Page 120 - The Evolution Impasse 1

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The people who first proposed the Following the development of Dar-
theory of eugenics were Darwinists. winism and the idea of eugenics, racist
Charles Darwin’s nephew, Francis Gal- scientists in Germany began openly ad-
ton, and his son Leonard Darwin led the vocating the killing of unwanted indivi-
eugenics movement in Britain. From duals. One of these scientists, Adolf Jost,
that point of view, the concept of euge- called for unwanted people to be medi-
nics emerged as a natural consequence cally put down in his 1895 book Das
of Darwinism. That fact was specially Recht auf den Todt (“The Right to Die”).
emphasized in publications supporting Jost claimed that “the state needs to as-
eugenics – “Eugenics is mankind direc- sume the responsibility for killing indivi-
ting its own evolution,” they stated. duals for the health of the social orga-
According to K. Ludmerer, the idea nism.”
of eugenics was as old as Plato’s famous Jost was the intellectual inspiration
work The Republic. However, Ludmerer behind Adolf Hitler, who would emerge
states that Darwinism was the reason onto the world stage 30 years later.
why interest in the idea increased: Along the same lines, Hitler said, “The
. . . modern eugenics thought arose only state must ensure that only healthy chil-
in the nineteenth century. The emergence dren exist. The visibly sick and those
of interest in eugenics during that cen- carrying infectious diseases must be
tury had multiple roots. The most impor- declared to be unfit.” 151
tant was the theory of evolution, for
Shortly after coming to power, Hitler
Francis Galton’s ideas on eugenics—and
initiated an official policy of eugenics,
it was he who created the term “euge-
which he summarized in these words:
nics”—were a direct logical outgrowth of
the scientific doctrine elaborated by his Mental and physical education occupy
cousin, Charles an important place for the state, but hu-
Darwin. 150 man selection is just as important. The
state has a responsibility to declare that
the genetically sick or individuals with
infectious diseases are unfit to breed . . . .
And that responsibility must be ruthlessly

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THE EVOLUTION IMPASSE I