Outcasts from Evolution: Scientific Attitudes of Racial Inferiority, 1859-1900 - Hardcover

John S. Haller, Jr.

Hardcover

ISBN 10: 0252001648 ISBN 13: 9780252001642

Publisher: University of Illinois Press, 1986

Synopsis

In the only book to date to explore the period between the 1859 publication of Darwinâ s Origin of Species and the discovery in 1900 of Gregor Mendelâ s experiments in genetics, John S. Haller, Jr., shows the relationship between scientific "conviction" and public policy. He focuses on the numerous liberally educated American scientists who were caught up in the triumph of evolutionary ideas and who sought to apply those ideas to comparative morality, health, and the physiognomy of nonwhite races.

During this period, the natural and social scientists of the day not only accepted without question the genetic and cultural superiority of the Caucasian; they also asserted that the Caucasian race held a monopoly on evolutionary progress, arguing that "inferior races" were no more than evolutionary survivors doomed by their genetic legacy to remain outcasts from evolution.

Hereditarians and evolutionists believed that "less fit" human races were perishing from the rigors of civilizationâ s struggle and competition. Indeed, racial inferiority lay at the very foundation of the evolutionary framework and, remaining there, rose to the pinnacle of "truth" with the myth of scientific certainty.

About this title

About the Author

John S. Haller, Jr., is the author ofMedical Protestants: The Eclectics in American Medicine, 1825–1939 and Farmcarts to Fords: A History of the Military Ambulance, 1790–1925, both available from Southern Illinois University Press.

Review

"A thorough study of an eventful and highly significant era in the history of American science and in the history of race relations."—Journal of Southern History

Edition details

• Publisher: University of Illinois Press
• Publication date: 1986
• Language: English
• ISBN 10: 0252001648
• ISBN 13: 9780252001642
• Binding: Hardcover
• Edition number: 1
• Number of pages: 240