The Dawn Treader

Merrick: In two years, I will be able to cure a child's leukaemia. How many men in the world can say that?
Albert Laurent: I guess just you and God. That's the answer you want, isn't it?

* spoiler warning - go no further if you intend to see this biotech thriller - and I recommend you see it *

Eugenics played a signficant role in the Nazi biomedical vision that I have been reading about in The Nazi Doctors.   Just what is eugenics anyway?

Though eugenics sounds similar to genetics,  it is not a scientific concept.  It belongs in the realm of social science.  The term Eugenics was coined in 1883 by Sir Francis Galton, a cousin of Charles Darwin.  It means "good genes" as in "good breeding" or "good births".

"National Socialism is nothing more than applied biology".

Deputy Party Leader Rudolf Hess, mass meeting in 1934.

The Nazis based their justification for direct medical killing on the simple concept of "life unworthy of life" (lebensunwertes Leben).  They carried out this principle in progressive steps: coercive sterilization; the killing of "impaired" children in hospitals; the killing of impaired adults, mostly collected from mental hospitals; the killing of "impaired"  inmates of concentration and extermination camps; and finally, the mass killings of Jews.

"Do you know any seminal books on eugenics and euthanasia, particularly dealing with the Nazis?", I asked my friend Sam.

Sam, who holds a degree in geo-politics, paused and thought for a second.

"I might just have something you should read", Sam replied.

Sam loaned me his copy of , by Robert Jay Lifton.  Lifton specializes in writing about the psychological aspects of history.  He analyzes and tries to understand how physicians, who take the Hippocratic oath, could commit atrocities like these [warning: graphic content].

Your worldview is not what you say you believe about the world, it is what you actually believe about the world.  People act on what they believe -- that is why actions are more important than words.

Remember the adage, "your actions are speaking so loudly I cannot hear your words"?  Bill Frist provides a clear example of why this rings so true.