To be fair, what Rutherford said, very appropriately, is "I do not know" and that is 100% what he *should* say given that it is NOT his topic. Speculating on a topic he hasn't studied is always less welcome than that! That is something many others do, e.g. Dawkins talking out of his rear saying "say what you want about the ethics, but genetically, eugenics works" which completely ignores so many issues that are not per se related to the moral and ethical issues with eugenics. In this case, if by "went over his head" you mean that he failed to mention that euthanasia *could* be used in a nefarious way by the same people who would endorse eugenics, maybe. But in that case, speaking of "euthanasia" would be at the very least questionable in and of itself. What do we mean, then, when we use this word? If we understand it to be any ending of another life in the name of ending suffering, then that leaves a lot of room for what the person who made the comment said. And that is what has happened in the past. But I'd argue that this is a willful misuse of the word. This is probably why the topic is such a hotly debated one. If a person makes a decision to seek an end to their life, that surely is a different case from when a person who is personally not affected by an illness or disability seeks to decide for others, who are perfectly capable of making their own decisions that they are "in an unbearable state of suffering" and that person would then step in to end another person's life. What the nazis did to people with disabilities should, in my opinion, not be called euthanasia, although I know that people do call it that and this is where eugenics and euthanasia link up to this day. It's problematic, yes. But Rutherford is not an expert on this, so he rightfully passed on answering.

I don't know what you mean by "he'll be on Bridgerton next" as in I wouldn't know what this burn is supposed to mean, but in terms of being weighted, in a way, yes... and? he is not saying that he is somehow *apolitical* by saying that science is inherently always political. However, he is generally pointing out *how* the politics of the time, place, person guide their scientific pursuits. But that in and of itself doesn't make his dismantling of some assumptions wrong. He is never claiming that Galton or Fisher or other grandfathers of modern statistics devised inappropriate methods because they didn't. They were mathematically pretty good and useful, which is why we still use them (to an extent, depending on what you work on) but he rightfully points out what they were driven by and how some of that was very wrong and misguided. That is not a burn. They did not know better in some cases and were driven by a particular racist view in other cases, for which they are to blame more or less, because, again, they might not have known better or had the tools do know better due to the isolation and lack of resources you point out.