ANTROPOMETRIC
LABORATORY
Galton developed his tests into Anthropometric laboratory, which was
initially displayed at International Health Exhibition in the year
1884. It showed a surprising focus on the physical aspects of human
kind and a lack of mental testing even though he had hopped to predict
eminence in the mental arena.
EUGENICS
Although Galton finally compromised on nature-nurture issue, there
was some doubt about his heavily favored hereditary side of the
argument. This belief was cornerstone for eugenics. To study this,
he spent his second half of his life.
| His belief in heritable human characteristics, led him to develop a theory with the aim to improve human stock by utilizing a selective mating programme. This was known as ‘Eugenics.’ Through this programme he wanted to encourage the human race by mating eminent people together and as a result of it, he wanted to bring in physical and mental improvement in society at large. |
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It
was possible to bring improvement in each human being, because the
innate characteristics of each individual’s ancestry would
descend itself in all future generations. He developed this theory
by examining the family trees of outstanding people. It was revealed
by this examination that a statistically significant proportion
of those people were inter-related.
The
limitations of this examination was the incapability of appreciating
the likelihood of similar backgrounds in education and experienced
that closely related individuals would probably have to share. This
fact was also ignored in the other portions of evidence that he
cited, namely examination of the “National Character”
for different areas of the world and also a set of twin studies.
Galton was one of the first to utilize twins in the study of genetic
based hypotheses in human beings. He also contributed to a variety
of other areas which became the basis for testing individual differences.
His
eugenic ideas were ruthlessly applied with horrific results in the
twentieth century. During same century, in Germany, Adolph
Hitler advocated eugenics.
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