Survival of the Fittest- or Dating?
Francis Galton wrote this book to explain the varied hereditary faculties of different men, and of the great differences in different families and races. He wanted to learn how far history may have been shown the practicability of succeeding evolution and coming to an ends toward a better human race with out as much distress to humans if human race was left to its own course. Galton feels that instincts and faculties differ greatly in different races. He thinks some may be good and believes that other races need to be improved. Galton suggests that selective breeding of humans might be desirable in order to improve the human race.
Galton mentions that the moral and intellectual wealth of a nation depends upon the diverse gifts of the men that compose the nation. He feels a reverse of improvement to make all its members assimilate to a common type. Some of the traits in races, he feels, result in degeneration, are harmful or of little value to humans. Throughout the book, he compares every trait, feature, bodily qualities, energy, sensitivity, weight, anthropometrics, character, criminals and the insane, gregarious and slavish instincts, intellectual differences, mental imagery, nature verses nurture, consciousness and twin studies of different races. He also compares the influence of man on race, population, endowments, marks for family merit, early verses late marriages, order of events and the way different cultures domesticate animals. Galton also heavily explores the idea that religion and prayer plays an important role in evolution.
Galton comes to the conclusion that nature verses nurtures plays a huge part in the way different races evolve. He bases this on his twin studies and explains this by the fact that twins share so many genes yet have different life experiences, hence, they turn out differently. He says that the human mind is dependent on race and that humanity taken as a whole is not fixed but variable which leads us to reconsider what the true place and function of man in the order of the world is.
Since Galton was so closely tied to Charles Darwin’s theory of evolution, I feel he was reacting to this theory when he wrote this book. Galton also came out with other books exploring the theories of evolution, one that was Hereditary Genius.
The outcome of his writing was about the impact of nature verses nurture and that there is not one single factor that decides which races may or may not survive. I feel Galton’s concept is relevant to psychology today. Even though the way Galton explains it may sound racist, I do feel that every race has traits that enable them to survive wherever they live, and what cultures they grew up in. I do not, however, feel this will make one race outlive others or become more prominent than others will. The reasons I feel this is because I believe nurture rather than nature plays a larger role in the development of an individual. I think the way one is brought up by their parents and the education they receive enables one to survive and do well in life.
Galton explains his outcome of his studies of religion and prayer in his book. He mentions that religion plays a significant of evolution. He believes that it plays a large role in one’s mental attitude and imposes a new moral duty. He feels that once a person is in a religion they feel more freedom, responsibility and opportunity. I feel this is a valid outcome to his studies and I can see why people with religion may feel a higher self-efficacy and purpose in life.
The way I feel that his concept is not relevant in psychology today is the fact that it should not matter which race may or may not be superior or inferior, or which genes are supposedly strong genes and will survive. I think this may make people feel degraded when we start to talk about things like this. It also is not relevant because we could not make one race dominant so the weaker ones could not survive.
After reading this book, I was just amazed that anyone would even sit down to study this and think of all the ways we could over come evolution to make a better human race. I was kind of disgusted at Galton and think he is somewhat racist. However, he never did mention which race or characteristics he thought to be superior to the others. This also bothers me from my religious background because I grew up believing that all humans are equal and made in God’s image. I do believe we should all strive to become better people and use our knowledge to help everyone but not in a way that degrades certain races and people or would make certain races die off sooner or others become stronger than they would on their own throughout evolution.
