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One of the major problems with eugenics highlighted in Gattaca is that it was used to artificially pre-select who was allowed to compete and who wasn't. > "Eve

One of the major problems with eugenics highlighted in Gattaca is that it was used to artificially pre-select who was allowed to compete and who wasn't. > "Even the selection of mating partner is a form of eugenics." Only when the selection is done by those who aren't the two partners (e.g. arranged marriages, theoretically rape in the absence of abortion). Otherwise it's natural selection between partners - there's no guarantee the aspects two people find attractive in each other are genetically heritable. > "College graduates only marrying college graduates, repeat that for many generations and it is bound to have an effect." Assortative mating per se isn't necessarily eugenics. It takes an instruction from the outside on what mating partners should consider attractive in a potential mate. Without this instruction people will find a variety of differing, and even mutually exclusive, traits attractive, and will assort on these variety of traits, not on a hierarchy of traits. http://www.eugenicsarchive.org/eugenics/topics_fs.pl?theme=33&search=&matches= http://www.eugenicsarchive.org/eugenics/topics_fs.pl?theme=3... "Eugenicists realized that assortative mating did not always produce the best offspring, so sought ways to popularize what they considered to be good marriages. Francis Galton urged the brightest and the healthiest individuals to marry each other. He found an ideal situation in German university professors <emphasis mine> (then all male) who tended to marry the daughters of professors or their female graduate students <emphasis mine>. This positive expression of eugenics encouraged the selection of good mates through popular health books and Fitter Families Contests held at state fairs. The training of field workers at the Eugenics Record Office included exercises to help them analyze mate preferences and make better eugenic choices."

lmm 4y ago
> there's no guarantee the aspects two people find attractive in each other are genetically heritable. Evolution naturally tends in that direction. > Assortative mating per se isn't necessarily eugenics. It takes an instruction from the outside on what mating partners should consider attractive in a potential mate. Without this instruction people will find a variety of differing, and even mutually exclusive, traits attractive, and will assort on these variety of traits, not on a hierarchy of traits. Up to a point. There's still a pretty strong correlation between what different people find attractive, and there are certainly things that almost everyone agrees are unattractive.
- anonymouskimmer 4y ago
  > Evolution naturally tends in that direction. A lot of what people find attractive about each other are personalities (and only some traits are heritable, not entire types), and artifacts of how people were raised or adapted to how they were raised. > Up to a point. There's still a pretty strong correlation between what different people find attractive, and there are certainly things that almost everyone agrees are unattractive. Of course, though moreso the latter. Eugenics, as a term, to have meaning, is an extreme of breeding behavior. It isn't just regular assortative mating among local populations.
  - whythre 4y ago
    > Of course, though moreso the latter. Eugenics, as a term, to have meaning, is an extreme of breeding behavior. It isn't just regular assortative mating among local populations. Thank you. Having preferences =/= eugenics.
  - lmm 4y ago
    > Eugenics, as a term, to have meaning, is an extreme of breeding behavior. It isn't just regular assortative mating among local populations. That's circular logic. The whole point of the argument is that eugenics (as it is normally understood) is of a piece with regular assortive mating; people look for good aspects in a partner all the time, and there's no clear sharp line between that and what we normally call eugenics.
    - anonymouskimmer 4y ago
      https://www.britannica.com/science/eugenics-genetics https://www.britannica.com/science/eugenics-genetics > The term eugenics was coined in 1883 by British explorer and natural scientist Francis Galton, who, influenced by Charles Darwin’s theory of natural selection, advocated a system that would allow “the more suitable races or strains of blood a better chance of prevailing speedily over the less suitable.” Eugenics is a societal phenomenon. Which is why arranged marriages belong in the eugenics camp. Assortative mating from free choice is not eugenics, regardless of the outcome over many generations.

lmm 4y ago

> there's no guarantee the aspects two people find attractive in each other are genetically heritable. Evolution naturally tends in that direction. > Assortative mating per se isn't necessarily eugenics. It takes an instruction from the outside on what mating partners should consider attractive in a potential mate. Without this instruction people will find a variety of differing, and even mutually exclusive, traits attractive, and will assort on these variety of traits, not on a hierarchy of traits. Up to a point. There's still a pretty strong correlation between what different people find attractive, and there are certainly things that almost everyone agrees are unattractive.

anonymouskimmer 4y ago
> Evolution naturally tends in that direction. A lot of what people find attractive about each other are personalities (and only some traits are heritable, not entire types), and artifacts of how people were raised or adapted to how they were raised. > Up to a point. There's still a pretty strong correlation between what different people find attractive, and there are certainly things that almost everyone agrees are unattractive. Of course, though moreso the latter. Eugenics, as a term, to have meaning, is an extreme of breeding behavior. It isn't just regular assortative mating among local populations.
- whythre 4y ago
  > Of course, though moreso the latter. Eugenics, as a term, to have meaning, is an extreme of breeding behavior. It isn't just regular assortative mating among local populations. Thank you. Having preferences =/= eugenics.
- lmm 4y ago
  > Eugenics, as a term, to have meaning, is an extreme of breeding behavior. It isn't just regular assortative mating among local populations. That's circular logic. The whole point of the argument is that eugenics (as it is normally understood) is of a piece with regular assortive mating; people look for good aspects in a partner all the time, and there's no clear sharp line between that and what we normally call eugenics.
  - anonymouskimmer 4y ago
    https://www.britannica.com/science/eugenics-genetics https://www.britannica.com/science/eugenics-genetics > The term eugenics was coined in 1883 by British explorer and natural scientist Francis Galton, who, influenced by Charles Darwin’s theory of natural selection, advocated a system that would allow “the more suitable races or strains of blood a better chance of prevailing speedily over the less suitable.” Eugenics is a societal phenomenon. Which is why arranged marriages belong in the eugenics camp. Assortative mating from free choice is not eugenics, regardless of the outcome over many generations.