Eugenics: So the Nazis took a hint from Americans?

Factual Questions
1

When I was in Sweden over Christmas, my friends (in hopes of quelling my excessive, utopic views of Sweden/Scandanavian countries) were explaining to me that Sweden was once the center for “Racial Biology,” and took a large part in informing the Nazis about their exploits.

Well, I’ve been studying eugenics (am I wrong thinking that “Eugenics” and “racial biology” are the same?) and I’ve actually found several articles on “Expanded Acedmic” database search as well as on NPR about America’s role in the Nazi’s developement of Eugenics program.

I’m shocked. Is this generally accepted that the Nazi’s borrowed this lovely “science” from Americans?

2

This sort of “NeoDarwinism” was an idea common in many areas around that time. America had it’s supporters of Eugenics too.

It really started in England with Galton. But it spread across the globe: “Almost all non-Catholic western nations adopted some eugenics legislation. In July 1933 Germany passed a law allowing for the involuntary sterilization of “hereditary and incurable drunkards, sexual criminals, lunatics, and those suffering from an incurable disease which would be passed on to their offspring…”[18] Sweden forcibly sterilized 62,000 “unfits” as part of a eugenics program over a forty-year period. Similar incidents occurred in Canada, United States, Australia, Norway, Finland, Denmark, Estonia, Switzerland and Iceland for people the government declared to be mentally deficient. Singapore practiced a limited form of “positive” eugenics that involved encouraging marriage between college graduates in the hope they would produce better children.[19]” However, after Nazi Germany, America (differing widely by State) likely had the second biggest program. It wasn’t one of America’s proudest moments, but in some case the motives were altruistic, not racist.

Note that at that time, Eugenics was thought to be real solid science, and wasn’t always rooted in racism- although certainly the racists saw & siezed on it as a great tool to further their sick beleifs.

As to your last question “Is this generally accepted that the Nazi’s borrowed this lovely “science” from Americans”- I have never heard anyone expound that beleif, and while I don’t doubt there are plenty of dudes out there ready & willing to balme all of the worlds evils on America, blaming the weird Nazi idea of eugenics on America is certainly NOT “generally accepted”.

3

While Eugenics certainly had some Americans in its thrall, it would be wrong to think it was started by the Americans and infected the innocent Germans. (Or visa versa for that matter.)

Even silly ideas can have deep and broad roots. This is one example.

4

Eugenics started with Galton in England, but what he advocated was “positive Eugenics”, and rewarding “fit families” who produced lots of children. What the Nazis pushed forward with was “negative Eugenics”, which meant ensuring that the “unfit” were not allowed to reproduce.

Negative Eugenics as a science took root in Germany and America relatively simultaneously, and efforts made on both sides of the Atlantic were enthusiastically shared. However, America took the ‘lead’ in allowing negative Eugenics to shape public policy through state sterilization laws, anti-miscenegation laws, and immigration policy. Hitler in Mein Kampf specifically lauded American actions in these regards.

By the time the Nazis took power in Germany, Eugenics was losing steam in America- many of the early proponents of Eugenics such as Goddard had pulled back from their original positions, and the actual science of genetics was taking over the ciriculum. However, there were still plenty of Eugenicists in the United States doing ‘research’, and they were more than happy to share their work and give their praise to Nazi scientists working to eliminate the Jewish strain from Germany.

For a good book mapping the rise of the American Eugenics movement and its ties to Nazi Germany, I recommend Edwin Black’s War Against The Weak. Of course, I’m biased; I was one of his lead researchers and did the footnoting for the book.

5

That’s one of the NPR links was to a story about War Against the Weak. It does sound interesting…depressing, but interesting.

One thing that some of you have been saying is that it died out relatively early in the US, but some of the things that I’m reading are saying that sterilization was going on (in North Carolina for example) until the early 70s…

Is that isolated?

6

Is there anything scientifically wrong with pure eugenics besides people finding it ethically icky? I mean it worked for dog breeders for centuries, I fail to see why it’s not a valid principle for humans, scientifically speaking.

7

Are you including in that forced sterilization?

I tend to think that any mass effort like that incolving societal remodeling is bound to have horrible side effects.

Also, is there any scientific proof that stupid people having kids makes stupid kids, or vice versa for that matter? I know plenty of people who come from good, pure Nordic, stock who turned out to be listless idiots.

Dogs are bred for their temperment and their looks (am I wrong?), yet if you put any of those dogs in certain situations they will become raging, well, animals.

I don’t think there’s any scientific proof that genes determine what you will be.

8

“involving,” not incolving

9

[QUOTE=gitfiddle]

I don’t think there’s any scientific proof that genes determine what you will be.
[/QUOTE]

Not what you’ll be but a lot of traits, definitely. I remember looking a graph in some article that the probability distribution of a child’s IQ is a gaussian with the median very close to the average IQ of his parents. Anybody know where I can find that article?

10

[QUOTE=groman]
Is there anything scientifically wrong with pure eugenics besides people finding it ethically icky? I mean it worked for dog breeders for centuries, I fail to see why it’s not a valid principle for humans, scientifically speaking.
[/QUOTE]

Assume positive eugenics, not negative, so as to sidestep ethics and rights issues. Assume further that we’ve found some way to effectively convince the people we think are more fit to have more children while respecting everyone’s rights and still staying within some sort of budget.

A problem that has come up with dog and cat breeders is unexpected consequences. You decide to breed for, say, folded ears (as in Scottish Fold cats). The folded-ear gene turns out to be linked to skeletal deformities. Or a cat or dog breeder might just breed for a characteristic that isn’t directly linked to a genetic problem, but end up with genetic problems because of other characteristics they’re ignoring. Hip dysplasia is much more common in purebred dogs than in mutts, and dental problems are more common in purebred cats than in moggies. There are numerous examples of dog breeds that have developed temperament problems because they were bred for looks, with temperament a secondary consideration (if at all). We could have some of the same problems with humans if we encouraged, say, intelligent people to breed- you’re ignoring some health problems (or there may be some that you don’t know about), which might end up getting worse.

You might also end up breeding for something that isn’t important in the environment the people end up in, while neglecting or discouraging something that turns out to be very important. Sickle cell trait might end up being a bigger plus than a minus if drug-resistant forms of malaria became more widespread, for example. And there are some traits that are highly valued in a culture at a given time, but might actually pose a disadvantage to the person who has them. Light skin, hair, and eyes would be an example- they make you more prone to skin cancer.

If it’s taken too far, eugenics might decrease human genetic diversity, which makes people more uniformly vulnerable to diseases.

There’s also the fact that, to increase genetic fitness, you should probably be encouraging breeding between individuals as unrelated as possible. That means interracial, cross-cultural, and interfaith marriages, which some people still have a problem with. There are some people who probably would not take it well if the government gave $X to every black/white couple who marry. There would also be a fuss kicked up by members of some groups saying this was an effort to destroy their distinctiveness.

And then, it might just not work. If the traits you’re breeding for are governed by a large number of genes instead of a single gene, selective breeding just isn’t going to do very much to encourage it without running into the monoculture problem. Or a trait might be more affected by environment than by heredity.

11

[QUOTE=groman]
Is there anything scientifically wrong with pure eugenics besides people finding it ethically icky? I mean it worked for dog breeders for centuries, I fail to see why it’s not a valid principle for humans, scientifically speaking.
[/QUOTE]
Guilt by association with Germany’s 3rd Reich. As soon as you mention “good genes” and “selective breeding for physical vigor” people subconciously associate it with Hitler Youth rallies, Blitzkreig, Einsatzgruppe killings and concentration camps.

Then we also get into civil liberty issues: who is to decide who will marry whom? do we get to choose our own mates? Is eugenics to be voluntary or state-mandated?

*I can see the benefits of eugenics: choosing not to reproduce if you know there is a strong chance your children will be afflicted with a genetic disorder, choosing to terminate a pregnancy if the fetus is found to suffer from severe genetic defects.

12

[QUOTE=Anne Neville]
And then, it might just not work. If the traits you’re breeding for are governed by a large number of genes instead of a single gene, selective breeding just isn’t going to do very much to encourage it without running into the monoculture problem. Or a trait might be more affected by environment than by heredity.
[/QUOTE]

All this assumes of course that you are attempting selective breeding and are concerned with genetics alone. If for example you you institute a program that requires that your household to have paid at least X$ in federal income tax each year for the past N years before you can have another child, it is still eugenics but it is not necessarily concerned directly with genetics or selective breeding. This won’t cause any sort of inbreeding problem the way I see it.

13

But still, even if it can suggest IQ, it can’t predict how you’ll use your brain power. There are people of all levels of intelligence who do good, bad, and in between.
I want to make clear that when I mention Eugenics, I’m not talking about what it has evolved into: the study of genetics. I think there’s a lot of good in the study of genetics. I’m only disagreeing that breeding people like dogs doesn’t seem a good idea to me.

I think it all goes back to the negative and positive eugenics that John Corrado mentioned.

14

[QUOTE=groman]
All this assumes of course that you are attempting selective breeding and are concerned with genetics alone.
[/quote]

Isn’t that what eugenics is? :confused:

But it isn’t strictly positive eugenics, either- you’re forbidding people to have children. And that would have some very serious problems- do you force an “unfit” pregnant woman to have an abortion? There would be a great deal of public uproar over that. That’s the sort of issue I was trying to avoid when I confined it to positive eugenics.

And you could still end up with an inbreeding problem, because your parents’ income is an important factor in determining what yours will be. Children of higher income parents get better access to education, which makes them more likely to have the skills to become high-income people themselves. There are also issues of discrimination- people of certain racial or ethnic backgrounds might have a hard time breaking into high-income jobs. Those factors are going to reduce the diversity of the breeding pool of high-income people.

A high income is no guarantee against health problems, either. In fact, it could make some problems more, not less, prevalent. High income people have better access to medical care than low income people, so they are more likely to live and be able to have children if they have a not-immediately-fatal health problem like diabetes. If their children are less intelligent (due to genetics), they might still have more opportunities than more intelligent children of lower income parents, and end up with a higher income.

15

There’s a problem I didn’t even get into- how to measure some qualities. Some are simple- no subsidies for people with certain diseases, for example. But a quality like intelligence or general health are harder to measure objectively. We’ve all known people who were really smart and did really well on standardized tests, but have accomplished squat with their lives. Or there are people who don’t do well on standardized tests, but have talents in other areas and become productive and successful members of society.

16

The Wiki article gives some credence to the notion that Hitler drew on U.S. (comparative) enthusiasm for eugenics. It also makes clear that at least initially one of the more prominent advocates of eugenics of Margaret Sanger, founder of Planned Parenthood.

It is fair to note that eugencis was considered progressive at the time and I seem to recall reading various period novels in which idle young ladies were dilletante eugenics advocates and sufragettes at the same time. It’s also fair to remember that until pretty recently, “charity” was often performed in ways that would, rightly or wrongly, be considered appallingly high-handed or patronizing to the objects of it.

Oh, and I haven’t seen anyone else quote it, so I’ll mention that the revered jurist Oliver Wendell Holmes is also noted for upholding a compulsory sterilization law, with the memorable line, “three generations of imbeciles is enough.”

http://www.law.du.edu/russell/lh/alh/docs/buckvbell.html

17

[QUOTE=Anne Neville]

But it isn’t strictly positive eugenics, either- you’re forbidding people to have children. And that would have some very serious problems- do you force an “unfit” pregnant woman to have an abortion? There would be a great deal of public uproar over that. That’s the sort of issue I was trying to avoid when I confined it to positive eugenics.

[/QUOTE]

I’ll address two points:

a) Eugenics is not concerned with solving all problems, I’m proposing one. Regardless of everything, I feel bringing up the average IQ is a positive thing. Not without problems, not necessarily all that great, we don’t even know what the exact ramifications would be if any, but it’s not going to be net-negative.

b) You do not have to forbid people to have children to have that effect. You can just terminate all social services to the offenders. No welfare, no public health, no government sponsored pre-natal support, no public education, to get ambulance or police assistance you need to leave a deposit before hand. Those that would still have children and fare well, good for them.

18

No, they’ll just take what you have.

It seems to me the last thing any society needs is a caste of uneducated, starving, angry people running towards it with murder in their hearts.

19

[QUOTE=holmes]
No, they’ll just take what you have.

It seems to me the last thing any society needs is a caste of uneducated, starving, angry people running towards it with murder in their hearts.
[/QUOTE]

I am not actually proposing that though, I just gave a hypothetical. The fact that the hoi polloi would revolt is of no concern to the scientific feasibility of eugenics or social darwinism. Besides, revolutions are typically successful because of the aristocratic reliance on the masses and simultaneous pity for them. If it becomes fashionable to hunt proles for sport revolution will no longer be feasible. :wink:

20

But your hypothetical assumes that the goal of “eugenics”, is a higher IQ, that the great unwashed lack… I’m suggesting that we question what a higher IQ really means.

In this case the more valuable IQ manifestation may be organizational skills and the ability to lure your opponents out into the open and kill them as opposed to being able to add numbers in your head really, really fast or write a really detailed dictionary.

In other words, don’t bring a knife to a gun-fight.