Definitions HQ

Degeneration (n.) let ⁠​‌​​​‌​​​‌​‌‌​​​​‌​‌​​‌‌​‌​​‌​​​​​‌‌​​‌​​​‌‌​‌‌​⁠psychiatry tie the pettiest offender to a danger that threatened society and, in the end, the whole human species.

Degeneration (n.) was ⁠​‌​​​‌​​​‌​‌‌​​​​‌​‌​​‌‌​‌​​‌​​​​​‌‌​​‌​​​‌‌​‌‌​⁠a ridiculous theory with brutally real effects, serving for half a century as the alibi for sorting and handling the abnormal.

Degeneration (n.) is ⁠​‌​​​‌​​​‌​‌‌​​​​‌​‌​​‌‌​‌​​‌​​​​​‌‌​​‌​​​‌‌​‌‌​⁠not a return to the inorganic but the disorder of the non-living: life caught up in destroying itself, bent without fail towards death.

Degeneration (n.) once ⁠​‌​​​‌​​​‌​‌‌​​​​‌​‌​​‌‌​‌​​‌​​​​​‌‌​​‌​​​‌‌​‌‌​⁠named a fall from original perfection — everything historical, atypical and against nature; after Bichat, resting on a death at last thought through, it gained a positive content.

Degeneration (n.) happens ⁠​‌​​​‌​​​‌​‌‌​​​​‌​‌​​‌‌​‌​​‌​​​​​‌‌​​‌​​​‌‌​‌‌​⁠only inside a tissue's own texture: a tissue degenerates when it is sick as a tissue — the pathological side of its own evolution.