Eugenics

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For the album by Malignancy, see Eugenics (album).

Logo from the Second International Eugenics Conference, 1921, depicting eugenics as a tree which unites a variety of different fields[1]
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Eugenics (/juːˈdʒɛnɪks/; from Greek εὐγενής eugenes 'well-born' from εὖ eu, 'good, well' and γένος genos, 'race, stock, kin')[2][3] is a set of beliefs and practices that aims at improving the genetic quality of a human population by excluding (through a variety of morally criticized means) certain genetic groups judged to be less desirable and promoting other genetic groups judged to be superior.[4][5] The exact definition of eugenics has been a matter of debate since the term was coined by Francis Galton in 1883. The concept predates this coinage, with Plato suggesting applying the principles of selective breeding to humans around 400 BCE.

Frederick Osborn's 1937 journal article "Development of a Eugenic Philosophy" framed it as a social philosophy—a philosophy with implications for social order.[6] That definition is not universally accepted. Osborn advocated for higher rates of sexual reproduction among people with desired traits ("positive eugenics") or reduced rates of sexual reproduction or sterilization of people with less-desired or undesired traits ("negative eugenics").

Alternatively, by 2014, gene selection (rather than "people selection") was made possible through advances in genome editing,[7] leading to what is sometimes called new eugenics, also known as "neo-eugenics", "consumer eugenics", or "liberal eugenics".

While eugenic principles have been practiced as far back in world history as ancient Greece, the modern history of eugenics began in the early 20th century when a popular eugenics movement emerged in the United Kingdom,[8] and then spread to many countries, including the United States, Canada,[9] and most European countries. In this period, eugenic ideas were espoused across the political spectrum. Consequently, many countries adopted eugenic policies to improve the quality of their populations' genetic stock. Such programs included both positive measures, such as encouraging individuals deemed particularly "fit" to reproduce, and negative measures, such as marriage prohibitions and forced sterilization of people deemed unfit for reproduction. People deemed "unfit to reproduce" often included people with mental or physical disabilities, people who scored in the low ranges on different IQ tests, criminals and deviants, and members of disfavored minority groups.

The eugenics movement became negatively associated with Nazi Germany and the Holocaust when many of the defendants at the Nuremberg trials attempted to justify their human rights abuses by claiming there was little difference between the Nazi eugenics programs and the U.S. eugenics programs.[10] In the decades following World War II, with the institution of human rights, many countries gradually began to abandon eugenics policies, although some Western countries, among them the United States and Sweden, continued to carry out forced sterilizations.

Since the 1980s and 1990s, with new assisted reproductive technology procedures available, such as gestational surrogacy (available since 1985), preimplantation genetic diagnosis (available since 1989), and cytoplasmic transfer (first performed in 1996), fear has emerged about the possible revival of a more potent form of eugenics after decades promoting human rights.

A major criticism of eugenics policies is that, regardless of whether negative or positive policies are used, they are susceptible to abuse because the genetic selection criteria are determined by whichever group has political power at the time. Furthermore, negative eugenics in particular is criticized by many as a violation of basic human rights, which include the right to reproduce. Another criticism is that eugenics policies eventually lead to a loss of genetic diversity, thereby resulting in inbreeding depression due to lower genetic variation.

History[edit]

We put down mad dogs; we kill the wild, untamed ox; we use the knife on sick sheep to stop their infecting the flock; we destroy abnormal offspring at birth; children, too, if they are born weak or deformed, we drown. Yet this is not the work of anger, but of reason - to separate the sound from the worthless.[11]

Seneca the Younger

Main article: History of eugenics

Origin and development[edit]

The concept of positive eugenics to produce better human beings has existed at least since Plato suggested selective mating to produce a guardian class.[12] In Sparta, every Spartan child was inspected by the council of elders, the Gerousia, which determined if the child was fit to live or not. In the early years of ancient Rome, a Roman father was obliged by law to immediately kill his child if they were physically disabled.[13] Among the ancient Germanic tribes, people who were cowardly, unwarlike or "stained with abominable vices" were put to death, usually by being drowned in swamps.[14][15]

The first formal negative eugenics, that is a legal provision against the birth of allegedly inferior human beings, was promulgated in Western European culture by the Christian Council of Agde in 506, which forbade marriage between cousins.[16]

This idea was also promoted by William Goodell (1829–1894) who advocated the castration and spaying of the insane.[17][18]

Francis Galton was an early eugenicist, coining the term itself and popularizing the collocation of the words "nature and nurture".[19]

The idea of a modern project of improving the human population through a statistical understanding of heredity used to encourage good breeding was originally developed by Francis Galton and, initially, was closely linked to Darwinism and his theory of natural selection.[20] Galton had read his half-cousin Charles Darwin's theory of evolution, which sought to explain the development of plant and animal species, and desired to apply it to humans. Based on his biographical studies, Galton believed that desirable human qualities were hereditary traits, although Darwin strongly disagreed with this elaboration of his theory.[21] In 1883, one year after Darwin's death, Galton gave his research a name: eugenics.[22] With the introduction of genetics, eugenics became associated with genetic determinism, the belief that human character is entirely or in the majority caused by genes, unaffected by education or living conditions. Many of the early geneticists were not Darwinians, and evolution theory was not needed for eugenics policies based on genetic determinism.[20] Throughout its recent history, eugenics has remained controversial.[23]

Eugenics became an academic discipline at many colleges and universities and received funding from many sources.[24] Organizations were formed to win public support and sway opinion towards responsible eugenic values in parenthood, including the British Eugenics Education Society of 1907 and the American Eugenics Society of 1921. Both sought support from leading clergymen and modified their message to meet religious ideals.[25] In 1909 the Anglican clergymen William Inge and James Peile both wrote for the British Eugenics Education Society. Inge was an invited speaker at the 1921 International Eugenics Conference, which was also endorsed by the Roman Catholic Archbishop of New York Patrick Joseph Hayes.[25]

Three International Eugenics Conferences presented a global venue for eugenists with meetings in 1912 in London, and in 1921 and 1932 in New York City. Eugenic policies were first implemented in the early 1900s in the United States.[26] It also took root in France, Germany, and Great Britain.[27] Later, in the 1920s and 1930s, the eugenic policy of sterilizing certain mental patients was implemented in other countries including Belgium,[28] Brazil,[29] Canada,[30] Japan and Sweden.

G. K. Chesterton, an opponent of eugenics, in 1909, by photographer Ernest Herbert Mills

In addition to being practiced in a number of countries, eugenics was internationally organized through the International Federation of Eugenics Organizations.[31] Its scientific aspects were carried on through research bodies such as the Kaiser Wilhelm Institute of Anthropology, Human Heredity, and Eugenics,[32] the Cold Spring Harbour Carnegie Institution for Experimental Evolution,[33] and the Eugenics Record Office.[34] Politically, the movement advocated measures such as sterilization laws.[35] In its moral dimension, eugenics rejected the doctrine that all human beings are born equal and redefined moral worth purely in terms of genetic fitness.[36] Its racist elements included pursuit of a pure "Nordic race" or "Aryan" genetic pool and the eventual elimination of "unfit" races.[37][38]

Early critics of the philosophy of eugenics included the American sociologist Lester Frank Ward,[39] the English writer G. K. Chesterton, the German-American anthropologist Franz Boas, who argued that advocates of eugenics greatly over-estimate the influence of biology,[40] and Scottish tuberculosis pioneer and author Halliday Sutherland. Ward's 1913 article "Eugenics, Euthenics, and Eudemics", Chesterton's 1917 book Eugenics and Other Evils, and Boas' 1916 article "Eugenics" (published in The Scientific Monthly) were all harshly critical of the rapidly growing movement. Sutherland identified eugenists as a major obstacle to the eradication and cure of tuberculosis in his 1917 address "Consumption: Its Cause and Cure",[41] and criticism of eugenists and Neo-Malthusians in his 1921 book Birth Control led to a writ for libel from the eugenist Marie Stopes. Several biologists were also antagonistic to the eugenics movement, including Lancelot Hogben.[42] Other biologists such as J. B. S. Haldane and R. A. Fisher expressed skepticism in the belief that sterilization of "defectives" would lead to the disappearance of undesirable genetic traits.[43]

Among institutions, the Catholic Church was an opponent of state-enforced sterilizations.[44] Attempts by the Eugenics Education Society to persuade the British government to legalize voluntary sterilization were opposed by Catholics and by the Labour Party.[45] The American Eugenics Society initially gained some Catholic supporters, but Catholic support declined following the 1930 papal encyclical Casti connubii.[25] In this, Pope Pius XI explicitly condemned sterilization laws: "Public magistrates have no direct power over the bodies of their subjects; therefore, where no crime has taken place and there is no cause present for grave punishment, they can never directly harm, or tamper with the integrity of the body, either for the reasons of eugenics or for any other reason."[46]

As a social movement, eugenics reached its greatest popularity in the early decades of the 20th century, when it was practiced around the world and promoted by governments, institutions, and influential individuals. Many countries enacted[47] various eugenics policies, including: genetic screenings, birth control, promoting differential birth rates, marriage restrictions, segregation (both racial segregation and sequestering the mentally ill), compulsory sterilization, forced abortions or forced pregnancies, ultimately culminating in genocide.

Nazism and the decline of eugenics[edit]

Hartheim Euthanasia Centre in 2005
A Lebensborn birth house in Nazi Germany. Created with the intention of raising the birth rate of "Aryan" children from the extramarital relations of "racially pure and healthy" parents.
Main article: Nazi eugenics

The scientific reputation of eugenics started to decline in the 1930s, a time when Ernst Rüdin used eugenics as a justification for the racial policies of Nazi Germany. Adolf Hitler had praised and incorporated eugenic ideas in Mein Kampf in 1925 and emulated eugenic legislation for the sterilization of "defectives" that had been pioneered in the United States once he took power.[48] Some common early 20th century eugenics methods involved identifying and classifying individuals and their families, including the poor, mentally ill, blind, deaf, developmentally disabled, promiscuous women, homosexuals, and racial groups (such as the Roma and Jews in Nazi Germany) as "degenerate" or "unfit", and therefore led to segregation, institutionalization, sterilization, euthanasia, and even mass murder.[49] The Nazi practice of euthanasia was carried out on hospital patients in the Aktion T4 centers such as Hartheim Castle.

By the end of World War II, many discriminatory eugenics laws were abandoned, having become associated with Nazi Germany.[49][50] H. G. Wells, who had called for "the sterilization of failures" in 1904,[51] stated in his 1940 book The Rights of Man: Or What are we fighting for? that among the human rights, which he believed should be available to all people, was "a prohibition on mutilation, sterilization, torture, and any bodily punishment".[52] After World War II, the practice of "imposing measures intended to prevent births within [a national, ethnical, racial or religious] group" fell within the definition of the new international crime of genocide, set out in the Convention on the Prevention and Punishment of the Crime of Genocide.[53] The Charter of Fundamental Rights of the European Union also proclaims "the prohibition of eugenic practices, in particular those aiming at selection of persons".[54] In spite of the decline in discriminatory eugenics laws, some government mandated sterilizations continued into the 21st century. During the ten years President Alberto Fujimori led Peru from 1990 to 2000, 2,000 persons were allegedly involuntarily sterilized.[55] China maintained its one-child policy until 2015 as well as a suite of other eugenics based legislation to reduce population size and manage fertility rates of different populations.[56][57][58] In 2007 the United Nations reported coercive sterilizations and hysterectomies in Uzbekistan.[59] During the years 2005 to 2013, nearly one-third of the 144 California prison inmates who were sterilized did not give lawful consent to the operation.[60]

Modern resurgence of interest[edit]

Developments in genetic, genomic, and reproductive technologies at the end of the 20th century have raised numerous questions regarding the ethical status of eugenics, effectively creating a resurgence of interest in the subject. Some, such as UC Berkeley sociologist Troy Duster, claim that modern genetics is a back door to eugenics.[61] This view is shared by White House Assistant Director for Forensic Sciences, Tania Simoncelli, who stated in a 2003 publication by the Population and Development Program at Hampshire College that advances in pre-implantation genetic diagnosis (PGD) are moving society to a "new era of eugenics", and that, unlike the Nazi eugenics, modern eugenics is consumer driven and market based, "where children are increasingly regarded as made-to-order consumer products".[62] In a 2006 newspaper article, Richard Dawkins said that discussion regarding eugenics was inhibited by the shadow of Nazi misuse, to the extent that some scientists would not admit that breeding humans for certain abilities is at all possible. He believes that it is not physically different from breeding domestic animals for traits such as speed or herding skill. Dawkins felt that enough time had elapsed to at least ask just what the ethical differences were between breeding for ability versus training athletes or forcing children to take music lessons, though he could think of persuasive reasons to draw the distinction.[63]

Lee Kuan Yew, the Founding Father of Singapore, started promoting eugenics as early as 1983.[64][65]

In October 2015, the United Nations' International Bioethics Committee wrote that the ethical problems of human genetic engineering should not be confused with the ethical problems of the 20th century eugenics movements. However, it is still problematic because it challenges the idea of human equality and opens up new forms of discrimination and stigmatization for those who do not want, or cannot afford, the technology.[66]

Transhumanism is often associated with eugenics, although most transhumanists holding similar views nonetheless distance themselves from the term "eugenics" (preferring "germinal choice" or "reprogenetics")[67] to avoid having their position confused with the discredited theories and practices of early-20th-century eugenic movements.

Prenatal screening can be considered a form of contemporary eugenics because it may lead to abortions of children with undesirable traits.[68]

Meanings and types[edit]

Karl Pearson (1912)

The term eugenics and its modern field of study were first formulated by Francis Galton in 1883,[69] drawing on the recent work of his half-cousin Charles Darwin.[70][71] Galton published his observations and conclusions in his book Inquiries into Human Faculty and Its Development.

The origins of the concept began with certain interpretations of Mendelian inheritance and the theories of August Weismann.[72] The word eugenics is derived from the Greek word eu ("good" or "well") and the suffix -genēs ("born"), and was coined by Galton in 1883 to replace the word "stirpiculture", which he had used previously but which had come to be mocked due to its perceived sexual overtones.[73] Galton defined eugenics as "the study of all agencies under human control which can improve or impair the racial quality of future generations".[74]

Historically, the term eugenics has referred to everything from prenatal care for mothers to forced sterilization and euthanasia.[75] To population geneticists, the term has included the avoidance of inbreeding without altering allele frequencies; for example, J. B. S. Haldane wrote that "the motor bus, by breaking up inbred village communities, was a powerful eugenic agent."[76] Debate as to what exactly counts as eugenics continues today.[77]

Edwin Black, journalist and author of War Against the Weak, claims eugenics is often deemed a pseudoscience because what is defined as a genetic improvement of a desired trait is often deemed a cultural choice rather than a matter that can be determined through objective scientific inquiry.[78] The most disputed aspect of eugenics has been the definition of "improvement" of the human gene pool, such as what is a beneficial characteristic and what is a defect. Historically, this aspect of eugenics was tainted with scientific racism and pseudoscience.[79][80][81]

Early eugenists were mostly concerned with factors of perceived intelligence that often correlated strongly with social class. Some of these early eugenists include Karl Pearson and Walter Weldon, who worked on this at the University College London.[21]

Eugenics also had a place in medicine. In his lecture "Darwinism, Medical Progress and Eugenics", Karl Pearson said that everything concerning eugenics fell into the field of medicine. He basically placed the two words as equivalents. He was supported in part by the fact that Francis Galton, the father of eugenics, also had medical training.[82]

Eugenic policies have been conceptually divided into two categories.[75] Positive eugenics is aimed at encouraging reproduction among the genetically advantaged; for example, the reproduction of the intelligent, the healthy, and the successful. Possible approaches include financial and political stimuli, targeted demographic analyses, in vitro fertilization, egg transplants, and cloning.[83] The movie Gattaca provides a fictional example of a dystopian society that uses eugenics to decide what people are capable of and their place in the world. Negative eugenics aimed to eliminate, through sterilization or segregation, those deemed physically, mentally, or morally "undesirable". This includes abortions, sterilization, and other methods of family planning.[83] Both positive and negative eugenics can be coercive; abortion for fit women, for example, was illegal in Nazi Germany.[84]

Jon Entine claims that eugenics simply means "good genes" and using it as synonym for genocide is an "all-too-common distortion of the social history of genetics policy in the United States". According to Entine, eugenics developed out of the Progressive Era and not "Hitler's twisted Final Solution".[85]

Implementation methods[edit]

According to Richard Lynn, eugenics may be divided into two main categories based on the ways in which the methods of eugenics can be applied.[86]

Arguments[edit]

Efficacy[edit]

The first major challenge to conventional eugenics based upon genetic inheritance was made in 1915 by Thomas Hunt Morgan. He demonstrated the event of genetic mutation occurring outside of inheritance involving the discovery of the hatching of a fruit fly (Drosophila melanogaster) with white eyes from a family with red eyes.[122] Morgan claimed that this demonstrated that major genetic changes occurred outside of inheritance and that the concept of eugenics based upon genetic inheritance was not completely scientifically accurate.[122] Additionally, Morgan criticized the view that subjective traits, such as intelligence and criminality, were caused by heredity because he believed that the definitions of these traits varied and that accurate work in genetics could only be done when the traits being studied were accurately defined.[123] Despite Morgan's public rejection of eugenics, much of his genetic research was absorbed by eugenics.[124][125]

The heterozygote test is used for the early detection of recessive hereditary diseases, allowing for couples to determine if they are at risk of passing genetic defects to a future child.[126] The goal of the test is to estimate the likelihood of passing the hereditary disease to future descendants.[126]

Recessive traits can be severely reduced, but never eliminated unless the complete genetic makeup of all members of the pool was known, as aforementioned. As only very few undesirable traits, such as Huntington's disease, are dominant, it could be argued[by whom?] from certain perspectives that the practicality of "eliminating" traits is quite low.[citation needed]

There are examples of eugenic acts that managed to lower the prevalence of recessive diseases, although not influencing the prevalence of heterozygote carriers of those diseases. The elevated prevalence of certain genetically transmitted diseases among the Ashkenazi Jewish population (Tay–Sachs, cystic fibrosis, Canavan's disease, and Gaucher's disease), has been decreased in current populations by the application of genetic screening.[127]

Pleiotropy occurs when one gene influences multiple, seemingly unrelated phenotypic traits, an example being phenylketonuria, which is a human disease that affects multiple systems but is caused by one gene defect.[128] Andrzej Pękalski, from the University of Wrocław, argues that eugenics can cause harmful loss of genetic diversity if a eugenics program selects a pleiotropic gene that could possibly be associated with a positive trait. Pekalski uses the example of a coercive government eugenics program that prohibits people with myopia from breeding but has the unintended consequence of also selecting against high intelligence since the two go together.[129]

Loss of genetic diversity[edit]

Eugenic policies could also lead to loss of genetic diversity, in which case a culturally accepted "improvement" of the gene pool could very likely—as evidenced in numerous instances in isolated island populations —result in extinction due to increased vulnerability to disease, reduced ability to adapt to environmental change, and other factors both known and unknown. A long-term, species-wide eugenics plan might lead to a scenario similar to this because the elimination of traits deemed undesirable would reduce genetic diversity by definition.[130]

Edward M. Miller claims that, in any one generation, any realistic program should make only minor changes in a fraction of the gene pool, giving plenty of time to reverse direction if unintended consequences emerge, reducing the likelihood of the elimination of desirable genes.[131] Miller also argues that any appreciable reduction in diversity is so far in the future that little concern is needed for now.[131]

While the science of genetics has increasingly provided means by which certain characteristics and conditions can be identified and understood, given the complexity of human genetics, culture, and psychology, at this point no agreed objective means of determining which traits might be ultimately desirable or undesirable. Some diseases such as sickle-cell disease and cystic fibrosis respectively confer immunity to malaria and resistance to cholera when a single copy of the recessive allele is contained within the genotype of the individual. Reducing the instance of sickle-cell disease genes in Africa where malaria is a common and deadly disease could indeed have extremely negative net consequences.

However, some genetic diseases cause people to consider some elements of eugenics.

Ethics[edit]

Societal and political consequences of eugenics call for a place in the discussion on the ethics behind the eugenics movement.[132] Many of the ethical concerns regarding eugenics arise from its controversial past, prompting a discussion on what place, if any, it should have in the future. Advances in science have changed eugenics. In the past, eugenics had more to do with sterilization and enforced reproduction laws.[133] Now, in the age of a progressively mapped genome, embryos can be tested for susceptibility to disease, gender, and genetic defects, and alternative methods of reproduction such as in vitro fertilization are becoming more common.[134] Therefore, eugenics is no longer ex post facto regulation of the living but instead preemptive action on the unborn.[135]

With this change, however, there are ethical concerns which lack adequate attention, and which must be addressed before eugenic policies can be properly implemented in the future. Sterilized individuals, for example, could volunteer for the procedure, albeit under incentive or duress, or at least voice their opinion. The unborn fetus on which these new eugenic procedures are performed cannot speak out, as the fetus lacks the voice to consent or to express his or her opinion.[136] Philosophers disagree about the proper framework for reasoning about such actions, which change the very identity and existence of future persons.[137]

Opposition[edit]

In the decades after World War II, the term "eugenics" had taken on a negative connotation and became increasingly unpopular within academic science. Many organizations and journals that had their origins in the eugenics movement began to distance themselves from the philosophy, as when Eugenics Quarterly became Social Biology in 1969.

A common criticism of eugenics is that "it inevitably leads to measures that are unethical".[138] Some fear future "eugenics wars" as the worst-case scenario: the return of coercive state-sponsored genetic discrimination and human rights violations such as compulsory sterilization of persons with genetic defects, the killing of the institutionalized and, specifically, segregation and genocide of races perceived as inferior.[139] Health law professor George Annas and technology law professor Lori Andrews are prominent advocates of the position that the use of these technologies could lead to such human-posthuman caste warfare.[140][141]

In his 2003 book Enough: Staying Human in an Engineered Age, environmental ethicist Bill McKibben argued at length against germinal choice technology and other advanced biotechnological strategies for human enhancement. He writes that it would be morally wrong for humans to tamper with fundamental aspects of themselves (or their children) in an attempt to overcome universal human limitations, such as vulnerability to aging, maximum life span and biological constraints on physical and cognitive ability. Attempts to "improve" themselves through such manipulation would remove limitations that provide a necessary context for the experience of meaningful human choice. He claims that human lives would no longer seem meaningful in a world where such limitations could be overcome with technology. Even the goal of using germinal choice technology for clearly therapeutic purposes should be relinquished, since it would inevitably produce temptations to tamper with such things as cognitive capacities. He argues that it is possible for societies to benefit from renouncing particular technologies, using as examples Ming China, Tokugawa Japan and the contemporary Amish.[142]

Endorsement[edit]

Some, for example Nathaniel C. Comfort from Johns Hopkins University, claim that the change from state-led reproductive-genetic decision-making to individual choice has moderated the worst abuses of eugenics by transferring the decision-making from the state to the patient and their family.[143] Comfort suggests that "the eugenic impulse drives us to eliminate disease, live longer and healthier, with greater intelligence, and a better adjustment to the conditions of society; and the health benefits, the intellectual thrill and the profits of genetic bio-medicine are too great for us to do otherwise."[144] Others, such as bioethicist Stephen Wilkinson of Keele University and Honorary Research Fellow Eve Garrard at the University of Manchester, claim that some aspects of modern genetics can be classified as eugenics, but that this classification does not inherently make modern genetics immoral. In a co-authored publication by Keele University, they stated that "[e]ugenics doesn't seem always to be immoral, and so the fact that PGD, and other forms of selective reproduction, might sometimes technically be eugenic, isn't sufficient to show that they're wrong."[145]

In their book published in 2000, From Chance to Choice: Genetics and Justice, bioethicists Allen Buchanan, Dan Brock, Norman Daniels and Daniel Wikler argued that liberal societies have an obligation to encourage as wide an adoption of eugenic enhancement technologies as possible (so long as such policies do not infringe on individuals' reproductive rights or exert undue pressures on prospective parents to use these technologies) in order to maximize public health and minimize the inequalities that may result from both natural genetic endowments and unequal access to genetic enhancements.[146]

Original position, a hypothetical situation developed by American philosopher John Rawls, has been used as an argument for negative eugenics.[147][148]

See also[edit]

References[edit]

Notes

  1. ^ Currell, Susan; Cogdell, Christina (2006). Popular Eugenics: National Efficiency and American Mass Culture in The 1930s. Athens, Ohio: Ohio University Press. p. 203. ISBN 978-0-8214-1691-4.
  2. ^ "εὐγενής". Greek Word Study Tool. Medford, Massachusetts: Tufts University. 2009. Retrieved 19 October 2017. Database includes entries from A Greek–English Lexicon and other English dictionaries of Ancient Greek.
  3. ^ "γένος". Greek Word Study Tool. 2009. Retrieved 19 October 2017.
  4. ^ "Eugenics". Unified Medical Language System (Psychological Index Terms). Bethesda, Maryland: National Library of Medicine. 2009. Archived from the original on 16 October 2010. Retrieved 19 October 2017.
  5. ^ Galton, Francis (July 1904). "Eugenics: Its Definition, Scope, and Aims". The American Journal of Sociology. X (1): 82. Bibcode:1904Natur..70...82.. doi:10.1038/070082a0. Archived from the original on 3 November 2007. Retrieved 27 December 2010. Eugenics is the science which deals with all influences that improve the inborn qualities of a race; also with those that develop them to the utmost advantage.
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  14. ^ Tacitus. Germania.XII "Traitors and deserters are hanged on trees; the coward, the unwarlike, the man stained with abominable vices, is plunged into the mire of the morass, with a hurdle put over him."
  15. ^ Sanders, Karin (2009). Bodies in the Bog and the Archaeological Imagination. University of Chicago Press. p. 62. ISBN 978-0226734040. Tacitus's Germania, read through this kind of filter, became a manual for racial and sexual eugenics
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  19. ^ Galton, Francis (1874). "On men of science, their nature and their nurture". Proceedings of the Royal Institution of Great Britain. 7: 227–236.
  20. ^ a b Bowler, Peter J., Evolution: The History of an Idea, 3rd Ed., University of California Press, 2003, pp. 308–310.
  21. ^ a b Hansen, Randall (2005). "Eugenics". In Gibney, Matthew J.; Hansen, Randall. Eugenics: Immigration and Asylum from 1990 to Present. ABC-CLIO. Retrieved 23 September 2013.
  22. ^ James D., Watson; Berry, Andrew (2009). DNA: The Secret of Life. Knopf.
  23. ^ Blom 2008, p. 336.
  24. ^ Allen, Garland E. (2004). "Was Nazi eugenics created in the US?". EMBO Reports. 5 (5): 451–452. doi:10.1038/sj.embor.7400158. PMC 1299061.
  25. ^ a b c Baker, G. J. (2014). "Christianity and Eugenics: The Place of Religion in the British Eugenics Education Society and the American Eugenics Society, c.1907–1940". Social History of Medicine. 27 (2): 281–302. doi:10.1093/shm/hku008. PMC 4001825. PMID 24778464.
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  28. ^ "The National Office of Eugenics in Belgium". Science. 57 (1463): 46. 12 January 1923. Bibcode:1923Sci....57R..46.. doi:10.1126/science.57.1463.46.
  29. ^ dos Santos, Sales Augusto; Hallewell, Laurence (January 2002). "Historical Roots of the 'Whitening' of Brazil". Latin American Perspectives. 29 (1): 61–82. doi:10.1177/0094582X0202900104. JSTOR 3185072.
  30. ^ McLaren, Angus (1990). Our Own Master Race: Eugenics in Canada, 1885–1945. Oxford University Press. ISBN 978-0-7710-5544-7.[page needed]
  31. ^ Black 2003, p. 240.
  32. ^ Black 2003, p. 286.
  33. ^ Black 2003, p. 40.
  34. ^ Black 2003, p. 45.
  35. ^ Black 2003, Chapter 6: The United States of Sterilization.
  36. ^ Black 2003, p. 237.
  37. ^ Black 2003, Chapter 5: Legitimizing Raceology.
  38. ^ Black 2003, Chapter 9: Mongrelization.
  39. ^ Ferrante, Joan (1 January 2010). Sociology: A Global Perspective. Cengage Learning. pp. 259 ff. ISBN 978-0-8400-3204-1.
  40. ^ Turda, Marius (2010). "Race, Science and Eugenics in the Twentieth Century". In Bashford, Alison; Levine, Philippa. The Oxford Handbook of the History of Eugenics. Oxford University Press. pp. 72–73. ISBN 978-0-19-988829-0.
  41. ^ "Consumption: Its Cause and Cure" An Address by Dr Halliday Sutherland on 4 September 1917, published by the Red Triangle Press.
  42. ^ "Lancelot Hogben, who developed his critique of eugenics and distaste for racism in the period...he spent as Professor of Zoology at the University of Cape Town". Alison Bashford and Philippa Levine, The Oxford Handbook of the History of Eugenics. Oxford; Oxford University Press, 2010 ISBN 0199706530 (p.200)
  43. ^ "Whatever their disagreement on the numbers, Haldane, Fisher, and most geneticists could support Jennings's warning: To encourage the expectation that the sterilization of defectives will "solve the problem of hereditary defects, close up the asylums for feebleminded and insane, do away with prisons, is only to subject society to deception". Daniel J. Kevles, In the Name of Eugenics. University of California Press, 1985. ISBN 0520057635 (p. 166).
  44. ^ Congar, Yves M.-J. (1953). The Catholic Church and the Race Question (pdf). Paris, France: UNESCO. Retrieved 3 July 2015. 4. The State is not entitled to deprive an individual of his procreative power simply for material (eugenic) purposes. But it is entitled to isolate individuals who are sick and whose progeny would inevitably be seriously tainted.
  45. ^ Bashford, Alison; Levine, Philippa (24 September 2010). The Oxford Handbook of the History of Eugenics. Oxford University Press, USA. ISBN 9780195373141 – via Google Books.
  46. ^ Pope Pius XI. "Casti connubii".
  47. ^ Ridley, Matt (1999). Genome: The Autobiography of a Species in 23 Chapters. New York: HarperCollins. pp. 290–291. ISBN 978-0-06-089408-5.
  48. ^ Black 2003, pp. 274–295.
  49. ^ a b Black 2003.
  50. ^ Lynn 2001. p. 18 "By the middle decades of the twentieth century, eugenics had become widely accepted throughout the whole of the economically developed world, with the exception of the Soviet Union."
  51. ^ Turner, Jacky (2010). Animal Breeding, Welfare and Society. Routledge. p. 296. ISBN 978-1844075898.
  52. ^ Clapham, Andrew (2007). Human Rights: A Very Short Introduction'. Oxford University Press. pp. 29–31. ISBN 9780199205523.
  53. ^ Article 2 of the Convention defines genocide as any of the following acts committed with the intent to destroy, in whole or in part, a national, ethnic, racial or religious group, as such as:
    • Killing members of the group;
    • Causing serious bodily or mental harm to members of the group;
    • Deliberately inflicting on the group conditions of life calculated to bring about its physical destruction in whole or in part;
    • Imposing measures intended to prevent births within the group;
    • Forcibly transferring children of the group to another group.
    See the Convention on the Prevention and Punishment of the Crime of Genocide.
  54. ^ "Charter of Fundamental Rights of the European Union". Article 3, Section 2.
  55. ^ Meilhan, Pierre & Brumfield, Ben (January 25, 2014). "Peru will not prosecute former President over sterilization campaign". CNN.com. CNN. Retrieved 19 October 2017.
  56. ^ Dikötter, F. (1998). Imperfect Conceptions: Medical Knowledge, Birth Defects, and Eugenics in China. Columbia University Press.
  57. ^ Miller, Geoffrey (2013). "2013: What Should We Be Worried About? Chinese Eugenics". Edge. Edge Foundation. Retrieved 30 August 2014.
  58. ^ Dikötter, F. (1999). "'The legislation imposes decisions': Laws about eugenics in China". UNESCO Courier. 1.
  59. ^ Antelava, Natalia (12 April 2012). "Uzbekistan's policy of secretly sterilizing women". BBC News. Retrieved 30 August 2014.
  60. ^ Johnson, Corey G. (20 June 2014). "Calif. female inmates sterilized illegally". USA Today. Retrieved 30 August 2014.
  61. ^ Epstein, Charles J. (1 November 2003). "Is modern genetics the new eugenics?". Genetics in Medicine. 5 (6): 469–475. doi:10.1097/01.GIM.0000093978.77435.17.
  62. ^ Simoncelli, Tania (2003). "Pre-implantation Genetic Diagnosis and Selection: From disease prevention to customised conception" (PDF). Different Takes. 24. Archived from the original (PDF) on 18 October 2013. Retrieved 18 September 2013.
  63. ^ Dawkins, Richard (2006). "From the Afterward". The Herald. Glasgow. Retrieved 17 October 2013.
  64. ^ Chan, Ying-kit (4 October 2016). "Eugenics in Postcolonial Singapore". Blynkt.com. Berlin. Retrieved 19 October 2017.
  65. ^ "13 Controversies of Lee Kuan Yew". MustShareNews.com. Singapore. 10 March 2015. Retrieved 19 October 2017.
  66. ^ "Report of the IBC on Updating Its Reflection on the Human Genome and Human Rights" (PDF). International Bioethics Committee. 2 October 2015. p. 27. Retrieved 22 October 2015. The goal of enhancing individuals and the human species by engineering the genes related to some characteristics and traits is not to be confused with the barbarous projects of eugenics that planned the simple elimination of human beings considered as ‘imperfect’ on an ideological basis. However, it impinges upon the principle of respect for human dignity in several ways. It weakens the idea that the differences among human beings, regardless of the measure of their endowment, are exactly what the recognition of their equality presupposes and therefore protects. It introduces the risk of new forms of discrimination and stigmatization for those who cannot afford such enhancement or simply do not want to resort to it. The arguments that have been produced in favour of the so-called liberal eugenics do not trump the indication to apply the limit of medical reasons also in this case.
  67. ^ Silver, Lee M. (1998). Remaking Eden: Cloning and Beyond in a Brave New World. Harper Perennial. ISBN 978-0-380-79243-6. OCLC 40094564.
  68. ^ Thomas, Gareth M.; Rothman, Barbara Katz (April 2016). "Keeping the Backdoor to Eugenics Ajar?: Disability and the Future of Prenatal Screening". AMA Journal of Ethics. 18 (4): 406–415. doi:10.1001/journalofethics.2016.18.4.stas1-1604. PMID 27099190. Retrieved 2 September 2016. We argue that prenatal screening (and specifically NIPT) for Down syndrome can be considered a form of contemporary eugenics, in that it effaces, devalues, and possibly prevents the births of people with the condition.
  69. ^ Galton, Francis (1883). Inquiries into Human Faculty and its Development. London: Macmillan Publishers. p. 199.
  70. ^ "Correspondence between Francis Galton and Charles Darwin". Galton.org. Retrieved 28 November 2011.
  71. ^ "The Correspondence of Charles Darwin". Darwin Correspondence Project. University of Cambridge. Archived from the original on 24 January 2012. Retrieved 28 November 2011.
  72. ^ Blom 2008, pp. 335–336.
  73. ^ Ward, Lester Frank; Palmer Cape, Emily; Simons, Sarah Emma (1918). "Eugenics, Euthenics and Eudemics". Glimpses of the Cosmos. G. P. Putnam's sons. pp. 382 ff. Retrieved 11 April 2012.
  74. ^ Cited in Black 2003, p. 18
  75. ^ a b Spektorowski, Alberto; Ireni-Saban, Liza (2013). Politics of Eugenics: Productionism, Population, and National Welfare. London: Routledge. p. 24. ISBN 978-0-203-74023-1. Retrieved 16 January 2017. As an applied science, thus, the practice of eugenics referred to everything from prenatal care for mothers to forced sterilization and euthanasia. Galton divided the practice of eugenics into two types—positive and negative—both aimed at improving the human race through selective breeding.
  76. ^ Haldane, J. (1940). "Lysenko and Genetics". Science and Society. 4 (4).
  77. ^ A discussion of the shifting meanings of the term can be found in Paul, Diane (1995). Controlling Human Heredity: 1865 to the Present. New Jersey: Humanities Press. ISBN 978-1-57392-343-9.
  78. ^ Black, Edwin (2004). War Against the Weak. Thunder's Mouth Press. p. 370. ISBN 978-1-56858-321-1.
  79. ^ Black, Edwin (2004). War Against the Weak. Thunder's Mouth Press. p. 370. ISBN 978-1-56858-321-1.
  80. ^ Worrall, Simon (24 July 2016). "The Gene: Science's Most Dangerous Idea". National Geographic.
  81. ^ White, Susan (28 June 2017). "LibGuides: The Sociology of Science and Technology: Pseudoscience". Library of University of Princeton. Retrieved 12 September 2017.
  82. ^ Salgirli, S. G. (July 2011). "Eugenics for the doctors: Medicine and social control in 1930s Turkey". Journal of the History of Medicine and Allied Sciences. 66 (3): 281–312. doi:10.1093/jhmas/jrq040. PMID 20562206.
  83. ^ a b Glad, John (2008). Future Human Evolution: Eugenics in the Twenty-First Century (PDF). Hermitage Publishers. ISBN 978-1-55779-154-2.
  84. ^ Pine, Lisa (1997). Nazi Family Policy, 1933–1945. Berg. pp. 19 ff. ISBN 978-1-85973-907-5. Retrieved 11 April 2012.
  85. ^ Entine, John (30 December 2014). "Let's (Cautiously) Celebrate the 'New Eugenics'". The Huffington Post. Retrieved 2 May 2015.
  86. ^ Lynn 2001. Part III. The Implementation of Classical Eugenics pp. 137–244 Part IV. The New Eugenics pp. 245–320
  87. ^ Lynn 2001. pp. 165–186
  88. ^ Lynn 2001. pp. 169–170
  89. ^ Lynn 2001. pp. 170–172
  90. ^ Lynn 2001. pp. 172–174
  91. ^ Lynn 2001. pp. 174–176
  92. ^ Lynn 2001. pp. 176–178
  93. ^ Lynn 2001. pp. 179–181
  94. ^ Lynn 2001. pp. 181–182
  95. ^ Lynn 2001. pp. 182–185
  96. ^ Lynn 2001. pp. 187–204
  97. ^ Lynn 2001. pp. 188–189
  98. ^ Lynn 2001. pp. 189–190
  99. ^ Lynn 2001. pp. 190–191
  100. ^ Lynn 2001. pp. 191–192
  101. ^ Lynn 2001. pp. 194–195
  102. ^ Lynn 2001. pp. 196–199. Quote: "There is, nevertheless, a good case for reviving the sterilization of the mentally retarded and criminals. It is indisputable on both empirical and theorethical ground that many of these people transmit their characteristics to their children by both genetic and environmental processes."
  103. ^ Lynn 2001. pp. 199–201. First quote: "The rationale for this sentencing policy was that the judges considered these women unfit to rear children and that they should therefore be prevented from having more, at least for a few years." Second quote: "In these and similar cases many people will no doubt accept that the judges were right in deciding that the women were unfit mothers and likely to cause harm to any future children and that it would be desirable to prevent further pregnancies. It is preferable for these women to be put on probation conditional on temporary sterilization than to send them to prison, which in most cases would serve little useful purpose. These judges' decisions were not made ostensibly on eugenic grounds, but they furthered the eugenic objective of preventing these women from having children, at least for a limited period. The eugenic objective should be to support these judicial sentences and to promote their use more often, together with the stipulation of longer periods of contraception and, preferably, permanent sterilization"
  104. ^ Lynn 2001. pp. 201–203. Quote: "A better alternative, from the point of view of reducing future criminal offending and the promotion of eugenics, would be for judges to offer convicted male criminals the alternatives of imprisonment or castration accompanied by probation."
  105. ^ Lynn 2001. pp. 205–214
  106. ^ Istvan, Zoltan (14 August 2014). "It's time to consider restricting human breeding". Wired UK. Retrieved 19 October 2017.
  107. ^ Lynn 2001. pp. 211–213. Richard Lynn argued that to have an effective licensing program, reversible sterilization methods should be used. Those who wish to have children would obtain the licence and have the sterilization reversed. Lynn stated that the proposals made by Francis Galton, Hugh LaFollette and John Westman would not be effective from the eugenicists' viewpoint, since those without licences could still have children. The proposal by David Lykken would be only slightly effective.
  108. ^ Lynn 2001. pp. 215–224
  109. ^ Lynn 2001. pp. 215–217
  110. ^ Lynn 2001. pp. 217–219
  111. ^ Lynn 2001. p. 219
  112. ^ Lynn 2001. pp. 220–221. Quote: "While it can be confidently expected that elites would respond to financial incentives to have children and to penalties for childlessness by increasing their fertility, they might not do this to the extent that would be desired. Ideally a program of positive eugenics would increase the fertility of the elite to perhaps around four children per couple; and at the same time a complementary program of negative eugenics would reduce the fertility of those with low intelligence and psychopathic personality to zero.
  113. ^ Lynn 2001. pp. 222–224. Quote: "The final strategy for the promotion of positive eugenics would consist of the acceptance of good-quality immigrants."
  114. ^ Lynn 2001. p. 246
  115. ^ Redvaldsen, David (26 June 2014). "Eugenics, socialism and artificial insemination: The public career of Herbert Brewer". Historical Research. 88 (239): 138–160. doi:10.1111/1468-2281.12074.
  116. ^ Lynn 2001. p. 247
  117. ^ Lynn 2001. pp. 248–251
  118. ^ Lynn 2001. p. 252
  119. ^ Lynn 2001. p. 253
  120. ^ Lynn 2001. p. 254
  121. ^ Lynn 2001. pp. 254–255
  122. ^ a b Blom 2008, pp. 336–7.
  123. ^ "Social Origins of Eugenics". Eugenicsarchive.org. Retrieved 19 October 2017.
  124. ^ Carlson, Elof Axel (2002). "Scientific Origins of Eugenics". Image Archive on the American Eugenics Movement. Dolan DNA Learning Center, Cold Spring Harbor Laboratory. Retrieved 3 October 2013.
  125. ^ Leonard, Thomas C. (Tim) (Fall 2005). "Retrospectives: Eugenics and Economics in the Progressive Era" (pdf). Journal of Economic Perspectives. 19 (4): 207–224. doi:10.1257/089533005775196642. Retrieved 3 October 2013.
  126. ^ a b "Heterozygote test / Screening programmes — DRZE". Drze.de. Retrieved 19 October 2017.
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  129. ^ Jones, A. (2000). "Effect of eugenics on the evolution of populations". European Physical Journal B. 17 (2): 329–332. Bibcode:2000EPJB...17..329P. doi:10.1007/s100510070148.
  130. ^ (Galton 2001, 48)[full citation needed]
  131. ^ a b Miller, Edward M. (1997). "Eugenics: Economics for the Long Run". Research in Biopolitics. 5: 391–416.
  132. ^ Bentwich, M. (2013). "On the inseparability of gender eugenics, ethics, and public policy: An Israeli perspective". American Journal of Bioethics. 13 (10): 43–45. doi:10.1080/15265161.2013.828128. PMID 24024807.
  133. ^ Fischer, B. A. (2012). "Maltreatment of people with serious mental illness in the early 20th century: A focus on Nazi Germany and eugenics in America". Journal of Nervous and Mental Disease. 200 (12): 1096–1100. doi:10.1097/NMD.0b013e318275d391. PMID 23197125.
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  137. ^ Roberts, M. A. "The Nonidentity Problem". Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy. Stanford University. Retrieved 18 October 2016.
  138. ^ Lynn 2001. The Ethical Principles of Classical Eugenics – Conclusions P. 241 Quote: "A number of the opponents of eugenics have resorted to the slippery slope argument, which states that although a number of eugenic measures are unobjectionable in themselves, they could lead to further measures that would be unethical. This argument is unpersuasive because all sorts of measures that are acceptable might, if taken to extremes, lead to other measures that are unacceptable."
  139. ^ Black, Edwin (2003). War Against the Weak: Eugenics and America's Campaign to Create a Master Race. Four Walls Eight Windows. ISBN 978-1-56858-258-0.
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  145. ^ Wilkinson, Stephen; Garrard, Eve (2013). Eugenics and the Ethics of Selective Reproduction (PDF). Keele University. ISBN 978-0-9576160-0-4. Retrieved 18 September 2013.
  146. ^ Buchanan, Allen; Brock, Dan W.; Daniels, Norman; Wikler, Daniel (2000). From Chance to Choice: Genetics and Justice. Cambridge University Press. ISBN 978-0-521-66977-1. OCLC 41211380.
  147. ^ Shaw, p. 147. Quote: "What Rawls says is that "Over time a society is to take steps to preserve the general level of natural abilities and to prevent the diffusion of serious defects." The key words here are "preserve" and "prevent". Rawls clearly envisages only the use of negative eugenics as a preventative measure to ensure a good basic level of genetic health for future generations. To jump from this to "make the later generations as genetically talented as possible," as Pence does, is a masterpiece of misinterpretation. This, then, is the sixth argument against positive eugenics: the Veil of Ignorance argument. Those behind the Veil in Rawls' Original Position would agree to permit negative, but not positive eugenics. This is a more complex variant of the Consent argument, as the Veil of Ignorance merely forces us to adopt a position of hypotethical consent to particular principles of justice."
  148. ^ Harding, John R. (1991). "Beyond Abortion: Human Genetics and the New Eugenics". Pepperdine Law Review. 18 (3): 489–491. Retrieved 2016-06-02. Rawls arrives at the difference principle by considering how justice might be drawn from a hypothetical "original position.' A person in the original position operates behind a "veil of ignorance" that prevents her from knowing any information about herself such as social status, physical or mental capabilities, or even her belief system. Only from such a position of universal equality can principles of justice be drawn. In establishing how to distribute social primary goods, for example, "rights and liberties, powers and opportunities, income and wealth" and self-respect, Rawls determines that a person operating from the original position would develop two principles. First, liberties ascribed to each individual should be as extensive as possible without infringing upon the liberties of others. Second, social primary goods should be distributed to the greatest advantage of everyone and by mechanisms that allow equal opportunity to all. ... Genetic engineering should not be permitted merely for the enhancement of physical attractiveness because that would not benefit the least advantaged. Arguably, resources should be concentrated on genetic therapy to address disease and genetic defects. However, such a result is not required under Rawls' theory. Genetic enhancement of those already intellectually gifted, for example, might result in even greater benefit to the least advantaged as a result of the gifted individual's improved productivity. Moreover, Rawls asserts that using genetic engineering to prevent the most serious genetic defects is a matter of intergenerational justice. Such actions are necessary in terms of what the present generation owes to later generations.

Bibliography

Histories of eugenics (academic accounts)
Histories of hereditarian thought
  • Barkan, Elazar (1992). The Retreat of Scientific Racism: Changing Concepts of Race in Britain and the United States Between the World Wars. New York: Cambridge University Press.
  • Ewen, Elizabeth; Ewen, Stuart (2006). Typecasting: On the Arts and Sciences of Human Inequality (1st ed.). New York: Seven Stories Press. ISBN 978-1-58322-735-0.
  • Gould, Stephen Jay (1981). The Mismeasure of Man. New York: Norton. ISBN 978-0-393-01489-1.
  • Gillette, Aaron (2007). The Nature–Nurture Debate in the Twentieth Century. New York: Palgrave Macmillan. ISBN 978-0-230-10845-5.
Criticisms of eugenics

External links[edit]

  • Works related to Eugenics at Wikisource
  • Quotations related to Eugenics at Wikiquote
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