Who Killed Eugenics? Or Did They?
Frederic Weizmann, York
University
Since the work of scholars such as Kamin (1974)
and Samelson (1979), it has become clear that psychologists played
an important role in providing scientific support for eugenics
policies during the early 1900s. Much of the reaction to this
fact has focussed not on psychology's role as a discipline, but
on the individuals involved, occasionally defending (e.g., Cronbach,
1975) but more often attacking them. Henry Goddard has been a
particular target of these attacks (see Zenderland, 1998, pp.
348-365).
This individualistic focus forms part of what
might be considered the "received view" of the relationship
between science and eugenics. The psychobiologist R. W. Oppenheim
(1982) provides a good example of this approach, one more knowledgeable
than most. Oppenheim argues that even at its height, eugenics
did not reflect what most biologists or psychologists believed.
It was supported by a "relatively small," albeit sometimes
influential, group of scientists interested in "socio-economic
questions. . . who. . . misused the new findings of genetics to
support their conservative, and often racist, ideological preconceptions
(Oppenheim, p. 42)."
The facts are, however, that eugenics enjoyed
widespread support among scientists. Ludmerer (1972) has noted
that all the geneticists on the board of the new journal, Genetics,
founded in 1916, had been supporters of eugenics to one degree
or another. William Provine (1986) has suggested that the interest
of geneticists in race during the first quarter of this century
was spurred by their interest in eugenics.
Eugenics enjoyed at least moderate support from
prominent psychologists, such as J. McKeen Cattell, and, as Oppenheim
acknowledged, R. S. Woodworth. As late as 1945, Woodworth wrote
in his influential text, Psychology: A Science of Mental Life,
that it "is wise for society to take measures to perpetuate
the best family stocks, which have a tendency to die out from
their low birth rate (Woodworth, 1945, p. 238)." He also
wrote that "society may well take measures to minimise the
number of such [feeble-minded] children (Woodworth, 1945, p. 240)."
(Interestingly, Woodworth cited R. B. Cattell's book, The Fight
For Our National Intelligence, as the source for data regarding
birth rate and intelligence.)
It is difficult to portray Woodworth and many
other psychologists sympathetic to eugenics as ideologues. The
fact is that eugenics was popular across the political spectrum
for many years, both in England and in North America (e.g., Paul,
1984; Soloway, 1990). In England, many socialists supported eugenics.
Even those viewed as critics, such as J. B .S. Haldane, Lancelot
Hogben and Julian Huxley were not against eugenics per se,
but came to believe that eugenics in capitalist societies was
infected with class bias. Even so, some (see Paul, 1984), accepted
the idea of upper class genetic superiority.
Not only were R. B. Cattell's eugenic beliefs
commonplace in that milieu, but he was influenced by prominent
socialists who supported eugenics, men such as Shaw, Wells, Huxley
and Haldane, some of whom he knew (Hurt, 1998). Jonathan Harwood
(1980) actually cited the example of Cattell to demonstrate that
British eugenics was not a right-wing preserve in the inter-war
years (although Keith Hurt, 1998, has noted that Harwood later
characterised Cattell's 1972 book on Beyondism as a "right-wing
eugenic fantasy").
Oppenheim (1982) claimed that American eugenicists
were opposed by those in the Progressive Movement, juxtaposing
the hereditarian reformism of the former with the environmental
reformism of the latter. Actually many progressives were also
eugenicists and incorporated the idea of eugenic reforms into
their larger agenda (e.g., Burnham, 1977); there was a great deal
of cross-over between the two movements (e.g., Pickens, 1968).
Another aspect of the received view of eugenics
is that scientific progress eventually undid eugenics. Oppenheim
(1982, p. 42) states that the scientific "overemphasis on
heredity" lasted only from 1900 to 1915 among biologists
(and to 1920 among psychologists and sociologists.) The year 1915
saw the publication of The Mechanisms of Mendelian Heredity,
by T. H. Morgan and his colleagues. This was an important book
that established that there was no one-to-one relationship between
genes and traits, and also demonstrated the role of environmental
factors in development.
In his emphasis on scientific progress, Oppenheim
agrees with historians such as Haller (1972) and Ludmerer (1972).
The latter, however, portray the decline of eugenics as a later,
more gradual occurrence, beginning in the late 1920s and extending
to the eve of World War II. While they also implicate the increasing
racism of the eugenics movement, like Oppenheim, they emphasize
the role of science in the repudiation of eugenics.
However, the view that scientific progress was
mainly responsible for the presumed undoing of eugenics is questionable.
Diane Paul (1995) has argued that discoveries in genetics occurred
much earlier than the decline of eugenics and thus had little
effect on it. Oppenheim himself acknowledged that by 1910 the
one-gene-one-character idea was discredited, and the importance
of the environment established. Actually, the dominant figure
in American eugenics, C. B. Davenport himself acknowledged both
the complexity of the gene character relationship and the role
of the environment (Davenport, 1911/1972). Moreover, if eugenics
enjoyed scientific support much later than 1915, it becomes difficult
to consider these early scientific developments as decisive.
Another key scientific development thought to
be vital in undermining eugenics, and in particular the logic
of sterilization was the Hardy-Weinberg principle, enunciated
in 1917. It demonstrated mathematically that it took thousands
of years to eliminate deleterious recessive genes (thought to
underlie mental deficiency) from the population (Barkan, 1992,
p. 130). However, it was argued by R. A. Fisher (1924) and other
geneticists at the time that these implications were misleading,
and sterilization was more effective than thought. Although this
is still the subject of debate (Barkan, 1992, p. 130; Paul &
Spencer, 1995), Paul and Spencer (1995) have presented evidence
that most geneticists and biologists in the 1920s and 1930s still
continued to believe that "mental defectives" should
be prevented from breeding.
The importance of social changes in understanding
shifts in attitudes towards eugenics has been raised directly
in the area of ethnic and racial differences. Provine (1986) has
argued that in the first quarter of the century, geneticists believed
that scientific evidence (largely contributed by psychologists)
supported the idea of intellectual differences among races. They
also believed that race crossing could be harmful. After 1925
(Provine, 1986), some geneticists increasingly argued that there
was no convincing evidence for such differences. This of course
did not constitute disproof, and many scientists still continued
to believe privately in their existence. As the implications of
the Nazi racial policies became clear, however, very few scientists
espoused these beliefs publicly (Provine, 1986).
Most geneticists also came to believe that racial
crosses were harmless. Provine (1986) has argued that this change
was due to changes in social attitudes rather than scientific
progress. This interpretation has been challenged by the geneticist
Bentley Glass (1986), but Paul (1998) has reached a conclusion
similar to Provine's.
Recently, historians such as Garland Allen, Barry
Mehler, Diane Paul, and Daniel Kevles have begun to argue that
the eugenics movement did not simply disappear. In fact, Paul
and Spencer (1995) have pointed out that sterilization programs
actually grew in the 1930s. Eugenics did, however, transmute itself
into several new forms, including medical genetics and population
control, as well as a newer "reform eugenics." (See
Allen, 1998 for a review).
While Kevles (1986) has suggested that the newer
eugenics flowed into more benign channels, Allen (e.g., 1998)
and Paul (e.g., 1998) are less sanguine, while Mehler (1994) has
stressed the continuity between the older eugenics and what appears
to be the current resurgence of eugenic thinking.
Another development of direct interest to psychologists
has been the emergence of a new "hereditarian research program,"
to employ Thomas Bouchard's (1987) useful phrase, associated with
the names of Arthur Jensen, Richard Herrnstein and others. The
relationship between this program and eugenics is controversial
and ambiguous, but needs to be explored.
What is the relevance of the older eugenics to
these newer developments? Some have argued that there are clear
parallels between the circumstances that led to the rise of the
eugenics movement originally and those that exist today (e.g.,
Allen, 1998). Beyond this, does it matter if the received view
concerning science and the earlier eugenics movement is correct?
If the belief in eugenics was confined to a few individuals and
if eugenics was undercut by scientific progress, then science,
including psychology, bears no responsibility for eugenics and
for its consequences, but deserves credit for its eradication.
If, as we think the evidence indicates, traditional
eugenics was closely tied to mainstream science and scientific
progress had less to do with its fate than usually thought, it
suggests the need for a more critical attitude toward science,
especially in areas of social concern. That is why it is important
to examine the work of R. B. Cattell; he not only links current
eugenic thinking to an older eugenics tradition, but more than
anyone else he tried to justify his eugenics through his science.
References
Allen, G. A. (1978). Thomas Hunt Morgan: The
man and his science. Princeton: Princeton University Press.
Allen, G. A. (1998). Opposition to eugenics
in the United States, 1900-1940. Unpublished manuscript.
Barkan, E. (1992). The decline of scientific
racism. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.
Bouchard, T. J. (1987). The hereditarian research
program: Triumphs and tribulations. In S. Modgil & C. Modgil
(Eds.), Arthur Jensen: Consensus and controversy (pp. 55-57).
London: Falmer Press.
Burnham, J. (1977). Essay. In J. D. Buenker, J.
C. Burnham, & R. M. Creden (Eds.), Progressivism (pp.
1-29). Cambridge: Schenkman.
Cronbach, L. J. (1975). Five decades of public
controversy over mental testing. American Psychologist, 30,
1-14.
Davenport, C. B. (1972). Heredity in relation
to eugenics. New York: Arno Press. (Original work published
1911)
Fisher, R. A. (1924). The elimination of mental
defect. Eugenics Review, 16, 114-116.
Glass, B. (1986). Geneticists embattled. Proceedings
of the American Philosophical Society, 130, 130-154.
Haller, M. H. (1972). Eugenics: Hereditarian
attitudes in American thought. New Brunswick: Rutgers University
Press.
Harwood, J. (1980). Nature, nurture and politics.
In J. V. Smith & David Hamilton (Eds.), The Meritocratic
Intellect (pp. 115-131). Aberdeen: Aberdeen University Press.
Hurt, K. (1998, October 5). Raymond Bernard Cattell
(1905-1998) [bibliography to 1963] [Online]. Available: http://www.ferris.edu/htmls/othersrv/isar/bibliography/catbib.htm
[verified November 5, 1998].
Kamin, L. (1974). The science and politics of
I.Q. Social Research, 41, 387-425.
Kevles, D. (1986). In the name of eugenics:
The uses of human heredity. Berkeley: University of California
Press.
Ludmerer, K. M. (1972). Genetics and American
society. Baltimore: Johns Hopkins University Press.
Mehler, B. (1994). In genes we trust: When science
bows to racism. Reform Judaism 23, 10-13; 77-79.
Oppenheim, R. W. (1982). Preformationism and epigenesis
in the origns of the nervous system and behavior: Issues, concepts
and their history. In P. P. G. Bateson & P. Klopfer (Eds.),
Perspectives in Ethology Vol. 5 (pp. 1-100). New York:
Plenum.
Paul, D. B. (1984). Eugenics and the Left. Journal
of the History of Ideas, 45, 567-590.
Paul, D. B. (1995). The hidden science of eugenics.
Nature, 374, 302-305.
Paul, D. B. (1998). Did eugenics rest on an elementary
mistake? In The politics of heredity: Essays on eugenics, biomedicine
and the nature-nurture debate (p. 117-132). Albany: State
University of New York Press.
Paul, D. B., & Spencer, H. M. (1995). The
hidden science of eugenics. Nature, 374, 302-305.
Pickens, D. K. (1968). Eugenics and the progressives.
Nashville: Vanderbilt University Press.
Provine, W. B. (1986). Geneticists and race. American
Zoologist, 26, 857-887.
Samelson, F. (1975). On the science and politics
of the IQ. Social Research, 42, 467-488.
Samelson, F. (1979). Putting psychology on the
map: Ideology and intelligence testing. In A. R. Buss (Ed.), Psychology
in social context (pp. 103-168). New York: Halstead Press.
Soloway, R. A. (1990). Demography anddegeneration:
Eugenics and the declining birthrate in twentieth-century Britain.
Chapel Hill, NC: University of North Carolina Press.
Woodworth, R. S. (1945). Psychology: A study
of mental life (17th ed.). London: Methuen.
Zenderland, L. (1998). Measuring minds.
Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.
FREDRIC WEIZMANN is Associate
Professor of Psychology at York University, and Director of Clinical
Training in the Clinical-Developmental Program. E-mail address:
<weizmann@yorku.ca>.
Recent publications relevant to this special
issue include:
Weizmann, F., Wiener, N. I., Wiesenthal, D., &
Ziegler, M. (1990). Differential K-theory and racial hierarchies.
Canadian Psychology, 31, 1-13.
Wiener, N. I., Weizmann, F., Wiesenthal, D. L.
& Ziegler, M. (1990). IQ, economic productivity and eugenics.
International Journal of Dynamic Assessment and Instruction,
1, 105-115.
Yee, A. H., Fairchild, H. H., Weizmann, F., &
Wyatt, G. E. (1993). Adressing psychology's problem with race.
American Psychologist, 48, 1132-1140.
Weizmann, F., Wiener, N. I., Wiesenthal, D., &
Ziegler, M. (1996). The (Mis)uses of evolutionary theory and biology.
In L. R. Reynolds and L. Lieberman, (Eds.) Race and other misadventures:
Essays in honor of Ashley Montague. New York: General Hall
Publishing.
Wiener, N. I., Ziegler, M., Weizmann, F., &
Wiesenthal, D. (1996) Straightening out the "Bell Curve".
In M. Luther, E. Cole, & P. Gamelin (Eds.), Dynamic assessment
for instruction: From theory to application. Toronto: Captus
Press.
Weizmann, F., Wiener, N. I., Wiesenthal, D., &
Ziegler, M. (1996). Scientific racism in contemporary psychology.
In M. Luther, E. Cole, & P. Gamelin (Eds.), Dynamic assessment
for instruction: From theory to application. Toronto: Captus
Press.
Dr. Barry Mehler incorporated the Institute for the Study of Academic Racism (ISAR) in Lansing, Michigan in 1993. ISAR monitors academic racism and serves as a resource center for scholars, legislators, civil rights organizations, and journalists. ISAR is independent of Ferris State University and the materials presented on this web site do not necessarily reflect the views of Ferris State University's Board of Trustees or Administration.
All original ISAR materials as well as Dr. Mehler's posted publications are Copyrighted. All rights reserved. Electronic redistribution for nonprofit purposes is permitted, provided this notice is attached in its entirety. Unauthorized, for-profit redistribution is prohibited. For further information regarding reprinting and syndication, please call ISAR at (231) 591-3612 or (231) 591-2331 or send email to Barry Mehler at mehler50@yahoo.com
This article originally appeared at: http://www.ferris.edu/isar/bios/Cattell/HPPB/killed.htm but seems to be only sporadically accessible so is reproduced here also.
Go to Index page for this site
Go to John Ray's "Tongue Tied" blog (Backup here)
Go to John Ray's "Dissecting Leftism" blog (Backup here)
Go to John Ray's "Australian Politics" blog (Backup here)
Go to John Ray's "Gun Watch" blog (Backup here)
Go to John Ray's "Education Watch" blog (Backup here)
Go to John Ray's "Socialized Medicine" blog (Backup here)
Go to John Ray's "Political Correctness Watch" blog (Backup here)
Go to John Ray's "Greenie Watch" blog (Backup here)
Go to John Ray's "Food & Health Skeptic" blog (Backup here)
Go to John Ray's "Leftists as Elitists" blog (Not now regularly updated)
Go to John Ray's "Marx & Engels in their own words" blog (Not now regularly updated. Backup here)
Go to John Ray's "A scripture blog" (Not now regularly updated)
Go to John Ray's recipe blog (Not now regularly updated -- Backup here)
Go to John Ray's Main academic menu
Go to Menu of recent writings
Go to John Ray's basic home page
Go to John Ray's pictorial Home Page (Backup here)
Go to Selected pictures from John Ray's blogs (Backup here)
Go to Another picture page (Best with broadband)