Darwin and the Totalitarian Temptation
First, I know all of Ricochet joins me in wishing Peter a speedy recovery from his ear inflammation. That's the malady as I, Claire Berlinski, amateur physician, have diagnosed it. Any more medical questions, just send them to Dr. Berlinski, GDS. That stands for Google Diagnostic Specialist. I diagnosed a textbook case of Lupus like that the other day.
Second, Peter's post reminded me that some of you may not know that I'm David Berlinski's daughter. I'm also Mischa Berlinski's sister, which is perhaps why I view the plight of David Miliband with more than academic sympathy. (So where's my National Book Award nomination, Universe? Where? Where? Does the word "firstborn" mean nothing to you?) Fieldwork is, in fact, the best novel written in this century. The insult is further aggravated because when I was five years old, Mischa stole my favorite stuffed animal, Kitty, which was a present from Uncle Jay, and my mother promised to get me a new one, but she forgot. It was incredibly unjust. This may go some way toward explaining why I adopted seven cats.
But I digress. My father became exceedingly controversial in the late 1990s after the publication of this essay, The Deniable Darwin, in Commentary. He followed this with a series of articles about the mysteries of the existence of the human mind, the existence and diversity of living creatures, and the existence of matter. They've been collected here. He recently wrote The Devil's Delusion: Atheism and its Scientific Pretensions.
Here my father discusses Darwin, Nazism, Communism, Richard Dawkins, Peter Singer, and the totalitarian temptation:
The influence of Darwin on modern culture and politics: your thoughts?
PS: For those of you who are curious, this is my mother, who set off a firestorm of international controversy with her recordings of the Martinu Cello Sonatas. General Petraus had to call her personally to warn that she was endangering our troops. Apparently, once they started listening, they became so hypnotized by the elegiac central Largo that unit cohesion and battle-readiness went right out the window. She felt awful about that, of course.
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May '10
Re: Darwin and the Totalitarian Temptation
I am glad I stayed up past my bedtime so I could listen to this before going to sleep. What a great listen. And the mind reels at what Thanksgiving at your childhood home must have been like... oy!
Re: Darwin and the Totalitarian Temptation
Oh, yes. That reminds me of the 1986 Marshmallow and Sweet Potato Casserole Imbroglio. Ugly, ugly, ugly. But perhaps that's the kind of dirty family laundry that ought never be aired.
May '10
Re: Darwin and the Totalitarian Temptation
I have a few remarks regarding David's comments. First, I would argue that even if the Nazis used Darwinian propositions as premises to infer fascist politico-economic conclusions, this does not necessarily refute the Darwin propositions in question. Second, its also conceivable (and far more likely) that the Nazis erroneously inferred fascist politico-economic conclusions from Darwinian propositions. Would this therefore discredit Darwinism? All it takes for the smearing of a biological method is for an assemblage of political tyrants to claim that they admire it? Darwinism provides a description of how animals, particularly non-rational ones, conduct themselves in order to survive; it does not offer a prescription for how animals should behave themselves. So, it seems to me that Darwinism can hardly inform political economy, since the latter attempts to prescribe types of conduct. I would much rather indict racism and very ill-advised economic policies as causes of Nazism then Darwinism.
Jun '10
Re: Darwin and the Totalitarian Temptation
My comment will stumble a bit since this really got me going. What a wonderful post and your father's video was incredible.
As someone who meticulously studies Communism, especially during the time of the Russian Revolution, this REALLY fascinated me. Normally, I attribute the trigger to Communism as the Industrial Revolution (just the trigger, these ideas have been floating around forever). But whatever the trigger was, it certainly seemed to be something during the 19th Century. I honestly had never pondered the role Darwinism had on any of the political eruptions we're all very familiar with. I'll have to think about it further. Great stuff!
Right or wrong, Darwinism did cause a major shift in thinking. It not only put "survival of the fittest" into the limelight, but it also removed an inhibition humanity relied upon for most of our existence, i.e. some explanation which says we are something more than an accident. That thought can remove all sense of accountability in us. It can also mean that human nature can change, which is, of course, one of Communism's favorite theories and an abomination to many of us here in Ricochet. Wonderful post Claire. Thanks!
Jun '10
Re: Darwin and the Totalitarian Temptation
Not having read The Devil’s Delusion I write with some trepidation that it may not be Darwin who is at fault so much as it is certainty. Indeed, certainty may be the chief delusion of the sciences, which for lack of a better description we might for the sake of argument even call it the devil’s delusion. Divorce humanity from uncertainty and fascism is inevitable for the simple reason that anyone who does not agree has no opinion, which conclusion inevitably leads to no life. That Darwinism is a theory and will for all of humanity’s future remain a theory never to be proven is no excuse being as the enlightened hold it to be true with religious fervour. Oddly enough in his book God is Not Great, Christopher Hitchens attempts to lay the blame for the millions killed at religion’s door, because of the very religious-like fervour with which the Communists when about their slaughter.
May '10
Re: Darwin and the Totalitarian Temptation
I saw the previous 8 min of this interview. Your father is an especially confident person.
Jun '10
Re: Darwin and the Totalitarian Temptation
The randomness of human existence is a very recent argument not one that extends back in history. Prior to Darwin, humans for the most part thought themselves the beneficiaries of divine intervention. And it is this deistic thinking that Darwin confronts and in some minds defeats. Darwin himself was a man very much of the nineteenth century in that he was for most of his life religious. He was also a dog breeder, and that fact alone should suggest the roots of the theory of evolution in that he himself was breeding to raise certain genetic traits in the animals he owned.
May '10
Re: Darwin and the Totalitarian Temptation
Cas, I give more credit to the Darwinians than someone such as yourself. The Darwinians don't claim that they believe in their theory without evidence nor do I suspect that they actually do believe in their theory without evidence. To label their devotion as "religious fervor" is, I think, mistaken. Furthermore, Hitchens blames religion and religious institutions for having marinated the Russian people in abject obedience and credulity for centuries and for giving people like Lenin and Stalin the "gift" of a reservoir of servility ready and willing to live and die on behalf of myths. I haven't heard him consider communism as a religion.
Jun '10
Re: Darwin and the Totalitarian Temptation
If you see Darwin as a dog breeder, you cannot extrapolate from a close reading of his theory any conclusions about “human nature”, which I take to mean the psychological makeup of man. Darwin addresses biology, not psychology as is generally implied by the term human nature.
Jun '10
Re: Darwin and the Totalitarian Temptation
I did not label Darwinism as religious fervour! And what's more I never will.
Jun '10
Re: Darwin and the Totalitarian Temptation
Whether I did it effectively or not, I do think I was saying the same thing. Biology and human nature are certainly on different spectrums. I used "human nature" on purpose since I think it can be argued that an unintended consequence of Darwinism is that people took an errant leap into thinking that it too could be changed just as the theory says about biology.
Cas Balicki
If you see Darwin as a dog breeder, you cannot extrapolate from a close reading of his theory any conclusions about “human nature”, which I take to mean the psychological makeup of man. Darwin addresses biology, not psychology as is generally implied by the term human nature. · Oct 7 at 1:01am
May '10
Re: Darwin and the Totalitarian Temptation
I accept the Darwin Theory as being in line with what I see. But I wonder: is it stale? Is there are biological Einstein out there poised to ask questions that Darwin's Newton never contemplated?
Re: Darwin and the Totalitarian Temptation
I'm distraught that thus far no one has called attention to my Lupus joke. I was so proud of that, too.
Re: Darwin and the Totalitarian Temptation
I will simply add that everyone, whether they are brave enough to admit it, has a frightening Marshmallow and Sweet Potato skeleton in their family closet.
Jul '10
Re: Darwin and the Totalitarian Temptation
The problem with the Theory of Evolution is that it is not a scientific theory, properly understood, at all.
May '10
Re: Darwin and the Totalitarian Temptation
I think Kenneth might have a transcript of this... Kenneth?
May '10
Re: Darwin and the Totalitarian Temptation
Please keep off digress.
But do let us know when you and Mischa enter Kitty Therapy...
May '10
Re: Darwin and the Totalitarian Temptation
Claire,
Anyone who has watched House regularly knows that it's never Lupus (unless the episode is S04E08, in which case it is Lupus - but just this once). In fact, if I didn't have a colleague who suffers from it, I wouldn't believe that the condition exists.
May '10
Re: Darwin and the Totalitarian Temptation
Your Dad is one smart man Claire, although I think Darwin's theory has been maligned by those who would use it for evil ends, not that the theory is intrinsically evil. Darkness at Noon is a terrifying book of that terrible period of Stalinism. You can apply the same reasoning to sections of the Bible advocating genocide that has led to the evils of the Inquisition and other religious fascism.
Advances in evolutionary theory such as Punctuated Equilibrium and others are significant changes to the original theory of gradual evolution smoothly carried out over a long period to time.
( Seinfeld's George Costanza : "Are there terrorists on the plane? A hotel fire — is that it? Typhus? Malaria? Yellow fever? Lupus? Is it lupus?!")
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=LNelnqsmnlM
May '10
Re: Darwin and the Totalitarian Temptation
And Punctuated Equilibria for Gould, just as Chaos Theory for Kauffman, are simply vain attempts to find solutions to the intractable problems and "just-so stories" of Dawkins' version of Darwinism (not to mention the infinite universes hypotheses of The Landscape). In addition to which, all of these attempt to explain the advances of life and speciation, but none of them address the initiation of first life. Including the RNA World.
Michael, that "culture of servility enabling Lenin/Stalin" nonsense is the silliest thing i have ever seen from Hitchens, and I include his early writings at The Nation in the alternatives.