Both Erasmus Darwin and Samuel Galton were founding members of the Lunar Society of Birmingham, which included Matthew Boulton, James Watt, Josiah Wedgwood, Joseph Priestley and Richard Lovell Edgeworth. The Galtons were Quaker gun-manufacturers and bankers, while the Darwins were involved in medicine and science.īoth the Galton and Darwin families included Fellows of the Royal Society and members who loved to invent in their spare time. He was also a cousin of Douglas Strutt Galton. His father was Samuel Tertius Galton, son of Samuel Galton, Jr. He was Charles Darwin's half-cousin, sharing the common grandparent Erasmus Darwin. Galton was born at "The Larches", a large house in the Sparkbrook area of Birmingham, England, built on the site of "Fair Hill", the former home of Joseph Priestley, which the botanist William Withering had renamed. He also invented the Galton Whistle for testing differential hearing ability. Īs the initiator of scientific meteorology, he devised the first weather map, proposed a theory of anticyclones, and was the first to establish a complete record of short-term climatic phenomena on a European scale. His quest for the scientific principles of diverse phenomena extended even to the optimal method for making tea. He also conducted research on the power of prayer, concluding it had none due to its null effects on the longevity of those prayed for. He devised a method for classifying fingerprints that proved useful in forensic science. Īs an investigator of the human mind, he founded psychometrics (the science of measuring mental faculties) and differential psychology, as well as the lexical hypothesis of personality. His book Hereditary Genius (1869) was the first social scientific attempt to study genius and greatness. He was a pioneer of eugenics, coining the term itself in 1883, and also coined the phrase " nature versus nurture". He was the first to apply statistical methods to the study of human differences and inheritance of intelligence, and introduced the use of questionnaires and surveys for collecting data on human communities, which he needed for genealogical and biographical works and for his anthropometric studies. He also developed the statistical concept of correlation and widely promoted regression toward the mean. Galton produced over 340 papers and books. He was a proponent of social Darwinism, eugenics, and scientific racism Galton was knighted in 1909. Sir Francis Galton, FRS FRAI ( / ˈ ɡ ɔː l t ən/ 16 February 1822 – 17 January 1911), was an English polymath in the Victorian era. Royal Geographical Society's Founder's Medal (1853)Īnthropology, Sociology, Psychology, Statistics
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