Fausto-Sterling - Sexing the Body

318 Notes
analyses]. Imaginary readers . . . are not asked only to believe the author
but to spell out what sort of tortures, ordeals and trials the heroes should
undergo before being recognized as such. The text unfolds the dramatic
story of these trials. ...Attheend, the readers, ashamed of their former
doubts, have to accept the author’s claim. These operas unfold thousands
of times on the pages of Nature. [Latour 1987,p.53]
72. Statistics can be seen as a specialized technology of difference. Statistical
analyses and the establishment of population means (which often became
norms) became an essential part of the field of psychology in the twentieth
century. Only then was a ‘‘normal’’ psychological subject established—built
by heavy reliance on population aggregates. For a full treatment of the role of
statistics in the narrowing of ‘‘epistemic access to the variety of psychological
realities,’’ see Danziger 1990, p.197. Danziger’s history is especially important
in analyzing lateralization studies, which are often used to demonstrate
the psychological relevance of CC studies.
73. During the second half of the nineteenth century, statisticians reinterpreted
the bell curve as representing mere variability rather than a distribution
of error around an average, ideal type, as Quetelet thought. Eventually,
scientists renamed standard error, calling it standard deviation instead. Charles
Darwin’s first cousin, Sir Francis Galton, did not extol the virtues of the median
(see Porter 1986, p.129). In contrast to earlier scientists, who focused
on improving humankind through improving environmental conditions, Galton
wanted to use knowledge about the exceptional variant in order to use
evolution (selective breeding) to improve upon the bodies making up a population.
To this end, he invented a new field of study and a social movement:
eugenics. In his book Hereditary Genius: An Inquiry into Its Laws and Consequences,
he wrote a prescription for improving the health of English society: ‘‘I propose
...thataman’snaturalabilitiesarederivedbyinheritance....Consequently,
as it is easy . . . to obtain by careful selection a permanent breed of
dog...gifted with peculiar powers ...,soitwouldbequitepracticable
to produce a highly-gifted race of men by judicious marriages during several
consecutive generations‘‘(Galton 1892, p.1). Dismissing the possibility that
variations in human ability resulted primarily from differences in training and
opportunity, he wrote: ‘‘I have no patience with the hypothesis that babies
are born pretty much alike, and that the sole agencies in creating differences
between boy and boy, and man and man, are steady application and moral
effort’’ (Galton 1892, p.12). As evidence, he noted that despite the wider
educational opportunities available in America (compared with the more
rigid class system of Great Britain), England still produced more great writers,
artists, and philosophers: ‘‘The higher kind of books . . . read in America
are principally the work of Englishmen. ...Ifthehindrances to the rise of
genius were removed from English society as completely as they have been