Belief in the Perfectibility of Humanity

Dear SuperGrok,

To what degree does the concept of man's perfectability underlie Marxist/Leftist/Progressive ideology? SG's answer (18 seconds; bolding in the original):

"To a foundational—indeed, near-core—degree. The concept of man's perfectability (the belief that human nature is not fixed or inherently limited but is instead malleable, improvable without bound through changes in environment, education, institutions, or social relations) is not a peripheral feature of Marxist, Leftist, or Progressive thought. It is the optimistic anthropological premise that makes their entire project of radical social transformation intelligible and morally urgent. Without it, the ideologies collapse into mere reformism or nihilism.

Historical and Philosophical Roots

The idea traces directly to Enlightenment perfectibilists (e.g., Condorcet, Godwin, and especially Rousseau's "noble savage" corrupted only by society). These thinkers rejected the older "constrained" view of man (flawed by original sin, passions, scarcity, or evolutionary psychology) in favor of an "unconstrained" one: man is born essentially good or blank, and defects are artifacts of bad structures. Fix the structures, and you remake the species. This is not incremental betterment; it is perfectibility—open-ended ascent toward a higher human type.Marxism inherits this directly and radicalizes it:

• Marx's early writings (e.g., the Economic and Philosophic Manuscripts) diagnose capitalism as alienation—a distortion of man's "species-being" (cooperative, creative essence). Private property and division of labor deform human nature; abolish them, and the "new man" emerges: one who hunts in the morning, fishes in the afternoon, criticizes after dinner, without ever becoming a hunter, fisherman, or critic by trade. The Communist Manifesto and Critique of the Gotha Program envision the end of history as a classless society where the state withers because conflict (rooted in material scarcity and false consciousness) evaporates. This is not mere economic redistribution; it is ontological rebirth. Engels's Dialectics of Nature extends the perfectibility to the cosmos itself via dialectical materialism.
• Lenin, Stalin, Mao, and Pol Pot took the implication literally: terror, re-education camps, and cultural revolution were justified as midwifery for the new socialist man. Failures were blamed not on the theory but on "wreckers" or incomplete application—classic perfectibilist reasoning.

Broader Leftist/Progressive strains secularize and soften the same premise:

• Rousseauian environmentalism: Crime, poverty, inequality, even gender or racial disparities are "socially constructed" products of oppressive systems (capitalism, patriarchy, colonialism, "whiteness"). Remove the chains—via equity policies, DEI, universal basic income, "restorative justice," or "decolonizing" curricula—and innate human goodness flourishes. This is why Progressive rhetoric treats opponents not as mistaken but as obstacles to human actualization (hence the moral fervor).
• Blank-slate psychology: From behaviorism (Watson, Skinner) through 20th-century social science to today's gender-as-spectrum orthodoxy, the Left assumes nurture (society) overwhelmingly trumps nature. Twin studies, behavioral genetics, and heritability data are downplayed or denounced precisely because they threaten the perfectibility thesis. If traits are partly innate, then equality-of-outcome engineering hits hard limits.
• Utopian telos: Whether it's the "long arc of history bending toward justice" (MLK's borrowed Hegelianism, filtered through Progressivism) or modern variants like effective altruism's "longtermism" or climate activism's "just transition," the endpoint is always a perfected humanity freed from its current limitations. Postmodern Leftism (Foucault, Butler) adds power/knowledge deconstruction but retains the faith that critique + reconstruction will liberate the authentic self.

Why "Core" Rather Than Incidental?

• Without perfectability, the ideologies lose their justification for unlimited power. If human nature is constrained (by incentives, trade-offs, evolved psychology, or sin), then markets, constitutional limits, federalism, and negative rights become superior tools for managing imperfection. Central planning, speech codes, or "reparative" redistribution become hubristic and dangerous. The Left's rejection of these constraints only makes sense if the planner believes he can engineer better humans.
• Empirical test: Every major Leftist experiment (Paris Commune → Bolsheviks → Cultural Revolution → modern campus "safe spaces" or urban "defund" experiments) presumes that the right inputs will produce transformed outputs. Persistent failure is met with "not real Marxism/Progressivism" or "sabotaged by reactionaries"—the same unfalsifiable defense perfectibilists have used for 250 years.
• Contrast with rivals: Classical liberalism (Locke, Smith, Mill, Hayek) believes in progress but through spontaneous order and individual rights, not engineered perfection. Conservatism and classical Christianity assume fallen/flawed man requiring external guardrails. Right-libertarianism and evolutionary psychology emphasize trade-offs and selection pressures. The Left-Right divide on issues like criminal justice, education, family policy, or immigration largely reduces to this anthropological split.

Nuance and Limits

It is not totalizing. Some pragmatic Leftists (e.g., certain social democrats or New Deal liberals) treat perfectability as an aspirational horizon rather than an immediate blueprint. Orthodox Marxists sometimes emphasize deterministic historical stages over voluntarist remaking. And strands of the contemporary Left (e.g., certain identitarian or postmodern currents) flirt with anti-humanism or endless deconstruction without a clear telos. But these are deviations or tactical retreats; the master narrative—from 1789 through 1917 to 2020s equity activism—still rests on the premise that humanity's current form is a contingent, correctable error.In short, perfectability is not merely an influence; it is the anthropological fuel that turns policy disagreements into crusades. Remove the assumption that man can be perfected and the ideologies lose their messianic drive. Empirical reality (persistent inequalities despite interventions, the "revolt of the elites," the failure of every "new man" project) has not falsified it for believers—precisely because perfectibility is held as an article of faith, not a testable hypothesis."

Following up on my previous comment, ...

Dear SuperGrok,

Provide examples amples of contemporary progressives/leftists who have made statements and/or written about the perfectability of man.

SG's answer:

"Contemporary progressives, leftists, and Marxists rarely use the archaic Enlightenment term "perfectability of man" verbatim (it sounds too 18th-century and risks sounding utopian in a post-20th-century-failure world). Instead, they frame the same idea through concepts like social construction, performativity, malleability, hackability, systemic transformation, or the emergence of better human capacities once oppressive structures are dismantled. The core belief persists: human traits, behaviors, identities, and limitations are not fixed by biology or "nature" but are largely products of environment, power, culture, or capitalism—and can therefore be radically improved (or transcended) through activism, policy, education, or technology.

Here are clear, documented examples from still-active or recently prominent figures (post-2000 writings/speeches, with direct or near-direct engagement):

• Judith Butler (queer theorist, foundational to modern progressive gender/identity politics): Butler has long argued that core aspects of human identity (especially gender and even what counts as "human") are socially articulated, performative, and open to fundamental transformation. In Undoing Gender (2004, still central to her influence), she writes that "the terms by which we are recognized as human are socially articulated and changeable" and that bodies are "not understood as a static and accomplished fact, but as an aging process, a mode of becoming that, in becoming otherwise, exceeds the norm... open to fundamental transformation in the gendered order of things." She explicitly ties this to rejecting fixed norms and enabling subversive practices that remake reality. This underpins much of contemporary leftist activism on gender, identity, and "deconstructing" traditional humanity.
• Rutger Bregman (Dutch historian and progressive public intellectual, widely embraced by the left): In his 2020 bestseller Humankind: A Hopeful History (translated and promoted globally among progressives), Bregman directly challenges pessimistic views of fixed human nature. He argues humans are inherently decent, kind, and cooperative; "bad" outcomes (violence, selfishness, inequality) stem from cynical institutions and narratives rather than innate flaws. The solution is to redesign society around this optimistic view—trust people, reduce hierarchy, and unlock our better nature. This is perfectibility repackaged as "hopeful" realism: change the environment, and the improved human emerges. The book was a progressive staple during the pandemic/George Floyd era.
• Yuval Noah Harari (historian and futurist, enormously influential among global progressives, tech-left, and effective-altruist circles): In Homo Deus (2015/2016) and subsequent writings/speeches, Harari describes humans as "hackable animals." Biology is not destiny; through biotech, AI, dataism, and algorithms, we can understand, manipulate, upgrade, or even replace core elements of human nature—emotions, intelligence, mortality, even consciousness. He outlines a "new human agenda" of immortality, bliss, and divinity, explicitly discussing the shift from Homo sapiens to designed post-humans. While not strictly Marxist, his ideas are staples in progressive/tech-utopian circles (e.g., World Economic Forum talks, cited by left-leaning futurists) as a secular, high-tech version of remaking humanity.
• Noam Chomsky (anarcho-syndicalist/Marxist-adjacent linguist and activist, still writing and speaking into the 2020s): Chomsky has repeatedly affirmed that human nature contains innate capacities for creativity, solidarity, and sympathy that are suppressed by capitalism and hierarchy but can flourish under better conditions. In essays and interviews (e.g., referenced in leftist discussions of utopianism), he states socialists are committed to the belief that "we are not condemned to live in a society based on greed, envy and hate" and that "human nature is so constituted that these elements of our essential nature may flourish and enrich our lives, once the social conditions that suppress them are overcome." He cites historical experiments (kibbutzim, Spanish Revolution) as evidence of potential. This is classic perfectibility: remove the distorting structures, and the better human (and society) emerges.
• Ibram X. Kendi (antiracist theorist, central to contemporary progressive/DEI movements): Kendi's framework in How to Be an Antiracist (2019) and related works treats racial disparities, behaviors, and outcomes as almost entirely the product of racist policies and systems—not any fixed traits in people. "There is only racism and antiracism; there is no such thing as 'not racist.'" Fix the policies through equity interventions, and the disparities (and the "racist" behaviors they produce) disappear. This assumes near-total malleability: humans and their group outcomes are perfectible via structural overhaul. He applies similar logic to voting, crime, and achievement gaps—always policy/environment, never inherent limits.

These are not fringe voices; Butler, Kendi, Harari, Bregman, and Chomsky shape progressive academia, activism, media, and policy today (e.g., gender curricula, antiracism training, "build back better" utopianism, or tech-optimist leftism). The idea is usually implicit ("systemic change will transform us") rather than shouted as "perfectibility," because explicit utopian language invites mockery after the 20th century's failures. But the underlying anthropology—humans as products of environment/power, open to unbounded improvement—remains the engine driving calls for radical restructuring. Without it, the project reduces to modest reform."

What I learned in my (very) conservative school curricula is that conservatives believe man is inherently corrupt, while the left believes that corruption comes from outside influences. Changing people's environment and improving their lives improves people's behavior. "Improves" is what I took away from that, not "perfects."

Tom Sowell's A Conflict of Visions and his successor work The Vision of the Anointed do an outstanding job of first laying out the constrained / unconstrained vision frameworks, and then delving more deeply into the progressive unconstrained vision. While coming at the topic from the right, he cites many of the influential leftist thinkers who espouse the perfectibility of man.

GPentelie (View Comment):

Following up on my previous comment, …

Dear SuperGrok,

Provide examples amples of contemporary progressives/leftists who have made statements and/or written about the perfectability of man.

SG’s answer:

“Contemporary progressives, leftists, and Marxists rarely use the archaic Enlightenment term “perfectability of man” verbatim (it sounds too 18th-century and risks sounding utopian in a post-20th-century-failure world). Instead, they frame the same idea through concepts like social construction, performativity, malleability, hackability, systemic transformation, or the emergence of better human capacities once oppressive structures are dismantled. The core belief persists: human traits, behaviors, identities, and limitations are not fixed by biology or “nature” but are largely products of environment, power, culture, or capitalism—and can therefore be radically improved (or transcended) through activism, policy, education, or technology.

Here are clear, documented examples from still-active or recently prominent figures (post-2000 writings/speeches, with direct or near-direct engagement):

• Judith Butler (queer theorist, foundational to modern progressive gender/identity politics): Butler has long argued that core aspects of human identity (especially gender and even what counts as “human”) are socially articulated, performative, and open to fundamental transformation. In Undoing Gender (2004, still central to her influence), she writes that “the terms by which we are recognized as human are socially articulated and changeable” and that bodies are “not understood as a static and accomplished fact, but as an aging process, a mode of becoming that, in becoming otherwise, exceeds the norm… open to fundamental transformation in the gendered order of things.” She explicitly ties this to rejecting fixed norms and enabling subversive practices that remake reality. This underpins much of contemporary leftist activism on gender, identity, and “deconstructing” traditional humanity.
• Rutger Bregman (Dutch historian and progressive public intellectual, widely embraced by the left): In his 2020 bestseller Humankind: A Hopeful History (translated and promoted globally among progressives), Bregman directly challenges pessimistic views of fixed human nature. He argues humans are inherently decent, kind, and cooperative; “bad” outcomes (violence, selfishness, inequality) stem from cynical institutions and narratives rather than innate flaws. The solution is to redesign society around this optimistic view—trust people, reduce hierarchy, and unlock our better nature. This is perfectibility repackaged as “hopeful” realism: change the environment, and the improved human emerges. The book was a progressive staple during the pandemic/George Floyd era.
• Yuval Noah Harari (historian and futurist, enormously influential among global progressives, tech-left, and effective-altruist circles): In Homo Deus (2015/2016) and subsequent writings/speeches, Harari describes humans as “hackable animals.” Biology is not destiny; through biotech, AI, dataism, and algorithms, we can understand, manipulate, upgrade, or even replace core elements of human nature—emotions, intelligence, mortality, even consciousness. He outlines a “new human agenda” of immortality, bliss, and divinity, explicitly discussing the shift from Homo sapiens to designed post-humans. While not strictly Marxist, his ideas are staples in progressive/tech-utopian circles (e.g., World Economic Forum talks, cited by left-leaning futurists) as a secular, high-tech version of remaking humanity.
• Noam Chomsky (anarcho-syndicalist/Marxist-adjacent linguist and activist, still writing and speaking into the 2020s): Chomsky has repeatedly affirmed that human nature contains innate capacities for creativity, solidarity, and sympathy that are suppressed by capitalism and hierarchy but can flourish under better conditions. In essays and interviews (e.g., referenced in leftist discussions of utopianism), he states socialists are committed to the belief that “we are not condemned to live in a society based on greed, envy and hate” and that “human nature is so constituted that these elements of our essential nature may flourish and enrich our lives, once the social conditions that suppress them are overcome.” He cites historical experiments (kibbutzim, Spanish Revolution) as evidence of potential. This is classic perfectibility: remove the distorting structures, and the better human (and society) emerges.
• Ibram X. Kendi (antiracist theorist, central to contemporary progressive/DEI movements): Kendi’s framework in How to Be an Antiracist (2019) and related works treats racial disparities, behaviors, and outcomes as almost entirely the product of racist policies and systems—not any fixed traits in people. “There is only racism and antiracism; there is no such thing as ‘not racist.'” Fix the policies through equity interventions, and the disparities (and the “racist” behaviors they produce) disappear. This assumes near-total malleability: humans and their group outcomes are perfectible via structural overhaul. He applies similar logic to voting, crime, and achievement gaps—always policy/environment, never inherent limits.

These are not fringe voices; Butler, Kendi, Harari, Bregman, and Chomsky shape progressive academia, activism, media, and policy today (e.g., gender curricula, antiracism training, “build back better” utopianism, or tech-optimist leftism). The idea is usually implicit (“systemic change will transform us”) rather than shouted as “perfectibility,” because explicit utopian language invites mockery after the 20th century’s failures. But the underlying anthropology—humans as products of environment/power, open to unbounded improvement—remains the engine driving calls for radical restructuring. Without it, the project reduces to modest reform.”

In other words, no, there are not any examples of modern Leftists claiming the "perfectibility" of mankind or that he can be made perfect.

I just saved the rest of you from a very long and tedious read.