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基本説明
Explores the sources of a movement - negative eugenics - that was used to justify the Holocaust. Presents the first biological theory of degeneracy - onanism - and then follows the development of degeneracy theory throughout the 19th century.
Full Description
The Unfit, by Elof Carlson, explores the sources of a movement - negative eugenics - that was used to justify the Holocaust, which claimed millions of innocent lives in World War II. The title reflects the nearly three centuries of belief that some people are socially unfit by virtue of a defective biology, and echoes an earlier theory of degeneracy, dating to biblical antiquity, in which some people were deemed unfit because of some transgression against religious law. The author presents the first biological theory of degeneracy - onanism - and then follows the development of degeneracy theory throughout the nineteenth century and its application to a variety of social classes. The key intellectual theories and their proponents form the framework of this exploration, which includes the concepts of evolution and heredity and how they were applied to social problems. These ideas are followed into the twentieth century with the development of theories of positive and negative eugenics, the establishment of compulsory sterilization laws, racism and anti-Semitism, and the Holocaust. This story of misapplied science and technology is one that still haunts humanity in the twenty-first century. The ghost of eugenics recurs in many guises during debates and controversies about intelligence testing, genetic screening, prenatal diagnosis, gene therapy, new reproductive strategies, and uses of our genomic information. Carlson ends his discussion of the history of humanity in this arena with an exploration of the future of genetics that is based on new technologies and application of the Human Genome Project findings, as well as a discussion of the death of the old eugenics and of the problems that will not go away, including our ambivalence about our own biology.
Contents
Introduction Part 1: Before Darwin Chapter 1. Who Are the Unfit? Chapter 2. The Unfit in Biblical Times Chapter 3. Self-pollution and Declining Health Chapter 4. Degeneracy Theory: Identifying the Innately Depraved and the Victims of Vicious Upbringing Chapter 5. Dangerous Classes and Social Degeneracy Chapter 6. Poor Laws, and the Descent to Degeneracy Chapter 7. The Perfectibility of Man Confronts Vice and Misery Chapter 8. Evolutionary Ethics before Darwin Chapter 9. Hereditary Units and the Pessimism of the Germ Plasm Part 2: Eugenics Takes the Spotlight Chapter 10. The Jukes and the Tribe of Ishmael Chapter 11. A Minor Prophet of Democracy Chapter 12. Isolating the Unfit through Compulsory Sterilization Chapter 13. The Emergence of Two Wings of the Eugenics Movement Chapter 14. Europe's Undesirables Replace the Domestic Unfit Chapter 15. Eugenics Becomes an International Movement Part 3: Racism, the Holocaust, and Beyond Chapter 16. Racism and Human Inequality Chapter 17. Jews as People, Race, Culture, Religion, and Victims Chapter 18. The Smoke of Auschwitz Chapter 19. The Abandonment of Eugenics by Genetics Chapter 20. The Future of Eugenics Chapter 21. Dealing with Life's Imperfections Appendices Appendix 1: Flow Diagrams and the History of Ideas Appendix 2: Useful Books on the History of Eugenics Appendix 3: Bibliography Index
