Extreme measures : the dark visions and bright ideas of Francis Galton / Martin Brookes

Dead on arrival -- Lunar orbit -- Boy wonder -- Growing pains -- Wilderness years -- The great trek -- A comependium for Crusoe -- Storm warnings -- Extreme states -- On the origin of specious -- Rabbit stew -- Question time -- Vital statistics -- The gravity of numbers -- Tips on fingers -- Home improvements -- Birmingham's forgotten son.

Count wherever you can, was the motto of Sir Francis Galton's extraordinary life. His measuring mind left its mark all over the scientific landscape. Explorer, inventor, meteorologist, psychologist, anthropologist, and statistician, Galton was one of the great Victorian polymaths. And his obsessive quest for knowledge extended far beyond conventional fields of learning. He turned tea-making into a theoretical science, counted the brush strokes on his portrait, and created a beauty map of the British Isles, ranking its cities on the basis of their feminine allure. But it was in the fledgling field of genetics that he made his most indelible impression. Galton kick-started the enduring nature/nurture debate and took hereditary determinism to its darkest extreme, dreaming of a future society built on a race of pure-breeding supermen. Through this biography, Martin Brookes examines Galton's scientific legacy and takes us on a fascinating journey to the origins of modern human genetics.

English