Despite a frustrating lack of any palpable challenge to Socrates’ naive, limited essentialism, Plato’s Gorgias is of undeniable interest to any rhetorician even beyond the explicit discussion of oratory and sophistry contained in its opening discussion. The dialogue is well known in composition and rhetoric for its inaugural debate in which Socrates utilizes his famed method of questioning to outwit the well-known and likable orator Gorgias, who is not accustomed to Socratic questioning. Gorgias, in this case, serves metonymically to represent long, formal speeches, the Greek rhesis, which do not invite challenge or resistance and therefore draw the ire of Socrates. Gorgias fails to defend his chosen oratory form, much to Socrates’ delight, and finally caves upon a fatal admission to Socrates’ typical display of ironic politeness. A second orator, the young Athenian Polus, fairs a little better at first but soon falls victim to a similar exercise as Gorgias. Polus’ agreement after a long series of sequential, carefully coordinated questions that it is worse to do wrong than to suffer wrong directly contradicts earlier assertions he’d made, effectively ending that branch of the dialogue. Polus, despite combatting Socrates’ subtle onslaught for a few blows, bows to the elder philosopher and concedes that, despite his earlier beliefs, it seems that it is better to suffer a wrong than to commit one. Whether the Socratic method produces actual truth rather than simply ironing out consistency of belief in an isolated setting is a question not quite relevent here, but it nonetheless certainly merits future discussion. The dialogue largely abandons explicit discussions of oration and rhetoric at this point, though frequent references by Socrates to the meta-components of the conversations corral the attention of anyone reading with a rhetorical lens.
Rounding out the Gorgias is a final exchange between Socrates and a new challenger, the even younger Athenian politician Callicles. Proving himself far more well-equipped to protest Socrates’ rather predictable methods of reasoning, Callicles mounts a hostile and borderline aggressive assault on Socrates’ chosen discipline of philosphy. In particular, Callicles targets his opposition on Plato’s understanding of fair, productive argumentation, accusing him of cornering Polus in their earlier discussion between a winning argumentative position and public shame. The implication here is that Socrates hadn’t conducted the argument here on even, fair grounds, but rather had taken advantage of Polus’ need to be accepted by his fellow members of society, a need never particularly meaningful to Socrates. In Callicles’ estimation, Socrates’ great advantage over Polus is his social indifference, his estrangement from the public sphere of intellectual life, his withdrawal into isolated philosophical meandering. Ever the spirited pragmatist, Callicles accuses Socrates of forgetting how others in society behave, of overlooking the will and mood of society in favor of naive idealism, of prioritizing idealism over concrete reality. This is a crucial moment in Plato in which the topic of democracy begins to be probed– quite valuably to the present moment, I argue. Callicles follows Polus by suggesting that it is better in a democracy to be popular than to be wise, thoughtful, educated or particularly ethical. Here’s where things get sticky.
First, let’s be careful not to view this short blog post as an attack on democracy as an institution or as a political method. Obviously, that’s not the point of this short exploration. Rather, as the title suggests, it’s meant to probe democracy, to explore it from a new angle. Socrates certainly would agree that successful functioning of a democratic society requires the citizens maintaining it to be its custodians– to care about it enough to critique it, to examine and analyze it, to fix it when it requires maintenance. Like an old motorcycle (I revisited Pirsig’s philosophical novel last night, so this metaphor has latched itself into my mind), democracy needs to be kept in tune, re-dialed on occasion, measured and calibrated accordingly. Quite unlike Plato, Socrates and Callicles, we inhabit an era in which much of the population consumes its news via Twitter, in which the public sphere is increasingly an exercise of public digital performance. Russian operatives hacked our social web information streams, thousands of voters reading articles deliberately crafted to stoke tensions based on race, culture and difference. Countless “culture wars” rage at the present moment: the vice president walking out on a National Football League game in a coordinated, rehearsed effort after players took a knee on the field to protest police violence against persons of color; the culture clash over gun rights and ownership; the battle over whether news organizations should have the freedom to print information the executive branch considers “fake news,” frankly astounding in its dystopian, Orwellian tremors.
Democracy, when it comes to the social web sphere, is enacted in complex rhetorical situations that merit a lifetime of further examination and probing.
It is important here to acknowledge neither Plato nor Socrates to be defenders of our conventional modern notions of democracy. Indeed, it seems to me that Plato is just as much a believer in authoritarianism as either Callicles or Polus, though with radical differences in their definitions of right to rule and of the responsibility of rulers to their subjects. Callicles’ principle quarrel with Socrates turns out to be his supreme belief in “might is right,” that those with strength, courage, power and privilege are tasked with ruling fully and completely over the “weaklings” of society. He refers to a myth of Hercules in which the hero steals cattle from Geryon without paying for them, positing that it is the way of nature for the “weaker and inferior” to give way to the “man who is better and superior.” It is important here not to disregard the gender power conceptions not mentioned; equally absent is much discussion of the complexities of what is meant by “superior” or “better” in regards to the process of determining public policy. Plato’s conception of autocracy is quite the opposite of that affirmed by Callicles. He expounds upon an ideal philosopher-king that would act always to further the more virtuous interests of society, detailing a ruler who would not only possess the major virtues of Socratic areté (discipline, justice, reverence and courage) but would also educate the general public on them, including encouraging the average active political citizen to replicate them in everyday life, therefore generating a better society at the level of the individual. The social emphasis placed upon civics as a rung on the ladder of active democracy in the Greece of Plato’s time has, my argument goes, been eroded as well as warped by the processes enacted in our current era, especially within democracy as it appears on the social web.
Polus and Callicles are distinguished from Socrates principally by their commitment to public life in the Athens of their day. Both consider themselves members of the (all-male) public body ruling the city, and avoid anything more than minor deviations from conventional, commonsense wisdom, something Socrates spends his entire body of philosophical work railing against. It is here that I’d like to transition the various arguments enacted by Plato and his characters into a discussion of extreme import to modern political life- Twitter and the larger social web. While Plato and Socrates were extremely critical of the Athens of their day, they would undoubtably be stupefied and dismayed by modern politics and its penchant to pandering, extravagance and self-gratification. When a Twitter account has the universally-acknowledged power to provoke nuclear war, as has nearly been the case recently, we as rhetoricians are spurred toward an analysis of the various rhetorical situations that account creates and responds to. As a politician frequently concerned with the television ratings he garners, Donald Trump is undoubtably well-versed in checking the metadata associated with his Twitter account, including the likes, responses, ReTweets and media uproar each garners. We must ask ourselves: what is his primary motivation, or purpose, when utilizing the rhetorical power contained in his Twitter account? Would it square with the duties of rules outlined in the Gorgias?
The human-tool interaction that occurs at the site of the tweet and Twitter like is a complex negotiation inside of a rhetorical situation that, similar to the arguments made by Polus and Callicles, encroaches into dimensions pertaining directly to political pandering, for gratifying an audience rather than leading it, and to the ideal philosopher-ruler envisioned by Socrates and Plato. Socrates warns the citizens of Athens to be careful not to have “purchased political power at the cost of all we hold dear.” Undoubtably, modern political functioning is fine-tuned to appeal to the widest possible audience. Specifically, the relevance reflected by Twitter metadata is of extreme importance to this discussion.
Acts of democracy are increasingly performed on social web spaces such as Twitter. The issues plaguing democratic functioning throughout history, ie. blind, angry, oftentimes xenophobic and hate-driven populism, tend to fester when education in civics and citizenship is eroded and corroded. Composition’s role is clear here moving forward. I would like to revive Linda Adler-Kassner’s call for an activist WPA, as well as to forward Scott Sundevall and Katherine Fredlund’s recent endeavor in Composition Forum to teach critical media literacy and responsible citizenship through writing curricula. Sundevall and Fredlund call for student-citizens capable of participating and challenging the society they live in, a necessary function within democracies both in Athens and in the contemporary global moment. Nathaniel Rivers and Ryan Weber have recently called in the pages of College Composition and Communication for public writing pedagogies that expand the scope of rhetorical action as emerging “through a complex ecology of texts, writers, readers, institutions, objects, and history,” part of which should in my contention include considerations of student roles as actors in web 2.0 democratic spaces. Can we teach students to be responsible digital citizens in spaces like Twitter, Facebook and YouTube, places where democracy is enacted each and every day?
Lastly, I’d like to propose public writing within composition courses as a possible anecdote to the modern-day manifestation of the same problems Plato outlines in the Gorgias, including asking students to take on a role of public rhetor who must think and act for the public benefit rather than simply pandering to instructor evaluation wishes within a course experience functioning as an echo chamber, gratifying active rhetorical actors rather than educating, challenging or enlightening them. The future of democracy hangs in the balance. What will democracy look like in the future? How can we ensure its survival through teaching responsible rhetorical action to its citizens?


When Jesus arrived in Jerusalem on Palm Sunday, he knew that he was going to his death.
Here’s what his last week looked like:
Encounters blasphemous treatment of the temple – clears the temple.
Plots to kill him continue, failed attempt to arrest him.
[Matthew devotes five of his 28 chapters to this day alone (most of chapters 21-26).]
Jesus is teaching, and pushing back against ongoing attempts by his opponents to trick him into saying something self-incriminating.
Jesus prophecies about heaven and hell, the fall of Jerusalem (70AD) and his own Second Coming.
Probably stayed in Bethany, just outside Jerusalem.
Last Supper. Judas Iscariot, possessed by Satan, leaves the meal and betrays Jesus.
Jesus arrested and taken to the house of the High Priest deposed by the Romans.
Beaten and mocked.
Hearing before Caiaphas (Roman-approved High Priest) – false testimony made against Jesus, accused of blasphemy.
Trial before the Sanhedrin (Pharisees & Sadducees); accused of blasphemy.
Tied up and taken to Pilate.
Trial before Pilate, accused of treason.
Taken to Herod.
Trial before Herod.
Mocked and ridiculed, sent back to Pilate.
Crowds call for Jesus to be crucified.
Pilate has Jesus whipped, then hands him over to be crucified.
Jesus stripped, crown of thorns pushed into his scalp, mocked, beaten repeatedly on the head with a large stick.
Crucified. Nails through outstretched wrists and ankles meant Jesus had to push against those wounds constantly in order to be able to breathe.
Jesus wasn’t a masochist – he didn’t want to go through ANY of that.
But greater than his desire to avoid those things was his love that provoked a desire to honour and glorify his Father in heaven, and to save his people.
Bring on Sunday.


The word Karma means ACTION but it has come to represent the universal cosmic law of cause and effect. Like Newton’s 3rd law of motion – for every action there is an equal and opposite reaction – the Law of Karma suggests that whatever action we take will have an appropriate consequence.
Forces occur in pairs: every action has a reaction or consequence. In physics the action and reaction are simultaneous and it almost makes no difference which occurs first – cause and effect is fixed. But people tend to ascribe values on Karmic actions – we judge the actions and consequences to be good or bad based on our own morality. There is also the idea that there is a fundamental, universal morality that makes fair and impartial judgments of actions and based on that judgment, imposes appropriate consequences. The EFFECT is “chosen” based on the CAUSE. Thus, ACTION is judged based on intention and motive. This interpretation gives people comfort of a sort but it goes against the nature of the law.
Some also interpret Karma as a record of merit or demerit points – our lives and future lives are seen as determined or influenced by how many good or bad points we accumulate. The circumstances we find ourselves in are thought of as a result of the good or bad actions we have previously taken. This can lead people to speculate that the universe – our lives in particular – is based on some system of rewards and punishments. And if we accept the punishment and pay off are debt in some way, we can be free of further prosecution.
Karma should not be seen in this way. Karma is a natural law of the universe like gravity. There is no system of rewards and punishments built into it. Rather, there are simply natural consequences to certain actions and behavior.
The Bible explains it with the statement that “as you sow, so shall you reap.” If you plant an apple seed, an apple tree grows. If you plant corn, corn will grow. If you plant pain, suffering, fear, anger, hostility, violence – then these things will grow within you. And you will bear the accompanying fruit. What seeds you plant now might bear fruit in this life or in a future life – but the thing you plant will surely grow. Our thoughts, emotions, beliefs, actions and behavior eventually return to us. This is the way we grow in understanding and evolve spiritually. There should be no thought of judgment or the accumulation of Karmic Debt.
When we recognize the consequences of our actions, when we notice the effects in our lives, we can begin to modify our thoughts and behavior and move ourselves out of the negative circumstances we find ourselves in and develop more freedom and attain peace of mind.
There is an old saying – sow a thought, reap an action; sow an action, reap a habit; sow a habit, reap a character; sow a character, reap a destiny. This is more in line with how the cosmic law of Karma works.


Leo Zeilig, Haus, £9.99
Patrice Lumumba, murdered at the age of 35 in 1961, was prime minister of newly independent Congo for just seven months. The Belgian imperialists, desperate to eliminate him from history, had him shot and his body dissolved in acid. As the news came out, weeks later, mass demonstrations shook capitals across the world.
Malcolm X described Lumumba as "the greatest black man who ever walked the African continent". Patrice Lumumba was a new icon of resistance.
Leo Zeilig's biography charts the meteoric rise of a young man from humble rural origins to the heights of anti-imperialist struggle. Lumumba was not born to lead. By dint of extraordinary personal effort he clawed himself up the rigid hierarchy of 1950s Belgian racist colonialism and achieved the status of an "évolué" - formally registered as a member of the "civilised indigenous population" and one of a tiny caste of privileged Congolese.
He embraced his role as one of the Belgians' chosen natives and, for example, insisted that his children went to private French-speaking schools. But he baulked at the racism inherent in colonialism, became involved in moderate political projects and was promoted as a representative of the Congolese by his colonial masters.
Lumumba, a loyal post office clerk, was not a revolutionary by choice.
But events moved fast and in the space of three short years his nationalist party, the Mouvement National Congolais (MNC), the first in Congolese history, grew to 58,000 members and catapulted him into the leadership of the liberation movement.
He collaborated with all the great figures of the African anti-colonial struggle and moved from a willing reformer to an intransigent and eloquent exponent of anti-imperialism. His blistering speech at the Congo's independence celebrations is alone worth buying this book for.
After Lumumba's election as the first prime minister of the newly independent Congo, the Belgians successfully fostered ethnic and regional divisions to protect their mining interests and launched a military uprising.
Lumumba's desperate appeals for military support to pan-Africanist comrades, such as Kwame Nkrumah of Ghana, were rejected - lofty promises tragically betrayed. Too late he turned to his natural supporters to launch mass resistance, but failed.
For socialists, this is not just a heroic and tragic story, it is a vital lesson for struggles today and in the future. Zeilig brings to life Tony Cliff's pathbreaking theory of "deflected permanent revolution" - which explains how middle class leaders rise to power on the back of popular aspirations.
The Congolese movement of 1958-61 showed yet again that urban workers and rural masses have the power to shatter imperialism and its local agents - but also require the political analysis and strategy to bring about victory.
This little book is an important addition to our history of the 20th century and essential reading for students of, and activists in, the African liberation struggle.


Pilotage is the use of fixed visual reference on the ground or sea by means of sight or radar to guide oneself to a destination, sometimes with the help of a map or nautical chart. People use pilotage for activities such as guiding vessels and aircraft, hiking and scuba diving. Pilotage techniques apply when close enough to land or other navigational reference points. In these circumstances there is often not enough time for more elaborate navigational techniques that are used when out of sight of both navigational aids and hazards. In these circumstances, it is usually not necessary to know exactly where you are, but that one is in a safe position, or at least on a safe line and will remain so for a period of time, and to know when the next change will be required.
Without such pilotage references, it is necessary to navigate using dead reckoning (typically with a compass and some form of log for speed or distance estimation), radar, radio navigation, and satellite navigation (such as GPS).
Pilotage depends on the pilot being able to recognise the visual references in order to make use of them. The pilot must either be familiar with those visual references or be able to discover them from a map, aeronautical chart or nautical chart. Many nautical and aeronautical disasters have resulted from the pilot incorrectly identifying visual references.
Poor visibility may affect safe pilotage by obscuring the natural features used by pilots in an area. In such situations, pilots use navigational aids such as radar and the GPS to determine position and monitor their passage.
Common types of visual reference point used for pilotage:
During the day:
- Natural features: Mountains, hills, lakes, rivers and coastal features such as cliffs, rocks and beaches
- Man made nautical features: sea marks, landmarks and radio aerials
- Man made land features: Airports, cities, dams and highways
- Man made nautical features: Lighthouses, lightvessels and sea marks with lights
- Man made land features: Airports, illuminated towers and buildings
While not strictly a "visual feature," depth, measured by electronic means or manually (with a lead line), can also be an important element of pilotage.
Pilotage is frequently combined with navigation techniques such as dead reckoning. When a pilot at a known location cannot see the next visual reference on the route to a destination, he or she can use dead reckoning to get closer to the next reference point. This is the most common form of VFR navigation.
- "Pilotage: Why Do We Need Pilotage Plans?". Sailtrain.co.uk. Retrieved 20 January 2013.


In the year 1500 BC, the Israelites who had settled in Egypt had significantly grown in numbers. So much so that the Pharaoh at the time grew fearful of them: paranoid that they would eventually take over. Forgetting that it was actually an Israelite by the name of Joseph - yes, the guy with the groovy coat - who had guided the Egyptian people away from famine a few hundred years earlier, the Pharaoh made all the Israelites slaves. Things then took a most heinous turn when the Pharaoh ordered the midwives to drown all male Hebrew babies at birth.
Despite the Pharaoh’s orders, the midwives did their best to go against the will of their ruler, and a Hebrew mother called Jochebed was able to give birth to a son who she kept secret for three months. Out of desperation, when Jochebed could no longer keep her baby safely hidden, she got hold of a basket made of reeds and bullrushes, waterproofed it, and placed her baby within it on the Nile.
It just so happened that the Pharaoh’s daughter happened to be swimming close by with her entourage. She spotted the basket floating near by in the tall grass, and asked a servant to retrieve the object; this was all observed by Moses’ older sister, Miriam, who had been keeping a close eye on events the whole time from the river bank.
Upon retrieving the basket, the Pharaoh’s daughter guessed that the baby must belong to one of the Israelites, and out of compassion she planned to adopt him. Witnessing all this, the babies sister, Miriam, came dashing over and asked the princess if she would like her to fetch for a Hebrew nursemaid. Unbeknown to the Pharaoh’s daughter, Miriam naturally returned with Jochebed, the baby’s mother, who was then even offered a fee to feed her own baby until he was able to be weaned and raised in the house of the Pharaoh’s daughter.
The daughter of the Pharaoh named the child Moses, which in Hebrew translates as 'drawn from the water', and in Egyptian was close to the word for 'son'. The rest, as they say, is history.
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In Greek mythology, Halcyone and Ceyx were lovers who incurred the wrath of the god Zeus by mocking him and his wife. Angered, Zeus killed Ceyx.


In September 1917 Annie Wheeler received a desperate letter from Christina Robertson. Her brother, John Robertson, was unwell and had been unwell for a number of months. Something happened to John either before he embarked in February 1917 or on the troop ship from Australia.
John was working as a draper in Townsville when he enlisted in 1916. He was 23 and had come to Australia as a child. His family were from Buckhaven Scotland and John had cousins and friends in Scotland. John told his family in Townsville he would cable and write when he landed in England. By April, when no cable or letter arrived they began to worry and when they heard from John’s friends that he had spent the last part of the voyage “dangerously ill in the ship’s hospital” they feared the worse. An officer who was on board the ship told them John arrived in Plymouth in April 1917 in a “sick and dangerous condition”.
Letters to the AIF only increased their anxiety. Initially, they were told there was no report of John being sick and the AIF could only investigate further if the family provided more information about what they had heard. The family did and received a response dated 9th August informing them John had been in Devonport Military hospital after he arrived in England with a “slight attack of bronchitis” but was now with his training battalion in Rolleston. This didn’t tally with the reports they had received and if John’s illness was mild why hadn’t he contacted them or his cousins? John’s cousin headed to Rolleston to see for himself and was shocked by John’s condition.
Christina told Annie John was severely depressed, caused or exacerbated by John contracting the mumps on board the ship. However, there is no mention of mumps in John’s military records; in April he is admitted to hospital with bronchitis but discharged in May and sent to a training battalion in Perham Downs and then Rolleston. Around the time John’s cousin visited he had been AWOL for three days and was awaiting court-martial.
At the end of September, without anyone else to turn to, Christina asked Annie to help “cheer our Brother’.
Whether as a result of Annie’s visits, his family’s letters, a combination of both or something else, things did improve for John. A doctor’s assessment in October noted he had suffered from melancholia on board his transfer from Australia but improved and re-joined the training battalion. However, he found John’s melancholia had returned. “He lies about his hut and is difficult to rouse. He is developing dirty habits, never washes or shaves and wanders aimlessly about. He suffers from loss of memory and when questioned gazes aimlessly about. He makes no friends and his conduct is erratic.” The doctor declared him unfit for general service and unfit for home service. He was admitted to Hurdcott Hospital but only five weeks later was discharged and returned to his training battalion. Something happened during those five weeks that enabled John to “see things in a different light”. In early 1918 John was promoted to acting lance corporal and sent to fight in France. He survived the war and returned to Australia in 1919.
Christina Robertson’s letter to Annie Wheeler is part of Annie Wheeler’s collection in the State Library of Queensland.
John Robertson’s military record has been digitised by the NAA and is available online.


This article from the Australian Broadcasting Commission, reinforces and draws on a lot of the ideas I've previously heard. Ideas that have been confirmed by the elders I've been speaking to, but it also doesn't quite go far enough.
As Australia's first city, the pathways of Indigenous people were certainly used as the basic method to get from place to place, and those paths eventually became the accepted methods used by settlers, then paved for use by carriages and cars.
But in addition to the Sydney basin, this occured across the whole country. Explorers typically followed the paths linking different communities of Indigenous nations, often aided by native guides. When later leading surveyors across the land, the explorers took the paths they knew, and the Aboriginal pathways became locked into the settlers maps as the roads between towns.
Often the Aboriginal settlements were located on strategic waterholes, places where paths crossed rivers, or trading paths crossed each other, so naturally these became the places where settlers established their own towns to take advantage of the same strategic geographic elements. The Aboriginal communities were driven off, or killed, or otherwise had their connection to the land removed. Their marked trees were torn up, so that evidence of their sacred sites could be denied, but the placement of the old camps and settlements lies embedded in the current maps of the continent.
This basically means that in Walkabout, the Nomads roaming the highways uphold the sacred journeys of the Indigenous wanderers. They don't do it deliberately, but the travels along tarred motorways follow the same tracks that have been trodden for dozens of millennia (at least). The communities they meet are settled on places where the spirits have watched and influenced humanity since before recorded history, some home to those who have tried to reclaim the old ways of industrialization, some home to those who have tried to claim even older tribal ways.
Descendants of the Australian Aboriginals can be found in all these groups.


The operators of equipment are heavy workers using heavy equipment to move materials in construction. Operators can work one or more machines, such as pavers, graders and machine load, depending on your area of training and specialization. The average certified salary a heavy equipment operator has depends on factors such as location, working hours, job and experience.
The average income of workers in heavy construction is around $ 21 per hour, or $ 44,000 per year, according to the National Center for Education and Research Building. Salaries vary between US $ 14 to US $ 23 per hour for heavy equipment operators from May 2008, according to the Bureau of Labor Statistics of the US.. The highest paid workers earn US $ 38 per hour, with the 10 percent paid less than $ 11 per hour. The lowest wages were in the paving equipment operators, while the hammers made the most on average. Annual salaries vary based on average hours worked per week throughout the year.
Along with variations per job, the certified heavy equipment operators also receive different wages based on location, with large metropolitan areas that pay the highest average salary. Work projects available, along with the local climate and its effects on the working outdoors play an important role in determining the salaries of these workers, often resulting in an annual base salary, even for workers with wages more high per hour.
Training and promotion
School graduates may be offered to provide training on the job, from lighter construction equipment before moving the machinery with more technology and computerization. The International Union of Operating Engineers offers apprenticeship programs lasting three years of training, including classroom training. Certifications vary by specialization and are available in national professional organizations. Some employers require some type of certification for employment consideration. Operators may advance to supervisory positions or teaching, while others choose to start their own business.
The average job growth through 2018, with growth of over 10 percent in the openings, means that the certified heavy equipment operators must continue to find employment opportunities, according to the Bureau of Labor Statistics. Experienced operators on multiple machines have increased flexibility, leading to a greater chance of getting quality jobs. Employment growth should be higher in areas related to energy, such as oil rigs and pipelines as these companies increase their infrastructures.


Francis Galton was an accomplished figure in late 19th century science. Known chiefly for his work on heredity and eugenics, he also made important contributions to fields such as forensics and statistical methods.
Open the Galton papers
View digitised items online
Francis Galton was a long-lived polymath, remembered chiefly for promoting a selective approach to human breeding in order to perfect the 'race' and coining the term 'eugenics' to describe it. He also deployed his passionate interest in the collection of scientifically robust data across a wide range of subjects, making important contributions to meteorology and the forensic use of fingerprints, as well as biostatistics and psychometrics.
The exhaustive collection includes a substantial number of biographical notes and albums of photographs that go back several generations. A child prodigy himself, Galton's distinguished forebears included Erasmus Darwin, and Charles Darwin was his first cousin. His inherited wealth meant that he could devote his full energies to his investigations without needing to worry about earning his keep.
Galton obsessively recorded and collected data about himself, with examples of this including: a will, written at the age of eight
in a remarkably confident hand, leaving his "collection of beetles" (and much else besides) to his sister; his doctor's prescription
of "blue pills" (mercury) and Leamington Water for constipation at the age of 12; and a report of his examination by a phrenologist
when aged 27.
Galton's early adult life was devoted to intensive study and travel. He explored and charted Damaraland (part of modern Namibia) from 1850 to 1852. "I saw enough of the savage races," he wrote in his journal, "to give me material to think about for the rest of my life." On his return his marriage to Louisa Butler put an end to his travels. Louisa maintained annual summaries of their years together until her death in 1897. She mainly notes visits to friends and relatives, and illnesses and deaths among their acquaintances, though she does also refer to "Frank's" work.
Galton's scientific interest in inheritance came after the publication of Charles Darwin's On the Origin of Species in 1859. On a quest to discover whether human abilities were due to "nature or nurture", Galton delved into the family relationships of judges, MPs, military officers and many other notables from historical accounts, publishing his findings - in favour of nature - in his 1869 book Hereditary Genius. From the start his ideas received mixed reviews: "The mere accumulation of disjointed facts remain an inert and lifeless body…logically worth nothing," wrote an anonymous reviewer for the 'Saturday Review'. Galton continued to collect family data, for cattle, horses and dogs as well as humans.
Even his sister Emma was troubled by his views. But he dismissed her scruples, writing to her that "It is one of the few services that a man situated like myself can do, to take up an unpopular side when he knows it to be the true one". Though he and Darwin did not see eye to eye on every matter, Galton was devastated by Darwin's death in 1882, writing to Emma, "I owed more to him than to any man living… The world seems so blank to me now Darwin is gone" [letters to Emma
In pursuit of reliable data on which to base his studies of human inheritance, Galton pioneered the measurement of individual differences in mental and physical ability. His methods of data collection included innovative questionnaires on everything from twins to mental imagery, and much of the correspondence in the collection represents responses to these surveys - an early form of 'citizen science'. His Anthropometric Laboratory, established in 1891, was a predecessor of the Department of Applied Statistics at University College London, established by Galton's colleague Karl Pearson.
To analyse his data he invented or developed a number of useful statistical techniques and concepts, notably regression to the mean and the standard deviation from the mean, or 'law of error', - the performance of homing pigeons served as data to test this idea.
Galton died convinced that the way forward for a scientifically enlightened population was to favour for reproduction the most physically and psychologically able. He left the considerable residue of his estate, after gifts to his relatives, to University College London to found the Galton Professorship of Eugenics and a laboratory "to pursue the study and further the knowledge of National Eugenics that is of the agencies under social control that may improve or impair the racial faculties of future generations".
Originals held by...
This material has been provided by UCL Special Collections where originals may be consulted.


DOM CSS Rule Object
The CSS Rule object of the StyleSheet object allows you to access and modify the individual rules of a stylesheet. IE and Firefox varies in their implementation of the CSS Rule object, though luckily, the difference is mainly in the syntax:
document.styleSheets.cssRules //access the first
rule in Firefox
document.styleSheets.rules //access the first rule in IE Win
CSS Rule Object
As mentioned, IE and Firefox relies on two different CSS Rule objects to access a stylesheet's rules. Below lists the two objects:
|cssRules||DOM2 based CSS Rule object. Supported in NS/ Firefox.|
|rules||IE's CSS Rule object.
|cssText||Returns the content of a
css rule in its entirety, from the selector to the corresponding CSS
declaration(s). NS/Firefox only. A useful property to
easily search within a rule, by looking at both the selector and
attributes of a rule all at once.
|length||Returns the length of the CSS Rule object (cssRules.length or rules.length), in other words, the number of rules within a stylesheet.|
|parentStyleSheet||Returns the styleSheet object that contains the current rule.|
|selectorText||Read/write property that returns the selector part
of a rule. Setting this property yields unpredictable results in
both Firefox and IE.
|style||The "style" object of the css rule object provides
read/write access to individual attributes defined in the rule,
similar in fashion to the "style" object of inline styles.
DD CSS Library
Free CSS menus and codes to give your site a visual boost.