Posted on 12/13/2006 10:26:59 AM PST by truthfinder9
DARWIN'S CONSERVATIVES: THE MISGUIDED QUEST
The debate over Darwinian evolution is usually framed by the newsmedia as a clash between “right” and “left.” Conservatives are presumed to be critical of Darwin’s theory, while liberals are presumed to be supportive of it.
As in most cases, reality is more complicated.
There always have been liberal critics of Darwin. In the early twentieth century, progressive reformer William Jennings Bryan fought for women’s suffrage, world peace—and against Darwinism. More recently, left-wing novelist Kurt Vonnegut, a self-described “secular humanist,” has called our human bodies “miracles of design” and faulted scientists for “pretending they have the answer as how we got this way when natural selection couldn’t possibly have produced such machines.”
Just as there have been critics of Darwin on the left, there continue to be champions of Darwinism on the right. In the last few years, pundits such as George Will, Charles Krauthammer, and John Derbyshire, along with social scientist James Q. Wilson and political theorist Larry Arnhart, have strongly defended Darwin’s theory and denounced Darwin’s critics.
According to Will, “evolution” is a “fact,” and anyone who does not recognize this elementary truth endangers the “conservative coalition.” After the Kansas State Board of Education called for students to hear the scientific evidence for and against Darwin’s theory, Will castigated board members for being “the kind of conservatives who make conservatism repulsive to temperate people.” Charles Krauthammer has likewise berated proponents of intelligent design for perpetuating scientific “fraud,” and James Q. Wilson, writing for The Wall Street Journal, has insisted that “[t]he theory of evolution… is literally the only scientific defensible theory of the origin of species....”
Some of Darwin’s conservatives even promote Darwinian biology as a way to bolster conservatism. In his book The Moral Sense, James Q. Wilson draws on Darwinian biology to support traditional morality, and writing in National Review, law professor John O. McGinnis has championed Darwinian sociobiology as a counter to left-wing utopianism. McGinnis opines that the future success of conservatism depends on evolutionary biology: “any political movement that hopes to be successful must come to terms with the second rise of Darwinism.”
No one has been more articulate in championing “Darwinian conservatism” than professor Larry Arnhart of Northern Illinois University, who argues that “[c]onservatives need Charles Darwin... because a Darwinian science of human nature supports conservatives in their realist view of human imperfectibility and their commitment to ordered liberty....” Like McGinnis, Arnhart suggests that conservatism may be doomed unless it embraces Darwinian biology. “The intellectual vitality of conservativsm in the twenty-first century will depend on the success of conservatives in appealing to advances in the biology of human nature as confirming conservative thought.”
In his recent book Darwinian Conservatism, Arnhart offers multiple reasons why he thinks Darwinism supports conservatism, as well as responding to various objections to Darwin’s theory raised by some conservatives. As there is significant overlap between some of the reasons and objections discussed by Arnhart, I am going to group them into what I think are his seven main arguments: (1) Darwinism supports traditional morality; (2) Darwinism supports the traditional view of family life and sexuality; (3) Darwinism is compatible with free will and personal responsibility; (4) Darwinism supports economic liberty; (5) Darwinism supports “non-utopian limited government....”; (6) Darwinism is compatible with religion; and (7) Darwinism has not been refuted by intelligent design.
Analyzing each of these arguments in turn, [Darwin's Conservatives: The Misguided Quest] will argue that the quest to found conservatism on Darwinian biology is misguided and fundamentally flawed. Contrary to its conservative champions, Darwin’s theory manifestly does not reinforce the teachings of conservatism. It promotes moral relativism rather than traditional morality. It fosters utopianism rather than limited government. It is corrosive, rather than supportive, of both free will and religious belief. Finally, and most importantly, Darwinian evolution is in tension with the scientific evidence, and conservatism cannot hope to strengthen itself by relying on Darwinism’s increasingly shaky empirical foundations.
This is just flawed reasoning. Darwinian evolution explains an observed scientific phenomenon. It is not a values statement or a political philosophy and more than gravity is. If you don't like Darwinian evolution, than attack it using science not with polemic.
Just the mental picture of Will, lost inside his shirt collar, piping up with high-pitched indignation in defense of 'survival of the fittest,' is funny, since it's rather impossible to see how such a figure survived decades of schoolyard bullies demanding his milk money.
I wouldn't be surprised if he STILL didn't get extorted by chunky third-graders.
Tell that to the Darwinists. It's their religion, and from it they derive their values, and a worldview that influence the whole of life.
When you consider that the most ardent defenders and believers in Darwin's theory (for its social implications) in the last century were atheistic Marxist and eugenic fascist regimes, and when one considers that the Darwinists' most powerful allies today are the leftist media and the ACLU, how can Darwinism be seriously considered as a foundation of conservatism?
He we go again.
Really? See, because I'm a "Darwinist," and yet somehow I still pray to the God of Abraham, not to Charles Darwin. I think you'd be surprised at how little "Darwinism" influences my values or my "worldview."
When did logical fallacies like "guilt by association" become valid means of determining the "foundations of conservativism"?
My reaction to the above is "who cares?"
It's not a philosophy or a system of government, it's a scientific explanation of observed phenomena. It's immaterial what societal effects people believing it has, it just matters whether it's likely to be true, based on the observed evidence.
Just the same as if someone claimed that E=mc2 promotes moral relativism and fosters utopianism - my reaction would be "so?"
And if someone promoting the idea that the world is flat said that if more people believed the world was flat, they'd be more moral and support limited government, my reaction would be, again, "who cares?"
Creationists have a habit of projecting themselves on to Evolutionists - I really do think they imagine dark candle-lit rooms where people reverently read passages from "Origin of Species" and whatnot.
I can see now that this thread will inspire nothing but intelligent, thoughtful debate, bringing out the best Free Republic has to offer.
"According to Will, “evolution” is a “fact,”"
That about does George Will in for me. His "fact" is a hypothesis.
" Darwinian evolution explains an observed scientific phenomenon."
Observed! Wow! How old ARE you?
OLD. They don't call me the Alter Kaker for nothing.
But seriously, there are a great many observations of evolution -- in genetics, in the fossil record, in observed morphological diversity, that are explained -- and to date have only been explained -- by evolutionary theory.
"Really? See, because I'm a "Darwinist," and yet somehow I still pray to the God of Abraham, not to Charles Darwin. I think you'd be surprised at how little "Darwinism" influences my values or my "worldview.""
Common sense ping. :)
"just base science on how it positions with your politics, liberal or conservative."
The way of the future.
/roll eyes...
When one starts using a *science* to dictate and justify morality and politics, soemone has way overstepped their bounds. Then it can justifiably be called a religion.
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