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The War on Empathy Has a History
And it’s a scary one
The great innovator seemed to have lost his way at some point. His behavior grew obsessive and erratic. He alienated the people in his life and became increasingly isolated. He kept announcing fantastic inventions that were just around the corner, but they never materialized.
He seemed especially obsessed with eugenics, perhaps as part of a larger obsession with purity. He predicted that
The year 2100 will see eugenics universally established. In past ages, the law governing the survival of the fittest roughly weeded out the less desirable strains. Then man’s new sense of pity began to interfere with the ruthless workings of nature. As a result, we continue to keep alive and to breed the unfit. The only method compatible with our notions of civilization and the race is to prevent the breeding of the unfit by sterilization and the deliberate guidance of the mating instinct.… Certainly no one who is not a desirable parent should be permitted to produce progeny. A century from now it will no more occur to a normal person to mate with a person eugenically unfit than to marry a habitual criminal.
Yes, even though he bragged to a reporter that “I have always been ahead of my time,” by this 1937 interview, Nikola Tesla cut a rather pathetic figure. His eugenics rant came in the middle…
