Eugenics: Improving The Human Race?

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Recommended: Advantages and disadvantages of eugenics

The idea that one can improve the human race by careful selection of those who mate and produce offspring is called eugenics. It is better understood as the process of selective breeding can improve human society. The term eugenics is from the greek, meaning “well-born”. The idea of eugenics is to have a society be abundant with many wanted traits, during a movement called the melting pot where people tried to solve their problems with the use of technology.

Inquiries into Human Faculty and Its Development, is the book in which Sir Francis Galton first mentioned the term eugenics. In the book he says that “humans believe that humans were disrupting evolution in maintaining the weak and sickly through social welfare programs, mental institutions and the like.”

In the late 19th and 20th century almost every country had a eugenics policy in place. Indiana was the first state to establish such laws in 1907. By 1937 about 27 other states in America also had similar laws. Over 55,000 sterilizations were preformed in the United States by the year 1964. President Theodore Roosevelt wrote, “it is obvious that if in the future racial qualities are to be improved, the improving must be wrought mainly by favoring the fecundity of the worthy types” (Chase, p.15).

Countries had corrective and negative eugenics. Corrective eugenics were used to make races stronger. Negative eugenics were used to segregate and sterilize countries. This destroys moral standards.

Some eugenics believe that intelligence, criminality and pauperism are passed down through hereditary traits. Other eugenicists believe that only certain nationalities of people have defective genes. One influence on eugenics was an English Philosopher, Herbert Spencer. He was bes...

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Works Cited

"eugenics." The American Heritage® New Dictionary of Cultural Literacy, Third Edition. Houghton Mifflin Company, 2005. 06 Apr. 2011. .

"What Is Eugenics? An Introduction to Eugenics and the History of Eugenics." Find Health, Education, Science & Technology Articles, Reviews, How-To and Tech Tips At Bright Hub - Apply To Be A Writer Today! Ed. Paul Arnold. Paul Arnold. Web. 07 Apr. 2011. .

Steven Selden, "Conservative Ideology and Curriculum," Educational Theory 3 (Summer 1977), p. 218.

Eugenics from BookRags Student Essays. ©2000-2006 by BookRags, Inc. All rights reserved.

A Study of Eugenics. 06 Aug 2006. eCheat. 06 Apr 2011 .

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