Slide 1

Slide 2 - Galton believed that the natural selection mechanism was broken due to philanthropy of the rich [1] - Galton defined eugenics as artificial selection - At this early stage, another definition by Galton was the science of improvement of the human race germ plasm through better breeding Sir Francis Galton, father of eugenics Slide 3 Slide 4 - Eugenics is a term that has been defined by many different people in many different ways - There are actually two different types of eugenics, positive eugenics and negative eugenics - Generally, eugenics is the belief that people with favourable genes are more beneficial to a society - Many people are not familiar with the term eugenics Slide 5 - The concepts of eugenics have actually existed long before the Common Era of Man - Ancient Greek principles stated that if a man was a peasant, his children would also be peasants [4] - 1798 essay by Thomas Malthus laid the groundwork for modern eugenics - Cousin of Charles Darwin, Sir Francis Galton, first coined the term eugenics in 1883 Slide 6 -Charles B. Davenport was one of the most influential geneticists in the beginning of the 20 th century [3] - His initial definition of the aim of eugenics was to make young people fall in love intelligently - He later went on to claim that people had genes in them for feeblemindedness - He suggested that people with these genes should be sterilized in order to prevent their reproduction Slide 7 -Davenport had begun to influence many people by the 1910s that his ideas on eugenics were correct - The Binet immigration test was adopted in America in 1912: 80% failure rate - A book in 1916 by avid eugenicist Madison Grant called The Passing of the Great Race, just one of many eugenics books being written at the time, brilliantly summarized the general idea of eugenics Slide 8