What is eugenics? / by Leonard Darwin.

  • Leonard Darwin
Date:
1932
Catalogue details

Licence: Attribution-NonCommercial-NoDerivatives 4.0 International (CC BY-NC-ND 4.0)

Credit: What is eugenics? / by Leonard Darwin. Source: Wellcome Collection.

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    Chapter VI The Men we Want IF our object is to try to improve the breed of man, should we not first of all decide on the kind of man most to be desired ? To fix on all the qualities of the ideal man would probably do more harm than good, because to do so would be more likely to discourage than to encourage us in our efforts. Something must, however, be said on this subject. We can at all events assert that there are many kinds of men that we do not want. These include the criminal, the insane, the imbecile, the feeble in mind, the diseased at birth, the deformed, the deaf, the blind, etc., etc. How to lessen their numbers will be considered in later chapters. It has been suggested that, whilst getting rid of these extremely imdesirable types, we should endeavour to create a group of supermen at the other end of the scale. If a few perfect individuals were to appear on earth, and if their perfection were to be acknowledged by all, this would be very good. These supermen would rule over us to our great contentment. This idea is, however, utterly unpractical. The desire to dominate or lead other men is a very deeply-seated quality. It would be very difficult, and not altogether beneficial, to get rid of it. This being the case, any group of supermen appearing in our midst would probably bully or harass their fellow citizens, until the mob rose up and drove them from power or exterminated them. The creation of supermen is to be condemned because it would lead to either tyranny or rebellion. Neither should our aim be to create various inferior castes of human beings, such as would be especially adapted to do the dirty work of the world without complaint. No doubt 0 26