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FUCK YOU. Someone's reproductive rights aren't to be legislated. If eugenics programs began in America, I think I would try to stop it with force. You make me sick. Hitler would be proud.
It's nature to do it, and now that we have surpassed a lot of our nature, we should use that progression to breed better human beings.
If you're referring to choosing sexual partners based on their genes, I'd agree - we do that subconsciously all the time. But I think what OP is referring to is a more active, government-controlled eugenics program (specifically legislating contraception and abortion) that is more akin to preventing "undesirable" people from reproducing and discarding "undesirable" children.
It is a tricky situation. I understand why people would be upset about it, and I understand that it could cause troubles. I think that if we were to try progress humanity to the best it can be, then we should be pairing partners up that are intelligent with another that is intelligent, etc.
But that's the issue - there is no definitive test for intelligence or for the "optimal" human being. IQ tests are largely acknowledged throughout the scientific community as a very faulty representation of intelligence. There's also no definitive test for how overall athletic one is, how creative one is, or anything like that.
And even if we could perfectly define and test these things, who decides how good you need to be to reproduce? Stephen Hawking is incredibly intelligent, yet I don't think he'd be much use at any career other than physics. Does someone have to be great at everything in order to reproduce? If so, we'd probably all die. Not to mention, genes don't work perfectly either. Just because two people are good at something, that's not a guarantee their children will be too.
Our current system has worked the best so far, despite many flaws. People strive for what they most want to do (which is often what they're best at), and we end up with a fairly well-rounded society. Eugenics involves an inherent misunderstanding of the way society works.
I get what you're saying, but wouldn't the species start to progress more and more if we took those that do have a lot of intelligence due to being able to solve problems, etc?
I don't know, there seems to be a lot of dead weight nowadays with people not striving to be much, perhaps this way of reproduction would make people try harder?
There's not a lot of solid evidence that intelligence is mostly genetic, though, but there IS evidence that upbringing can heavily influence intelligence. Since forcing two people together to have children against their will would probably affect the children's upbringing extremely negatively, I think that would be a really, really bad idea.
I'm arguing that it is incredibly difficult to determine levels of intelligence, partially because there are so many different types. But even if we pretend that we had a perfect system to test for intelligence - what would be do in a society of only intelligent people? Who would build the buildings? Who would drive the bus? Who would raise our children? Our current system works because it allows for a large variety of careers, across a large variety of difficulties.
We haven't even addressed the issue that even if we did create a perfect IQ test and even if we did implement eugenics, there is no guarantee that the smartest people are the most moral people.
We need variety. Society depends upon it.
To throw my opinion in in addition to flutterhigh's:
If we pair the intelligent with the intelligent, that's fair enough. You're probably going to get a small number of super-intelligent humans. But, that means the unintelligent pair with the unintelligent which would only serve to create an enormous "lower class" of less privileged and unintelligent people. These people could not contribute to society as much as the intelligent class, but would still be a drain on it, which is usually the sort of thing you're so against: the people to take but don't give. This could be solved by not allowing the unintelligent to procreate at all. This leads to countless problems, most prominently:
1) How can it be enforced?
2) How can you expect to avoid a revolution against the people enforcing it? If you prevent people procreating, you can expect a backlash.
3) How can such a tight level of top-down control over society possibly be considered progressive? It would require a dictatorship.
4) Even the intelligent people would not agree to comply with it, because if they were really smart they'd foresee the other problems.
Moreover, I really don't think society would benefit that much. Intelligent people are usually more attracted to intelligent people as it is. You don't normally see opposite poles of intelligence in a relationship. Obviously there are exceptions, but I don't think there are likely to be very many. I don't think very would change if we manually paired up intelligent people as opposed to leaving them to their own devices to choose.
I actually kind of disagree with your first paragraph. This is already the way society works to some degree - like with like. People who are educated tend to end up with those who are also educated. People who are attractive tend to end up with those are also attractive. And so on. The old adage "opposites attract" has been proving wrong time and time again.
Aaand at this point I realize you've already addressed this at the bottom. Silly me.
But we shouldn't assume that this causes an "echo chamber". The offspring of two athletes is not guaranteed to be more athletic than both of their parents combined, especially when we remove environmental factors. Breeding has its limits. Even prize-winning vegetables become impractical in size.
That said, I agree with all your other points.
Ah, the way I think of this is that it isn't just genetic. It links in with the "Nature vs. Nurture" poll earlier in the day. A kid raised by genius parents will have very favourable environmental factors for intelligence anyway. Not to mention advancements in education; the kid will probably get a better education than it's parents. Yeah, a lot of it does rely on environmental factors though, which are no more predictable than genetic factors.
I'm not sure if I've just been splitting hairs, rephrasing your point, expanding it or making a whole new one. I think I'm too tired for thinking :P
if eugenics had survived the hype, your parents would have been sterilized.
You do realize trying to insult me is a lost cause, right?
...I fail to see your logic, though. You imply here that it doesn't happened due to it not "surviving", then say that is everywhere on your comment bellow. Irony on you trying to insult me on the matter.
First of all, make sense. How are you quoting something I didn't write? Besides, it's not about logic and it really wasn't an insult. I've read somewhere that your caregivers were subpar. they would have been castrated. I hear my father was an alcoholic. castrated. that is the point of eugenics. if you knew that, you wouldn't be implying eugenics is a potential triumph; it is a regression.
If I haven't made sense, it's because you haven't understood, not that I haven't made sense. Quoting incorrectly? So you didn't say "if eugenics had survived the hype, your parents would have been sterilized.", then said "Eugenics is everywhere and has always been." in a different comment?
I may have misunderstood being castrated with just not being allowed to reproduce. If eugenics is castration, then you are correct.
"You imply here that it doesn't happened due to it not "surviving""
What doesn't happen? Wtf. that's exactly my point. I hadn't understood because that statement makes no sense.
And you quoted "surviving"? I said survive. The 20th century eugenics-psuedo-science HYPE has not survived but the fundamentals have always been around.
Amongst other things, that's why a few Egyptian dynasties have fallen. The pharaoh would have a child with his sister, who would go on to have a child with an aunt/uncle/brother/sister, until of course a proceeding pharaoh was a cretin. eugenics.
And HELLO! Can you not figure out what "not being allowed to produce" means?
Eugenics is a very interesting science. old as the world and nothing sick about making profanum vulgus into ubermensch'es :P
Ist es richtig, Herr Adolf?
From the perspective of your offspring do you like to know that they won't thrive and will have those with superior genes out-compete them in every field and they'll be unhappy?