“The American ideal is, after all, that everyone should be as much alike as possible.”
“The following question had been much in my mind. How is it possible for a population to remain alike in its features, as a whole, during many successive generations, if the average produce of each couple resemble their parents? Their children are not alike but vary…”
Source: Memories of My Life (1908), Ch. XX Heredity (1909 ed.)
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Francis Galton 14
British polymath: geographer, statistician, pioneer in euge… 1822–1911Related quotes
Source: The Wisdom of W.E.B. Du Bois (2003), p. 132
Source: The Selfish Gene (1976, 1989), Ch. 3. Immortal Coils
Context: Genes do indirectly control the manufacture of bodies, and the influence is strictly one way: acquired characteristics are not inherited. No matter how much knowledge and wisdom you acquire during your life, not one jot will be passed on to your children by genetic means. Each new generation starts from scratch.
L'esprit consiste à connaître la ressemblance des choses diverses et la différence des choses semblables.
Pt. 3, ch. 8
De l’Allemagne [Germany] (1813)
“It is the common wonder of all men, how among so many million of faces there should be none alike.”
Section 2
Religio Medici (1643), Part II
Source: Dragon Magic (1972), Chapter 5, “Shui Mien Lung—Slumbering Dragon” (p. 168)
2000s, 2000, A Truly Great America (2000)