Francis Galton Eugenics

Most of the trait studied by eugenicist have little genetic basis. The probability that other Factors such as environmental, poor housing, poor nutrition, and not proper education were

Eugenics is the science of improving the human race by regulating who can bear children. Progressives saw this as a nation that was going to be permantly divided by race and ethnic lines. This began the process of Americanization, a homogenous natural culture. Women were often targets of Americanization because they follow tradition and culture. Children were also a primary target because of their innocent nature. Educators, employers, labor leaders, social reformers, and public officials made it their goal to Americanize immigrants. The Army began standard IQ tests taken by immigrants, scientifically proving they were far below white intelligence. Ford Motor Company sent people to investigate immigrant homes to evaluate clothing, furniture, food preferences, and enrolled them in English classes.

Chapter 8 of Kitcher's novel, Inescapable Eugenics, identifies past abuses of eugenics resulting from inaccurate, misleading information; abuses that include dominant groups using eugenics to discriminate against other undesirable groups.

The movie “Gattaca” is a sci-fi movie that takes place in “the not-too-distant” future, where genetic engineering of humans is common. In this sci-fi future, class differences are construct is primarily determined by your DNA. In the movie society’s culture is ingrained with eugenics, evident by the clear institutionalized discrimination. Eugenics is a set of beliefs and practices that aim at improving the genetic quality of the human population. Eugenics is not a “new” concept, people have been discriminating based on looks ever since prehistoric times. The movie inspired me to do some research on popular eugenics movements in the post-industrial age (1850-present). My primary goal of was to identify the motives behind early eugenics

Eugenics is the pseudoscience of obtaining desired traits in a population through controlled repopulation, specifically by preventing those deemed “unfit” by “Nordic stereotypes” from breeding. Most modern day Americans do not realize the origins of eugenics, which was planted by Charles Darwin and Sir Francis Galton and bloomed in America, and what effect it had on the attempt to create a master race in Nazi Germany. America played a very influential role in German eugenics by collaboration between scientists and funding from American corporations. The negative connotation associated with this science is usually directed towards the scientists of the Holocaust under Adolf Hitler, and not towards American scientists who also partook in horrific experiments and performed inhumane acts as well. This is absurd when you consider that the United States was the backbone of the eugenics movement internationally and only developed a negative perspective of the research when it became affiliated with the holocaust and the troubling actions of Nazi Germany.

Therefore, enlightened eugenics calls for the education on the basis of minimalist eugenics while responsible eugenics would use reliable genetic tests in order to avoid neurological diseases and prevent the previously mentioned dangers caused by laissez-faire eugenics. Kitcher’s view of utopian eugenics envisions a society in which genetics allow people to make free and educated reproductive choices and in which the education broadens an understanding of the likely quality of a modest life.

The eugenics movement began in the 20th century by a man named Francis Galton. As the cousin of Charles Darwin, Galton believed that eugenics was a moral philosophy to improve humanity by encouraging the ablest and healthiest people to have more children (Carlson). This Galtonian ideal of eugenics is often thought of as positive eugenics. Eugenics can be defined as the outgrowth of human heredity aimed at "improving" the quality of the human stock (Allen and Bird). At the other end of the spectrum is what can be classified as negative eugenics and is presently in disrepute. Negative eugenics entails selective breeding in which the least able from the population is taken out of the reproduction pool to preserve humanity's best traits.

The preceding difficulties experienced when attempting to regulate eugenics and properly enforce its practices calls into question if eugenics can in fact be effectively outlined in law. It is the purpose of this essay to argue that eugenics should be inducted into legislation in order to regulate experimental research so as to encourage learning about the human genome and to protect participants. Due to eugenics’ sordid past that is rooted in discriminatory practices, it has the potential to impede the development and wellness of humankind rather than promote it, therefore there needs to be precautionary laws put in place to minimize the risks as much as

Families across the country rushed to be tested and deemed genetically fit, or otherwise. While all this was going on, eugenics fans blazed across the country toting such propaganda as "Some Americans are born to be a burden on the rest" (Carlson 4), while claiming that it is the duty of the superior to ensure that the "feebleminded" did not over-run them. The hype among the higher upper class was to prove yourself worthy of being especially genetically adept, no matter what background you hailed from (the hypocrisy of this is terrible). Only when eugenicists began to actively sterilize patients did an opposite reaction to eugenics present itself.

The theory of Eugenics can be dated back all the way to 400 B.C. but was not popularized until the mid-1800s by an English scientist, Francis Galton. He researched and published the theory that aimed to improve the genetic quality of the human population through selective breeding (NC Office of Archives and History). As the half-cousin of Charles Darwin, Galton applied the Darwinism science (survival of the fittest) to heredity characteristics. Two types of Eugenics stemmed from the theory, positive and negative. Positive eugenics is encouraging the “best” people in the society based on financial and personal features to have more children while negative eugenics is picking people with flaws and defects from the population

Eugenics, a new science of heredity was first introduced in 1883, brought about to address the budding fears and threats to the purity and fitness of the British race. A fear brought upon by events such as the Boer War in 1899, forced Britain to question the spectrum of degeneracy within the population and resolve the issue of bringing the British and White race back to strength, unified and fit. Sir Francis Galton defined eugenics as “the study of agencies under social control that may improve or impair the racial qualities of future generations either physically or mentally”. It was believed that differences in mental, moral and physical traits between individuals, as well as races were hereditary, producing those who were deemed

Eugenics is the name given by Francis Galton to a theory for improving humanity through "judicious matings... to give the more suitable races or strains of blood a better chance of prevailing speedily over the less suitable". However, this process for bettering society through biological improvement is an indirect method. Through advanced technology, the step of selective breeding could possibly be bypassed. With these technologies it may be possible to directly and

The term and concept of Eugenics was introduced into our society dating back to the year 1883, by Francis Galton, cousin of Darwin (Harvard Law Review, 2004). Since that year, throughout history and into our current time the study and debate surrounding Eugenics has taken many forms, but controversy as society developed a better understanding of its concept, has grown in epic proportions. Today we are subjected to constant debates of the pros and cons of Eugenics and its study and use in healthcare today. Discussed in the following pages will be the definition and application of Eugenics, and how Eugenics has developed the debate regarding the pros and cons of its use in the healthcare industry, and how these debates have tested the ethics of healthcare and its professionals in many ways.

The definition of eugenics is to breed out undesirable traits. Based off of Austrian scientist Gregor Mendel’s studies, eugenics is accomplished through selective breeding. Dominant traits would replace recessive traits and the law of dominance would be ineffective. Originally, the idea behind eugenics was not completely bad. Over time though, problems surrounding it have been found. Dealing with positive and negative traits, questions have been asked about what constitutes as a negative trait and who decides which traits are

The roots of eugenics can be traced back to Britain in the early 1880’s when Sir Francis Galton generated the term from the Greek word for “well-born”. He defined eugenics as the science of improving stock, whether human or animal. According to the American Eugenics Movement, today’s study of eugenics has many similarities to studies done in the early 20th century. Back then, “Eugenics was, quite literally, an effort to breed better human beings – by encouraging the reproduction of people with "good" genes and discouraging those with "bad" genes.” (www.eugenicsarchive.org) According to Merriam-Webster, the modern day definition of eugenics is, a science that deals with the improvement (as by control of human mating) of