Editing Eugenics (section)

===Objections to scientific validity ===
Amanda Caleb, Professor of Medical Humanities at [[Geisinger Commonwealth School of Medicine]], says "Eugenic laws and policies are now understood as part of a specious devotion to a pseudoscience that actively dehumanizes to support political agendas and not true science or medicine."<ref>{{Cite book |last=Caleb |first=Amanda |date=27 January 2023 |access-date=18 February 2023 |title=The Holocaust: Remembrance, Respect, and Resilience |chapter=Eugenics and (Pseudo-) Science |chapter-url= https://psu.pb.unizin.org/holocaust3rs/chapter/1-2-eugenics-and-pseudo-science/ |publisher=Pennsylvania State University}}</ref>

The first major challenge to conventional eugenics based on genetic inheritance was made in 1915 by [[Thomas Hunt Morgan]]. He demonstrated the event of [[Mutation|genetic mutation]] occurring outside of inheritance involving the discovery of the hatching of a [[Drosophila melanogaster|fruit fly (''Drosophila melanogaster'')]] with white eyes from a family with red eyes,{{r|Blom 2008|pp=336–337}} demonstrating that major genetic changes occurred outside of inheritance.{{r|Blom 2008|pp=336–337}}{{Clarify|date=July 2024}} Morgan criticized the view that traits such as [[Heritability of IQ|intelligence]] or criminality were hereditary, because these traits were [[Subjectivity|subjective]].<ref>{{cite web |title=Social Origins of Eugenics |url=http://www.eugenicsarchive.org/html/eugenics/essay5text.html |access-date=19 October 2017 |website=Eugenicsarchive.org}}</ref>{{efn|name=Morgan|Despite Morgan's public rejection of eugenics, much of his genetic research was adopted by proponents of eugenics.<ref>{{cite web |last=Carlson |first=Elof Axel |date=2002 |title=Scientific Origins of Eugenics |url=http://www.eugenicsarchive.org/html/eugenics/essay2text.html |access-date=3 October 2013 |work=Image Archive on the American Eugenics Movement |publisher=Dolan DNA Learning Center, Cold Spring Harbor Laboratory}}</ref><ref>{{cite journal |last=Leonard |first=Thomas C. (Tim) |date=Fall 2005 |title=Retrospectives: Eugenics and Economics in the Progressive Era |url=https://www.princeton.edu/~tleonard/papers/retrospectives.pdf |url-status=live |journal=Journal of Economic Perspectives |volume=19 |issue=4 |pages=207–224 |doi=10.1257/089533005775196642 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20170820132528/https://www.princeton.edu/~tleonard/papers/retrospectives.pdf |archive-date=20 August 2017 |access-date=3 October 2013 |doi-access=free}}</ref>}}

[[Pleiotropy]] occurs when one [[gene]] influences multiple, seemingly unrelated [[phenotypic trait]]s, an example being [[phenylketonuria]], which is a human disease that affects multiple systems but is caused by one gene defect.<ref name="Stearns">{{cite journal |last=Stearns |first=F. W. |date=2010 |title=One Hundred Years of Pleiotropy: A Retrospective |journal=Genetics |volume=186 |issue=3 |pages=767–773 |doi=10.1534/genetics.110.122549 |pmc=2975297 |pmid=21062962}}</ref> Andrzej Pękalski, from the [[University of Wrocław|University of Wroclaw]], argues that eugenics can cause harmful loss of genetic diversity if a eugenics program selects a pleiotropic gene that could possibly be associated with a positive trait. Pękalski uses the example of a coercive government eugenics program that prohibits people with [[myopia]] from breeding but has the unintended consequence of also selecting against high intelligence since the two were associated.<ref name="pekalski">{{cite journal |last=Jones |first=A. |date=2000 |title=Effect of eugenics on the evolution of populations |journal=European Physical Journal B |volume=17 |issue=2 |pages=329–332 |bibcode=2000EPJB...17..329P |doi=10.1007/s100510070148 |s2cid=122344067}}</ref>

While the science of genetics has increasingly provided means by which certain characteristics and conditions can be identified and understood, given the complexity of human genetics, culture, and psychology, at this point there is no agreed objective means of determining which traits might be ultimately desirable or undesirable. Some conditions such as [[sickle-cell disease]] and [[cystic fibrosis]] respectively confer immunity to malaria and resistance to [[cholera]] when a single copy of the recessive allele is contained within the genotype of the individual, so eliminating these genes is undesirable in places where such diseases are common.<ref name="Withrock et al 2015">{{ cite journal |last=Withrock |first=Isabelle |title=Genetic diseases conferring resistance to infectious diseases |journal=Genes & Diseases |volume=2 |issue=3 |pages=247–254 |date=2015 |pmc=6150079 |pmid=30258868 |doi=10.1016/j.gendis.2015.02.008}}</ref>

[[Edwin Black]], journalist, historian, and author of ''War Against the Weak'', argues that eugenics is often deemed a [[pseudoscience]] because what is defined as a genetic improvement of a desired trait is a cultural choice rather than a matter that can be determined through objective scientific inquiry.{{sfn|Black|2003|p=370}} This aspect of eugenics is often considered to be tainted with [[scientific racism]] and pseudoscience.{{sfn|Black|2003|p=370}}<ref>{{cite news |last=Worrall |first=Simon |date=24 July 2016 |title=The Gene: Science's Most Dangerous Idea |url=http://news.nationalgeographic.com/2016/07/gene-history-siddhartha-mukherjee-science-eugenics/ |url-status=dead |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20170912102002/http://news.nationalgeographic.com/2016/07/gene-history-siddhartha-mukherjee-science-eugenics/ |archive-date=12 September 2017 |access-date=12 September 2017 |work=National Geographic}}</ref>
[[File:Eugenics congress logo.png|thumb|class=skin-invert-image|Logo from the [[Second International Eugenics Conference]], 1921. The bottom text reads: "Like A Tree, Eugenics Draws Its Materials From Many Sources And Organizes Them Into An Harmonious Entity" (such sources, i.e. roots, purportedly including e.g. [[genetics]], [[physiology]], [[mental testing]], [[anthropology]], [[statistics]], [[medicine]], [[politics]] and [[sociology]]).<ref>{{cite book |last1=Currell |first1=Susan |title=Popular Eugenics: National Efficiency and American Mass Culture in The 1930s |last2=Cogdell |first2=Christina |date=2006 |publisher=[[Ohio University Press]] |isbn=9780821416914 |location=Athens, Ohio |page=203}}</ref>|alt=]]