he also trained many professional anthropologists, most of whom went on to establish anthropology courses at other higher learning institutions.
References
Jurmain, R., Kilgore, L., Trevathan, W., & Bartelink, E. (2016). Essentials of physical anthropology . Nelson Education.
Scupin, R. (2016). Cultural anthropology: A global perspective . Pearson Education.
