Lecture 12: Darwin's Legacy Flashcards
What was the 18th century intellectual movement?
promotion of reason, rational thought, and truth
What was the pursuit of truth through scientific and rational means?
Look for empirical, physical evidence.
What was reason over superstition?
-grounded in science
What new attitudes towards disease emerge during the enlightenment?
New attitudes about bodies, diseases, mechanisms of behaviour (measure things that are normal, abnormal, repeating).
What kind of classification system emerged during the enlightenment?
Classification systems of diseases as ontological entities with discrete symptoms
-science of nosology or systematics of disease
During the enlightenment, clinical post-mortems became___. What is a clinical post-mortem?
- became common
- looking inside the bodies
What did clinical post-mortems lead to?
A decisive shift in medical theory from the humeral system to a more mechanistic view
- We can, therefore, heal it.
- Defect and disease
What did Charles Darwin’s Origin of the Species introduce?
Introduces the theory of natural selection (origins evolve due to interaction with environment). From study on Galapagos Islands (classifying things).
What did Charles Darwin’s Descent of Man discuss?
- confronts human evolution
- introduces idea of evolution
- discussed concept of survival of the fittest
What did Charles Darwin believe about survival of the fittest? Who did this appeal to?
- Concept of survival of the fittest
- Humanitarian impulses harming our race because we aren’t letting survival of the fittest take place
- states, farmers, and progressive folks believed it
What did Francis Galton and Darwin differ on?
Darwin acknowledged cultural influences and believed that some characteristics could be acquired.
Who was the “father of eugenics”?
Francis Galton
Who coined the term “eugenics”?
Francis Galton
What does eugenics mean?
Nobility in birth
When was Francis Galtons original lecture on eugenics? What did he believe and what did eugenics become?
- 1904 original lecture on eugenics, published din 1909 in collection of essays on eugenics
- way of thinking how we should govern our society
- the idea of eugenics becomes a political rallying point
Who coined the term ‘survival of the fittest’?
Herbert Spencer
What is survival of the fittest in the context of this course?
Social and philosophical ideas about how to improve humanity infused with new advances in biology and faith in science.
-Through generations we can alter our biology by who we mate with.
What is the social theory from late 19th Century, which promoted the improvement of the human ‘race’ through various forms of intervention?
Eugenics
What did progressive thinkers believe about eugenics?
- Improve society through science
- “we can improve lives”, promoted improvement of human race
- generational changes
What scientific developments contributed to the eugenics movement?
- statistics (vital and medical)
- better records of families, incomes, etc.
- rise of scientific and medical authority (interventions justified to study and perfect the race)
- fuelled both nature and nurture proponents
What were the social developments that contributed to the eugenics movement?
- North America experienced massive waves of immigration
- Intensified fears about the kind of society that would develop in North America (Canada)
What were the changes in immigration laws?
- control borders
- change our laws to filter in an out
- extremely racist language
- not allowing people to marry cross race
What did the belief that mixing races would lead to?
dilution of the ‘good stock’
What three things were eugenics philosophies reflected in?
1) Nativist attitudes
2) Immigration laws
3) Public health policies
What idea did Eugenics build upon?
The belief that North Americans could avoid the problems of the past
- idea that people who are part animal are coming into country and will infect country
- idea that we can protect our society with barriers and laws to stop this
Why did researchers start tracking certain families?
If we trace poor and inbred families we see they disproportionately contribute to crime, vice, etc. Eugenics believed that we need to get rid of these people.
