human evolution

TooCurious · #21 20th December 2006, 06:57 PM

Here's the thing. Evolution is a description of the phenomena we observe in the world around us. It's descriptive. Eugenics is a set of ideas about what humans should do. It's prescriptive. The first does not by any means necessitate the second. You can't derive an "ought" from an "is."

That said, institutionalized, systematic eugenics strikes me as problematic from a human rights perspective.

Avatar · #22 20th December 2006, 07:23 PM

I'm down with evolution, but eugenics? Its contrary to genetic survival. If your offspring aren't from you then you are the least fit member of the population. You've bought your own extinction.

MrGoodBytes · #23 21st December 2006, 06:32 AM

Originally Posted by Avatar

I'm down with evolution, but eugenics? Its contrary to genetic survival. If your offspring aren't from you then you are the least fit member of the population. You've bought your own extinction.

But that's the whole point of eugenics - the population is more important than the individual.

Pesto · #24 21st December 2006, 03:42 PM

Originally Posted by gluadys

Many past attempts at applying eugenics to humans have been an attempt to increase the proportion of the population which meets some sort of ideal which is classist and/or racist. This sort of Social Darwinism is both unscientific and morally wrong. We don't know what the "ideal" human is, even for the present generation, much less for the far future with different social and environmental challenges.

OTOH, I don't see a huge problem with negative eugenics, depending on the means. For example, if I knew there was a strong probability that I would pass a disabling genetic problem to my children, I would seriously consider sterilisation for myself. Or at least use strict birth control.

I wouldn't count that as eugenics. That would be a personal moral decision. Eugenics would be someone else telling you you couldn't have children because you are too short, or might pass on male pattern baldness.

MrGoodBytes · #25 21st December 2006, 04:17 PM

Originally Posted by Pesto

I wouldn't count that as eugenics. That would be a personal moral decision. Eugenics would be someone else telling you you couldn't have children because you are too short, or might pass on male pattern baldness.

To be fair, a typical eugenics program would probably attempt to eradicate heritable diseases first.

kingreaper · #26 22nd December 2006, 10:33 AM

Umm, you missed an option.

You see, many creationists believe that natural selection and mutation can produce changes far faster than evolution says it can (they believe in hyperevolution) and thus many creationists should sensibly believe that eugenics is MORE effective than those who accept the ToE.

You should have an option saying: Evolution is incorrect and Eugenics is correct.

In any case, Eugenics doesn't actually seem like a bad idea to me. In all honesty I find the fact that anyone can have a child, no matter how horrible their genetic load and how unfit they are to raise a child, seems to me extremely bad. I understand how it could lead to bad effects though if it were allowed to include anything as a plausible reason for sterilisation though (ie. using a genetic marker from one race to count as a reason for sterilisation, in order to wipe out that race depite their being no real damage from that marker)

Eugenics through the medium of sterilisation is VERY sharply different from Eugenics through the medium of killing though. The moral repugnancy associated with Eugenics comes mostly IMO from the fact that Eugenics as generally practised is in one of two forms: Arranged Marriages, which are seen as infringing on people's freedom to choose a spouse, and Genocide. And people only realise that it's Eugenics when it's Genocide.

shernren · #27 22nd December 2006, 11:39 AM

I think that so far it has been pointed out that eugenics of some sort (at a bare minimum) has been ongoing already. The debate now is essentially over enforced eugenics i.e. should the state or some other central governing authority control people's reproductive rights in order to bring about adjustments in the human race's populational genetic profile?

There would be two broad ways to perform these adjustments: prezygotic (i.e. controlling who has children with who) and postzygotic (i.e. controlling which children go on to have children and which don't). Of these, the most prominent example of postzygotic eugenics we have seen so far is obviously genocide. And that is obviously wrong. But let's say the state made it mandatory to abort all conceptus(es?) with congenital genetic disorders. Would that be ethical? That is in a sense a compounding of the abortion ethical problem with the state-control ethical problem.
Would it be ethical to allow people or couples perceived to be "superior" to have more children, and to enforce a limit that people or couples who are "inferior" must have less? Of course the whole question of who should be considered "superior" or "inferior" would need to be addressed first, but assuming there is some ethical means to determine this (but there probably isn't), then the ensuing eugenic programme would also likely be ethical as well.

Tormac · #28 22nd December 2006, 12:11 PM

There needs to be a more clearly defined definition of Eugenics here before i can make an accurate vote.

I've seen the lable eugenics applied to forced sterization programs in mental institutions, distopian visons of states designing the "master race" and emerging technologies that may provide cured for birth defects by correcting problems in the womb.

I accept evolution, but would not accept a state mandated "breeding program for humans".

PacificPandeist · #29 22nd December 2006, 12:19 PM

Eugenics would certainly lower the abortion rate, maybe with sufficient technology eliminate abortion altogether!! Who would abort a child when that child could be made effectively flawless (i.e. all potential defects eliminated) while in the womb?

//// Pacific PanDeist

gluadys · #30 22nd December 2006, 02:58 PM

Originally Posted by PacificPandeist

Eugenics would certainly lower the abortion rate, maybe with sufficient technology eliminate abortion altogether!! Who would abort a child when that child could be made effectively flawless (i.e. all potential defects eliminated) while in the womb?

//// Pacific PanDeist

That would only help if the reason for contemplating an abortion is a curable genetic disorder. There are some disabilities that are not genetic in origin. And there are many reasons other than disabilities in the fetus that lead women to choose abortion. Most aborted fetuses are healthy, so I don't think it would lower the abortion rate significantly.