Talk:Eugenics

Resident evil mentioned in opening paragraph, but not in the popular culture section.
I would like to point out that the opening paragraph for this article mentions the video game series Resident evil, but the "In popular culture" section does not. I wish for this inconsistency to be resolved, but I do not know the depth to go into without getting off topic. I leave this as something for wikipedians to discuss. 98.181.69.7 (talk) 19:25, 26 March 2024 (UTC)


 * There is no "In Popular Culture" section, nor does there need to be. It's not an inconsistency. —  The Hand That Feeds You :Bite 22:41, 26 March 2024 (UTC)

Grammar
"... Lee urged highly educated women to have more children, claiming that "social delinquents" would dominate unless their fertility rate increased" Come again?? On what way would the increased fertility rate of these "social delinquents" decrease their dominance? Perhaps: "Lee urged highly educated women to have more children to counteract the domination of "social delinquents"" - or similar. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 115.70.29.185 (talk) 01:40, 24 April 2024 (UTC)

Disputed edits
I invite to discuss their preferred edits here. In my view, removing "Nazi eugenics", "Bibliography of genocide studies", and "Outline of genocide studies" from the See also and describing Eugenics as a "field of study" represent a substantive POV-shift which would require consensus. Generalrelative (talk) 08:06, 3 June 2024 (UTC)


 * Thank you, I was just thinking about opening a thread myself. Maybe I am mistaken but please explain which of the following assumptions was in error:
 * (1) A point that already has a whole eponymous section with reference a la "main article: ..." below the heading does not need to be brought up in the "see also" section
 * (2) If two topics are not (non-controversially) the same - considering e.g. positive eugenics most prominently (!) -, one does not reference a separate bibliography from the already expansive one in the main article. Biohistorian15 (talk) 08:13, 3 June 2024 (UTC)
 * Aha, I see my error in both cases and retract my comments. I'll self-revert. Thanks for unpacking this for me. Generalrelative (talk) 08:22, 3 June 2024 (UTC)
 * Hey, thank you! Sorry for the accusation in that case. Biohistorian15 (talk) 08:24, 3 June 2024 (UTC)
 * No stress. In actual fact I was being far too hasty. Generalrelative (talk) 08:29, 3 June 2024 (UTC)

Exempt/Recover certain threads from "Lowercase sigmabot III" Archiving?
Some discussions (e.g. whether eugenics is supposed to be called "pseudoscientific" or not etc. ...) have opened up multiple times and are arguably not fully resolved. Would it be possible to keep a lot of these on the talk page indefinitely, and if so how? Biohistorian15 (talk) 08:21, 3 June 2024 (UTC)


 * I would suggest bringing this to WP:FTN to see if there is wider community interest in reevaluating the longstanding language. Not sure it makes sense to selectively keep certain threads from being archived. Generalrelative (talk) 08:30, 3 June 2024 (UTC)
 * Nah. If discussions go idle, they can be archived. If the question isn't fully resolved and it becomes important to resolve it, we can go through WP:DR or create an WP:RFC to deal with it then. Otherwise, there's no reason to have those discussions just permanently pinned here. —  The Hand That Feeds You :Bite 12:58, 3 June 2024 (UTC)
 * "Some discussions (e.g. whether eugenics is supposed to be called "pseudoscientific" or not etc. ...) have opened up multiple times and are arguably not fully resolved."


 * They absolutely have been resolved, WP:IDIDNTHEARTHAT notwithstanding. The scientific consensus is that eugenics is a pseudoscience because it is not founded on the basic principles of scientific inquiry. Brusquedandelion (talk) 00:39, 5 June 2024 (UTC)
 * Yeah, no. Considering that this is one of the most controversial wiki articles out there: I don't believe all the discussions have been resolved to the point that there is really no content disputes on this talk page whatsoever. Biohistorian15 (talk) 07:59, 5 June 2024 (UTC)
 * Then provide the suggestion for improving the article. Otherwise this isn't going to accomplish anything. —  The Hand That Feeds You :Bite 10:17, 5 June 2024 (UTC)
 * Yes, I will, in fact, commit myself to improving the article over the next few weeks. For this purpose, I think, just importing archived arguments in relevant discussions as a blockquote should do for now... Biohistorian15 (talk) 11:02, 5 June 2024 (UTC)
 * Would probably be more effective if you made your points in your own words, rather than just quoting someone else's. —  The Hand That Feeds You :Bite 13:29, 5 June 2024 (UTC)

Apply boldface to "positive" and "negative eugenics"?
Otherwise, we might well have to make it a whole subsection for people to link to (as opposed to an anchor with intuitive relevance per the emboldened terms...) Biohistorian15 (talk) 16:24, 21 June 2024 (UTC)


 * I don't know what you're referring to here. —  The Hand That Feeds You :Bite 18:08, 21 June 2024 (UTC)
 * To the common distinction between "pos." and "neg. eugenics" as found in the article; it used to be boldface some time ago. Biohistorian15 (talk) 18:10, 21 June 2024 (UTC)
 * Hm. I don't think it's necessary to boldface those terms. They're italicized in a few spots, but after that it seems fine to just leave them be. —  The Hand That Feeds You :Bite 18:13, 21 June 2024 (UTC)
 * Ok, you're probably right. I'll consider creating a new section with terminology/etymology in the future.Biohistorian15 (talk) 17:47, 22 June 2024 (UTC)

Disputed edits regarding Huxley
I invite HandThatFeeds to please specify their reasons for not including my clarifications about a well-known book that is otherwise easily misinterpreted. Biohistorian15 (talk) 17:52, 22 June 2024 (UTC)


 * First off, as I mentioned, the prose you added did not match Wikipedia's WP:MOS and read more like an essay.
 * Second, the citation added was a paper whose author asserted their personal opinion and interpretation of the book as part of the CRISPR debates. There is nothing to demonstrate this is WP:DUE for the Eugenics article itself, nor that the author or the paper are a reliable source for the topic. —  The Hand That Feeds You :Bite 18:29, 22 June 2024 (UTC)
 * I disagree with your assessment of the citation, but anyhow: would it help if I moved parts of the quote to a note and solely relied for my clarification on an in-text quote from BNW itself instead? Biohistorian15 (talk) 07:31, 23 June 2024 (UTC)
 * I honestly don't think the citation is due for inclusion in this article at all. It might be relevant to Brave New World but, as a primary source, that would be iffy. —  The Hand That Feeds You :Bite 15:57, 24 June 2024 (UTC)
 * Ok, I'll try doing without for now. Biohistorian15 (talk) 13:02, 29 June 2024 (UTC)

Thalassemia
You state that this edit was importing from the Thalassemia article, but I'm not seeing what was actually imported. That article makes no mention of eugenics. —  The Hand That Feeds You :Bite 12:51, 29 June 2024 (UTC)


 * I imported a large paragraph into the notes.
 * However, I forgot mentioning that I also imported much content from the Eugenics article of two non-English WP articles. Biohistorian15 (talk) 12:55, 29 June 2024 (UTC)
 * Okay, in that case, it looks like you've seriously violated WP:REUSE. You must properly source the content you took from within Wikipedia (including non-English WP articles) to comply with the Creative Commons license. We have to be able to show attribution to maintain the licensing of the original Wikipedia authors.
 * "To re-distribute a text page in any form, provide credit to the authors either by including a) a hyperlink (where possible) or URL to the page or pages you are re-using, b) a hyperlink (where possible) or URL to an alternative, stable online copy which is freely accessible, which conforms with the license, and which provides credit to the authors in a manner equivalent to the credit given on this website, or c) a list of all authors. (Any list of authors may be filtered to exclude very small or irrelevant contributions.) This applies to text developed by the Wikipedia community."
 * I won't revert your edit, but you'll likely need to self-revert and then add it back in with the proper attributions in place. —  The Hand That Feeds You :Bite 16:42, 29 June 2024 (UTC)
 * Ok, I actually never heard of that before. I'll remove the respective note for now (*nothing that my remaining translation from the German and Greek wiki was absolutely not verbatim), and will consider simply transcluding an updated/relevantly shortened version of this article over at the Thalassemia one instead at some future point. Does that solve the problem? Biohistorian15 (talk) 12:35, 1 July 2024 (UTC)

the Copy/paste was a mess, and I have removed the section. Editorializing, cherry-picking, and WP:SYNTH are not appropriate. You need to verify every source when copy/pasting content like this, and you obviously did not do that. And yes, this was absolutely synth and also very selective use of sources. Per one of the copy/pasted sources, Ruth Schwartz Cowan's "Moving up the slippery slope: mandated genetic screening on Cyprus": The people who designed the quasi-mandated genetic screening programs in the Republic of Cyprus succeeded in avoiding all that what was evil in earlier eugenic practices; indeed, the Cypriot version of thalassemia screening is so far removed from eugenics that it should not even be called by the same name. That was conveniently emphasized in the original. The cite, however, was attached to a mention of a medical ethicist who is not even mentioned in the source. Additionally, one of the links was dead, meaning you didn't bother to check that one, either. With edits like this WP:CIR becomes an issue. Simplistically reducing this to an example of good eugenics, completely with details from sources which do not even mention eugenics or mention it only in passing, and also ignoring what sources are specifically saying about this as it relates to eugenics, is completely inappropriate.

Wikipedia is not a platform for publishing original research. Wikipedia is not a platform for righting great wrongs. Grayfell (talk) 22:03, 5 July 2024 (UTC)


 * COI, you mean I am somehow involved with the small Island of Cyprus?!
 * "One of the links is dead" - and that somehow means WP:SYNTH? Never heard of that.
 * All of the sources mention eugenics in some form or other, some of them more than 200 times over (!)
 * I provided more accurate page numbers this time, but advise you to be very careful if your editing is not supposed to be understood to be disruptive. Biohistorian15 (talk) 08:54, 6 July 2024 (UTC)
 * About half of your paragraph does not even make sense to me. What did I attach to some "medical ethicist"?
 * It makes me quite angry that in the last few days my attempts at being transparent and pre-emptively seeking consensus (both in edit summaries and on talk pages) were meet by people like you who tried to immediately use these against me somehow...
 * I think independent editors would agree that this is extremely uncivil behavior potentially worthy of some sanctions if it continues. Biohistorian15 (talk) 09:09, 6 July 2024 (UTC)
 * COI should've been WP:CIR. You have apparently been copying links which you haven't bothered to check. Further, your sources do not constantly support the attached claims. As I said, the "Cowan 2009" cite doesn't appear to mention "Medical ethicist Robert Ranisch" at all, but that is the source you used for that summary of his opinion. This kind of sloppiness is common with your edits. Your repeated use of heavy-handed WP:EDITORIALIZING language and sloppy use of copy/pasted sources lead to SYNTH. You have already been given significant leeway and have repeatedly damaged articles to promote, either subtly or grossly, a pro-eugenics angle. Grayfell (talk) 10:28, 6 July 2024 (UTC)
 * This is honestly quite funny. So, apparently the only remaining reason you bothered to specify for your second revert is that I mentioned this potentially being a "slippery slope" (*btw. a claim that is expressly not pro-eugenics; and could be supplemented by other citations and a "more generally" for clarification...)
 * I'd like definitive clarification on your part or I will restore most of the original entry. How about you discuss actual instances of "editorializing"? Biohistorian15 (talk) 10:35, 6 July 2024 (UTC)
 * Your apparent inability to understand the many problems your edits have introduced is not an excuse for edit warring. Grayfell (talk) 21:41, 6 July 2024 (UTC)

Please stop reverting each other for a few minutes. I'm WP:SPLITTING out a new article and giving it the title Prevention of autosomal recessive disorders. It will briefly mention the possible connection to eugenics at the end.

The existence of that article will allow this article's Ethics section to refer to the whole concept, in a way that is both clear and attributable. Some made-up examples just to show you what I mean:
 * Ethical theory X would prohibit nearly all forms of eugenics. Proponents of eugenics dispute this ethical theory, citing the fact that it would prohibit the widely accepted methods for prevention of autosomal recessive disorders as evidence that it is overcautious to the point of absurdity.
 * A successful theory of the ethics of eugenics must account for the fact that prevention of autosomal recessive disorders is widely accepted. It should also take into consideration that disability-selective abortion is widely practiced.
 * Proponent Y argues for an expanded definition of eugenics that includes prevention of autosomal recessive disorders through methods such as carrier testing. They explain this as an attempt to shatter the reification fallacy.

Thank you for your patience while I make this bold change. Let's see if we can make it work. Jruderman (talk) 11:22, 6 July 2024 (UTC)


 * This is a genuinely appreciated effort, but wholly removing a positive mention of eugenics into an article unlikely to get more than 500 30-day views would also be unbalanced. I can find various other sources for calling their program "eugenic", so it is certainly relevant here. I may also expand the paragraph on nazism. We'd likely have to include an (abbreviated but still comparable!) version of my original section in this article in any case. Biohistorian15 (talk) 12:14, 6 July 2024 (UTC)
 * But I will first wait a few days and see what Jruderman is going to do. Biohistorian15 (talk) 12:16, 6 July 2024 (UTC)
 * There are many, many problems with Biohistorian15's recent edits. One example, from the paragraphs above the one you recently edited, is the WP:PEACOCK and WP:WEASEL bloat about "the skeptic's chaplain" supported by dubious and primary sources. Be aware that any split will make repairing that damage much harder. There are a lot of examples like this, and I'm not seeing a lot worth preserving. This really looks like it's headed towards a noticeboard. Grayfell (talk) 21:41, 6 July 2024 (UTC)
 * Sorry, I happen to like Dawkins. How about you remove these few words instead of employing intimidation tactics?
 * Has anybody recently dared to talk about taking you to a noticeboard? (*for one, you directly insulted me with the WP:CIR above) Biohistorian15 (talk) 09:03, 7 July 2024 (UTC)

Use of transclusion
While has advantages and disadvantages in general, I think many of the uses on this page aren't great. Below, I'll go into detail about two of the article's eight uses of. Jruderman (talk) 12:59, 3 July 2024 (UTC)

Transclusion of Dysgenics
The combination of section location, section heading, and transcluded text seems to create new claims without stating them outright:
 * ~ "Concern about dysgenics is 'Darwinian'"
 * ~ "Early eugenicists were more motivated by concerns about dysgenics than by opportunities for human enhancement"

Are these statements true? Verifiable? I don't know, but there's nowhere to put a citation or a citation-needed tag when an idea is communicated only through juxtaposition.

Furthermore, very little of the transcluded text (permalink) contributes to understanding the origins of eugenics. It's three sentences introducing a new term, one sentence that's half relevant, and two sentences about more recent perspectives. Those last two sentences are especially harmful to the flow of this article's history section. Jruderman (talk) 12:59, 3 July 2024 (UTC)

Transclusion for "treatment-enhancement distinction"
First, I don't know what the section title is trying to communicate with the word "Problematizing". What is being called a problem, in what way, and by whom? Again, since it's just a section title and transclusion, there's nowhere to put a clarification or source.

Second, six paragraphs laying out the argument in detail may be excessive for the Eugenics article. This could be one or two sentences in a section about the various lines that ethicists have drawn between acceptable and unacceptable uses of eugenics: "Differing feelings on the use of eugenics to reduce the prevalence of genetic disorders on the one hand, and to push the limits of human ability on the other, mirror the long-standing treatment-enhancement distinction in philosophy of medicine." Jruderman (talk) 12:59, 3 July 2024 (UTC)

Procedural notes
I'm frustrated with much how effort it takes to review new transclusions compared to how much effort it takes to make them. I know we don't all agree on which narratives the article should highlight, but I want helping with the article to feel less like an exercise in overwhelming one's opponents and more like an adversarial collaboration.

Maybe we should take some time to come to a consensus about a rough outline for the article, including how much weight we want to dedicate to each major section. By doing this earlier rather than later, we might be able to avoid wasting time writing things that get deleted later. Jruderman (talk) 12:59, 3 July 2024 (UTC)


 * I see what you mean.
 * I intend to rewrite dysgenics soon to heed these concerns. For now I changed "Darwinian origins" out for "Darwinian backdrop". I'll try finding a source for the established divide ("dysgenics" in the more Darwinian Britain, "degen. theory" everywhere else...)
 * I think "problematizing" is a reasonable word to use, but would "the collapse of the distinction" be better-suited? I'll think about shortening it, but many of the notes e.g. arguably do address common objections to eugenics (regarding disability rights etc.) which might indicate keeping them.
 * "I'm frustrated with much how effort it takes to review new transclusions compared to how much effort it takes to make them." - but it was mostly me though that wrote the original texts too, wasn't it?
 * Biohistorian15 (talk) 16:16, 3 July 2024 (UTC)
 * Shortened your second transclusion example a bit.
 * Suggestion to establish my good faith:
 * You might want to try finding a more NPOV title for "the threat of perfection" and the "retroactive compansation" quote box... - I can't think of anything personally.
 * Biohistorian15 (talk) 16:41, 3 July 2024 (UTC)
 * I don't know what "Retroactive compensation" is supposed to mean in this context. Can we just remove the box label? Jruderman (talk) 19:35, 3 July 2024 (UTC)
 * Ok, sure. Biohistorian15 (talk) 15:46, 4 July 2024 (UTC)
 * Regarding what it means to "problematize" the treatment-enhancement distinction... maybe it's clearer to "collapse", "dissolve", "erase", or "reject" the distinction? Or to "question its ethical relevance" when it comes to eugenics, just like we do when it comes to medicine. Jruderman (talk) 19:48, 3 July 2024 (UTC)
 * "Collapse" is a philo. well-established usage (cf. e.g. "the collapse of fact-value dist." or "modal collapse"), but maybe that's just WP:OR on my part. Biohistorian15 (talk) 15:47, 4 July 2024 (UTC)
 * Regardless of terminology, the important thing is to be clear about the distinction between:
 * Pointing out that a dichotomy is more of a continuum
 * Arguing that a dichotomy's axis is irrelevant, in a particular context, even at its two extremes
 * Jruderman (talk) 18:56, 4 July 2024 (UTC)
 * I'm not sure if I understand you entirely here. You could of course try finding a good argument that somehow (re-)establishes the axis, e.g. in a purely methodological way (*I vaguely remember some bioethics papers did that but can't find them RN)... Biohistorian15 (talk) 11:34, 8 July 2024 (UTC)

Content forks?
These pages all have some overlap. Some merging or distinction may be in order.


 * Eugenics
 * New eugenics
 * Human germline engineering
 * Directed evolution (transhumanism)
 * Designer baby

The guidelines Content forks and Subpages are relevant here. For articles that might be or become "about a term", WP:NOTDICT determines which terms should have articles.

Scattered thoughts: Jruderman (talk) 08:53, 7 July 2024 (UTC)
 * I am concerned about the divergence in attitude. The articles range from largely negative to largely positive to barely considering themselves part of a controversy at all. Broad consensus seems to be lacking.
 * This article has a section on the therapy–enhancement distinction while another article has a section on therapeutic and non-therapeutic use.
 * Maybe this article could be delineated in some way that keeps it from being a magnet for sections on broad economic policies / narrow medical pursuits / what might be ethically permissible to do with PGD / which logical fallacies everyone else is committing. We could scope this article to a date range, or to state mandates, or to "the pseudoscientific parts". Not by taking a definitive stance on what "eugenics" means, just wiki stuff like "This article is about X, for modern medical practices see Human germline engineering". Maybe.


 * We should consider merging first:
 * For one, "designer baby" is a POV term and if it is to remain, the debate there should be mostly about fallacies employed in using it, and not in taking an artificial ethical controversy seriously. (*for such a purpose we should point to a different article).
 * Alternatively, we may make it a new section of "new eugenics".
 * "Human germline engineering" may need to be merged into "new eugenics" entirely.
 * Would leave "directed evolution" alone for now
 * More generally, if you want to scope this article to a date range, hence exclude recent bioethical discussions entirely, this would necessarily make the article 30% more negative. Since this is the main article regarding the concept, that would be a dubious strategy. Biohistorian15 (talk) 09:14, 7 July 2024 (UTC)
 * That's kind of the point. It's okay if one article is negative and another article is positive if they're clearly about different topics.
 * It's always an alternative, of course, to have one article where it's very clear what it's positive and negative about.
 * If we're allowed to POV-push for anything here, it's for readers to come away informed. My capacity to care about which term is used is limited. Jruderman (talk) 10:26, 7 July 2024 (UTC)
 * Might I add:
 * Human genetic enhancement
 * ... and the former article:
 * Reprogenetics
 * Biohistorian15 (talk) 19:32, 10 July 2024 (UTC)

Is this portrait too charming?
Thought about using it to replace the black-and-white one. Honest question. Biohistorian15 (talk) 11:32, 8 July 2024 (UTC)


 * Same question per: Nick_Bostrom,_Stanford_2006_(square_crop).jpg
 * note that it has great resolution.


 * Biohistorian15 (talk) 12:57, 8 July 2024 (UTC)

Lee Kuan Yew statements
Hi User:Biohistorian15, seems we have a dispute about whether to include this in the Singapore section:

80% is probably an overestimate. The part about Lee's children makes it seem like he might not know how to reason about the multiple ways parents influence their children (genes but also rearing, wealth, connections, and more).

As is, the section misleads some readers by not providing a rebuttal. Changing "stated" to some other verb would help but only slightly. While the second one uses the verb "attributed" for one claim, it leaves a hidden statement of fact (the success of his children) that rubs me the wrong way in the context of this article.

If we add rebuttals, the section turns into "Based on these questionable beliefs, Lee implemented a program...". This would be misleading in another way: these weren't his only motivations for the program.

More generally, let's try not to fill the article with claims-by-insinuation, whether it's about hereditarianism or anything else. This goes for the "Darwin–Wedgwood and Huxley families" stuff too. Clearly stated claims are better for the encyclopedia: they can be cited and attributed; they don't make some readers suspicious; they don't bifurcate WP:BALANCE into balance-of-insinuations and balance-of-statements.

Can we remove the sentence for now and start looking for other information about Lee to replace it? Perhaps some quote that gets at Lee's motivations (rather than his beliefs), or something about how he gathered support for the proposal.

Jruderman (talk) 12:36, 8 July 2024 (UTC)


 * Ok, makes sense. Please (carefully!) remove it for now. But if I find absolutely nothing else to contextualize his policies, we'll have to talk this through. Biohistorian15 (talk) 12:51, 8 July 2024 (UTC)
 * The "80%" mess would bother me less if it were stuffed into an on the phrase "hereditarian beliefs". Like "Lee mentioned an estimate of 80%, at the high end of the ______ consensus estimates as of 2024".
 * Finally looking at the source, it's not entirely clear what Lee's beliefs were. The 80% quote is about "performance", but the article interprets this without explanation to be just "intelligence", without commenting as to whether it might also be conscientiousness or whatever. Also, it doesn't call Lee "hereditarian", but rather discusses "The fallacies of this and other hereditarian arguments". This makes me more inclined to leave the whole thing out.
 * The source is a review of Not in Our Genes by Lewontin, Rose, and Kamin. If the statements are drawn from the book, we could get a more precise understanding of what Lee said by looking at that book. If they're Gould's own statements to add context, it's trickier. Has Gould talked about Singapore in other writing where his statements and citations are more precise? In the absence of finding something more definitive than what's in the book review, I'm less inclined to even have it as a footnote.
 * Btw, for the end of the section, were any conclusions drawn from Singapore's experience? Did the economic policies affect differential birth rates as hoped, and did that in turn make the next generation better in some way (if that can even be calculated)? What specific objections to the policy spelled its doom? Does any of the policy continue to this day? And perhaps not for this section, but do other countries do the same thing but just frame it as "smoothing welfare cliffs" and "extending child benefits into the middle class so struggling families aren't forced to limit their size"?
 * I'll remove the sentence about Lee's beliefs for now. Ideally a new quote would answer some of the questions that readers might have, such as: was Lee narrowly focused on intelligence or broadly on multiple contributors to educational attainment; was Lee thinking more along the lines of countering what he believed to be a dysgenic trend, or was he aiming for something more ambitious; was Lee aiming to increase the overall population at the same time?
 * As for my slightly more vague concerns regarding "Darwin–Wedgwood and Huxley families", I'll wait to see if others want to weigh in. Jruderman (talk) 18:36, 8 July 2024 (UTC)
 * Just provided the missing citations for the family tree. Biohistorian15 (talk) 16:50, 9 July 2024 (UTC)
 * Just noticed that the article does mention Lee's dysgenics-ish concerns in the following paragraph. That seems more relevant than his specific beliefs about heritability of IQ, regardless of whether his estimate was off.
 * Do you think this should be moved over to Dysgenics? I'm leaning toward keeping it here. It would be weird if "whether something is eugenics" depends on whether it's slightly less or slightly more effective than intended. Jruderman (talk) 22:26, 8 July 2024 (UTC)
 * No, I think it isn't notable enough to be moved to dysgenics. Biohistorian15 (talk) 16:32, 9 July 2024 (UTC)

This section is extremely poorly-sourced, in addition to multiple WP:TONE and WP:EDITORIALIZING problems. It appears that most sources were copied from another article without having been verified. This is not appropriate.

Starting with the first source, what is Blynkt? This article appears to be the only time this website is cited anywhere on Wikipedia, both here and at History of eugenics. This is a red flag. Rhetorically speaking, is this source reliable, and is it being proportionately summarized, in this article, or was this yet another example of writing WP:BACKWARDS?

The very next source is a book review by Stephen Jay Gould from 1984. This, again, appears to have been added backwards, as it doesn't directly support the attached statement: In his speeches, Lee urged highly educated women to have more children, claiming that unless their fertility rate increased, "social delinquents" would dominate. This appears to instead be from the Blynkt source.

The next source sure looks like it was copied from Population control in Singapore without having been checked. Nobody should be citing sources they have not personally verified. If you do not have at least partial access to that source, do not cite it. Further, do not assume that it says anything at all about eugenics unless you can confirm that in some way.

The Nature opinion is WP:PRIMARY.

The NatGeo source is quite long, lists an access date of 2009 indicating yet again that it was copy-pasted without verification, and it doesn't appear to mention 'eugenics' once, making its use here likely WP:SYNTH. Rhetorically, what is the source actually saying, and how does that relate to the larger topic of eugenics?

The Yet more controversial... paragraph is solely supported by a single primary source.

Etc.. This section should be deleted. It could be rewritten from scratch to match reliable sources which specifically contextualize it as a notable example of eugenics. Grayfell (talk) 20:17, 10 July 2024 (UTC)


 * Again, this appears to be WP:EDITORIALIZING language, unverified copy/pasted sources, and the WP:SYNTH use of sources which are not even about eugenics.
 * I want to really emphasize that Wikipedia is not a platform for publishing original research. Our goal for this article is to summarize reliable independent sources about eugenics. We are not asking editors to combine sources to imply anything about eugenics. That's WP:SYNTH and WP:EDITORIALIZING. The above discussion leads me to believe there is some serious confusion about this.
 * The book review is from 1984, for the book Not in Our Genes. The review spends a single paragraph discussing Singapore for context of the otherwise unrelated book review. It directly mentions eugenics only once. This source is reliable in some contexts, but for this section of this article, it is extremely flimsy.
 * The part which says In 1985, incentives were significantly reduced after public – first and foremost Western... Is cited to a primary source from 1984 which says nothing about incentives being reduced a year in the future, and it says nothing whatsoever about this being first and foremost Western. This is transparent editorializing and a misrepresentation of the source to imply a political point. This is not appropriate for a Wikipedia article.
 * Grayfell (talk) 22:16, 13 July 2024 (UTC)
 * I have made an attempt to clean up this mess, but it's still not great. Again, verify sources and make sure citations are attached to the correct statements. Do not add editorializing. Grayfell (talk) 23:46, 15 July 2024 (UTC)

Hopes for a new "Ethics" section
I would like to organize arguments in an encyclopedic way that helps readers form opinions consistent with their own beliefs and principles. To that end, I'm looking to:


 * Focus a little more on each side's core affirmative arguments and a little less on who can accuse the other side of logical fallacies with the funniest names.
 * Group together arguments that are about the same thing: for example, pros and cons of enforced eugenics, then pros and cons of liberal eugenics.
 * Keep each subsection short and tight, by paraphrasing longer quotes, and by relying on links to other wiki articles to provide background. My hope here is that readers will be able to hold two opposing arguments in their mind at once.

I am optimistic that such an approach can be acceptable to editors in multiple camps: proponents, opponents, and cautious optimists who hope readers will conclude that good things are good and bad things are bad.

If I maintain interest in this subject long enough, and don't get burned out trying to mediate paragraph-by-paragraph disputes, I may try to do this myself. If I do, I will take Grayfell's advice and engage with some overview-type, reliable, secondary-to-tertiary sources before getting too committed to a list of distinctions or even an outline.

Jruderman (talk) 17:53, 10 July 2024 (UTC)


 * It is a serious mistake to treat these camps (proponents, opponents, and cautious optimists) as being equivalent. Attempting to avoid conflict and find a compromise is false balance, because Wikipedia is not a platform for promoting fringe views. Even if a fringe view seems reasonable to some in good faith, it is still a fringe view. The article has already become bloated with 'background', florid filler language, and fringe sources which falsely imply a level of legitimacy which is directly contradicted by reliable sources. I hope it is obvious why this is a problem. Grayfell (talk) 18:57, 10 July 2024 (UTC)
 * Grayfell, simply removing, say, dozens of scholarly sources you personally disagree with won't do. If you want to balance it more, how about you extend the "Nazi eugenics" entry that is currently basically a single paragraph and or transclude an improved lede from somewhere like that?
 * Careful and historically accurate perspectives like that would find no backlash by the likes of me at all. But, again, massive removals on flimsy grounds are a very different story.  Biohistorian15 (talk) 19:21, 10 July 2024 (UTC)
 * Your comment misrepresents the many, many problems your edits have caused. Using boldface to call them "flimsy" doesn't make them flimsy. Your edits have introduced far too many WP:EDITORIALIZING terms and WP:SYNTH claims.
 * As one example from my recent attempt to clean up this mess: "It should be noted, however, that not all proponents of human enhancement necessarily find such a net reduction in the diversity of human geno- and or phenotypes desirable at all." uses editorializing language to say nothing of substance. Who are "proponents of human enhancement"? This introduced a vague opinion in euphemistic language, presents it as significant enough that "it should be noted" (which is specifically cited as an example of WP:EDITORIALIZING), but this completely fails to provide any context, much less attribution. This is an extremely poor way of explaining this, and only adds even more bloat to an already bloated article. That is setting aside for the moment the serious issues with the source itself. There are many other examples that could be provided. Grayfell (talk) 19:38, 10 July 2024 (UTC)
 * Ok, thanks. Now that you are being concrete I can try to fix that issue. Biohistorian15 (talk) 09:50, 11 July 2024 (UTC)
 * You have not fixed any of those issues, nor indicated that you even understood them, since you have been repeating the same mistakes in recent edits. I have again attempted to restore more neutral language to the article. Much more work is still needed. Grayfell (talk) 21:47, 13 July 2024 (UTC)
 * Grayfell is right that avoiding false balance is a major concern. My aim is not to dictate which information is included, but to improve the organization of information that is included based on policy and consensus. I don't expect all editor camps to be equally happy, but I do hope that clear scoping can lower the temperature a bit as a side effect. Jruderman (talk) 20:25, 10 July 2024 (UTC)
 * maybe removing "Status quo bias" would be justified
 * Regrouping loose objections like "subjective hence not science" might make sense
 * Biohistorian15 (talk) 19:25, 10 July 2024 (UTC)

Liberal humanism and deontology
Regarding this edit. I tried to save it, but it's not worth it. I started to go over it line-by-line trying to fix problems, but there would be nothing left when I was done, so I skipped to the end and deleted it.

The entire section was written like an argumentative essay, not like an encyclopedia article. Even if I deleted the many, many instances of WP:EDITORIALIZING language, WP:WEASELs, WP:EUPHEMISMs and pointless filler words, the section would still be a cobbled-together mishmash of WP:SYNTH to promote a specific, non-neutral point of view.

As one example the context-free mention of Jürgen Habermas having a cleft palette was copied verbatim from Jürgen Habermas, but nowhere does that article make a connection between this factoid and Habermas' views on eugenics, making this yet again synth. That article doesn't use the word eugenics at all.

That was just one example, but the entire section was nothing but problems like this.

Many of these other sources do not mention eugenics either, and many of the points are disproportionately summarized to promote a very specific view that is contrary to the mainstream.

There is so, so, so much of this junk in the article now, and I expect that more work like this will need to be done to bring the article back to something resembling WP:NPOV and to comply with WP:MOS. The article now cites Richard Lynn for basic facts and recommends his work in the further reading section. I suppose WP:FRINGEN might have some insight, but the pro-fringe issues are just one part of a deeper and more fundamental problem here. Grayfell (talk) 20:04, 18 July 2024 (UTC)