Posted on 06/10/2009 8:33:46 AM PDT by GodGunsGuts
The Darwinian foundation of communism
by Jerry Bergman
Summary
A review of the writings of the founders of communism shows that the theory of evolution, especially as taught by Darwin, was critically important in the development of modern communism. Many of the central architects of communism, including Stalin, Lenin, Marx and Engels, accepted the worldview portrayed in the book of Genesis until they were introduced to Darwin and other contemporary thinkers, which ultimately resulted in their abandoning that worldview. Furthermore, Darwinism was critically important in their conversion to communism and to a worldview that led them to a philosophy based on atheism. In addition, the communist core idea that violent revolution, in which the strong overthrow the weak, was a natural, inevitable part of the unfolding of history from Darwinistic concepts and conclusions...
(Excerpt) Read more at creation.com ...
Yep, the few examples I found also. A couple of sentences within thousands of pages of personal letters. And apparently nothing in his hundreds of books.
What a way to SEIZE upon Darwinism. :-)
Once again you cite an article of astoundingly shoddy scholarship in addition to irrelevancy.
As but one example:
“....and was judged by his teachers ‘moderately proficient’ in theology (his first written work was on the ‘love of Christ’)8-10 until he encountered Darwin’s writings and ideas at the University of Berlin. Marx “
In point of fact, Marx resided in Berlin only between 1835 and 1841, which, of course, surfaces the question of what particular “writings and ideas” of Darwin he might have encountered there. While there are a couple of inconsequential scientific papers and a few private notes that it is hard to believe Marx would have ever picked up (or that would have had any influence upon him at all), other than the First Edition of the Voyage of the Beagle published in 1839 there is nothing Marx could have gotten his hands on. It did not exist.
The general intelligensia of Europe found Darwins account of the second Beagle voyage highly entertaining as a journal and travel log in the same sense that we might view the PBS National Geographic Special entertaining today and the natural scientists among them found lots of astute and useful natural observations. This was the first of Darwins works to be widely or popularly read.
Now, someone who had read Origin of Species might return to this book and find hints of Darwin’s later theory of evolution and certainly lots of observations that are later explained in interpreted in light of that theory, But no one would ever read the First Edition and depart with a glimmer of Darwin’s later theory. The 2nd Edition (published in 1845) is a different story because Darwin updated it with his first conjectural thoughts that later became part of his Theory. But the point is that Marx departed Berlin 4 years earlier than the publication of the 2nd edition and any idea that Darwin somehow corrupted a good Christian university boy is logically pathetic and possibly an intentional lie. It is certainly the typically shoddy scholarship of the Cretin Science type.
Skipping over the irrelevancy of Marx’s life to Darwin, the delusions continue:
“... Marx saw the living world in terms of a Darwinian ‘survival-of-the-fittest’ struggle, involving the triumph of the strong and the subjugation of the weak.12 Darwin taught that the ‘survival of the fittest’ existed among all forms of life. From ...”
Darwin thought no such thing, though Cretin Science types persist in perverting the sophisticated Darwinian concept of “natural selection” into a “tooth and claw” vision of dominance and subjegation. To the best of my knowledge and though he may well have in disgust with Herbert Spencer, Darwin never used the phrase “survival of the fitest.” The phrase was in fact coined by Herbert Spencer in 1864 as one of the popularized distortions of Darwin’s Theory. But, if the above is an accurate characterization of Marx’s view, it is prima facea evidence of how little he might have been influenced by Darwins Theory (when it was finally available in clearly described and complete form 11 years later).
The rest of your citation is similar gibberish or irrelevancy. Doubting that you even know what “Teleology” is, science is indeed the death of it, or at least its usefulness as explanation within scientific inquiry. To the degree that Darwin helped so much the better because it separates mysticism from science and allows science to make progress. Teleology is the domain of faith and I encourage you to have it. But stop using bad logic, flawed “facts”, and shoddy scholarship to justify it.
“Prominent communist Friedrich Lessner concluded that Das Kapital and Darwin’s Origin of Species were the ‘two greatest scientific creations of the century’.26” Certainly, and with reference to the 19th Century, most competent scientists would agree that Lessner was at least half right.
Narrowed to the period of time following say 1860 when Marx had had opportunity to read and understand Darwin’s Theory (and well after he had laid the intellectual foundation for communism), there may be substance including Karl Marx as among many “Darwin Groupies.” Virtually all good scientists today fall into that camp and nobody has ever accused all communists of being completely stupid or rejecting valid scientific conclusion.
In the mean time, I think it is time for you to prove to us that you are not a George Soros plant paid to post in a manner that makes Christians and Conservatives look like idiots.
The only astoundingly shoddy scholarship is your own, Mr. "Wow."
==In point of fact, Marx resided in Berlin only between 1835 and 1841, which, of course, surfaces the question of what particular “writings and ideas” of Darwin he might have encountered there.
Wrong.
==other than the First Edition of the Voyage of the Beagle published in 1839 there is nothing Marx could have gotten his hands on.
Wrong again.
==The 2nd Edition (published in 1845) is a different story because Darwin updated it with his first conjectural thoughts that later became part of his Theory. But the point is that Marx departed Berlin 4 years earlier than the publication of the 2nd edition
You might want to do your homework before putting your foot in your mouth in the future, Mr. "Wow." Karl Marx returned to Germany in 1848-1849 to fan the flames of the ill-fated (thank God!) communist revolution there. Needless to say, his return to Germany occured THREE YEARS AFTER the 2nd Edition of Voyages was published. As such, he could have very well read it during this time period. But who really knows, since Dr. Bergman only mentions the connection between Marx, Darwin, and the University of Berlin in passing, with no date or footnote. As such, maybe that's where Marx first encountered Darwin's writings, or maybe it wasn't...at this point we just don't know. I have sent an email to the Journal of Creation to get to the bottom of this.
Bottom line: Marx most definitely was in Germany after the publication of the 2nd edition of Voyages--which, needless to say, invalidates your entire argument.
Yeah right, dreamer. Then why did the founders of modern Communism say the following about Darwin's atheist creation myth?
'When Marx read On the Origin of Species he wrote, “Darwin’s work is most important and suits my purpose in that it provides a basis in natural science for the historical class struggle.”'
'So impressed was Marx by Darwin’s work that he sent an inscribed copy of the second edition of Das Kapital to Darwin when it was published in 1873.'
'At Marx’s graveside his friend Friedrich Engels declared, “Just as Darwin discovered the law of evolution in organic nature, so Marx discovered the law of evolution in human history...'
http://www.wsws.org/articles/2009/may2009/isse-m09.shtml
And, as Dr. Bergman points out, there was much truth in Engels' eulogy to Marx. Dr. Bergman makes this clear by quoting Himmelfarb's study of Darwin, in which she has this to say about Marx and Darwin:
"What they both celebrated was the internal rhythm and course of life, the one the life of nature, the other of society, that proceeded by fixed laws, undistracted by the will of God or men. There were no catastrophes in history as there were none in nature. There were no inexplicable acts, no violations of the natural order. God was as powerless as individual men to interfere with the internal, self-adjusting dialectic of change and development."
http://creation.com/the-darwinian-foundation-of-communism
...which I am sure suits your priority commitment to the Temple of Darwin just fine, dreamer.
During the time of the “Robber Barons” and the reign of Stalin both Capitalists and Communists agreed that the theory of natural selection was philosophically antithetical to Communism.
That is why under Stalin and for years after learning or teaching Darwin's theory would get you arrested, sent to Siberia and/or shot.
The Communists preferred Lamarck's ideas of inheritance of acquired traits.
Yesterday I foolishly believed I had gone "shopping." I went to a grocery store and exchanged money for a head of lettuce. It was only when I got home that I realized I had committed "the fallacy of equivocation" for believing that my exchange of money for lettuce had actually equated to "shopping."
"We could call this one the fallacy of begging the question for believing that what is observed is the result of 'evolution'."
I also realized that I had committed "the fallacy of begging the question" for believing that what I had just observed (my successful acquisition of lettuce in exchange for money) was the "result" of "shopping."
"Here, the fallacy of affirming the consequent is noted for believing that what is observed uniquely supports evolution' because it was a 'prediction' of 'evolution'."
And of course, I realized that I had committed "the fallacy of affirming the consequent" for believing that what I had just observed (my successful acquisition of lettuce in exchange for money) actually supported the concept of "shopping" because such exchanges are a "prediction" of "shopping."
Upon my realization that I had been a victim of these logical fallacies, my lettuce vanished. (Although my money didn't reappear, which kind of pissed me off.)
“What they both celebrated was the internal rhythm and course of life, the one the life of nature, the other of society, that proceeded by fixed laws, undistracted by the will of God or men. There were no catastrophes in history as there were none in nature. There were no inexplicable acts, no violations of the natural order. God was as powerless as individual men to interfere with the internal, self-adjusting dialectic of change and development.”
—I’m hardly an expert on Marx, but much of that is completely diametric to what (admittedly little) I’ve read from Marx. The “Theory of Revolution” was central to Marx’s thinking. To Marx, societies go through a series of predictable, directional, rapid, progressive, *REVOLUTIONS* which will eventually result in Communism.
All of that is antithetical to Darwinism, in which the changes that life undergoes are unpredictable, gradual (”natura non facit saltum”), and display no tendency for progress (”Heaven forfend me from Lamarck nonsense of a ‘tendency to progression’” - instead evolution is about a tendency for increased diversity).
This is precisely why the USSR would ban Darwinism in favor of Lysenkoism. Lysenko essentially developed a Marxist theory of evolution: the changes that occur in life are rapid - directional - predictable - progressive, etc.
The fallacy comes in when you assume that a DEFINITION can be extrapolated backward into unobservable time.
Remember science? Observable, testable, repeatable? Well, when you extrapolate current observations back into unobservable time based on a DEFINITION, you have engaged in logical fallacy and it is no longer science.
I tried to warn you...
Not surprising.
Stories about evo confusion when shopping for lettuce are excellent examples of support for 'evolution'. They show that story-telling is the primary foundation of 'evolution' and that no story is too ridiculous to be rejected as support for 'evolution'.
I'd be completely surprised if this didn't pass peer-review for publication in a scientific journal.
LOL. The experiment I described to you did not involve any backward extrapolation. Remember: start with organism(s) of your choice, manipulate environmental conditions, document changes in the gene pool. No backward extrapolation of any kind.
You seem to consider yourself quite an expert on the subject of evolution. Yet from your comments I find it difficult to believe that you have any formal training in biology.
==Guttless?
Project much? It’s obvious you are still beating yourself up over not having the intestinal fortitude to finish your Ph.D. program, because you know that is exactly what I’m going to point out when you (of all people!) call me gutless. And while I appreciate the fact that your decision to dropout of grad school makes it difficult to look into the mirror each morning, I would appreciate it if you stop using me as your bed of nails.
==During the time of the “Robber Barons” and the reign of Stalin both Capitalists and Communists agreed that the theory of natural selection was philosophically antithetical to Communism.
You really are clueless, aren’t you dreamer. The chief philosopher and champion of the so-called “Robber Barons” was none other the Herbert Spencer, and he described the survival of the fittest in Lamarckian terms.
==That is why under Stalin and for years after learning or teaching Darwin’s theory would get you arrested, sent to Siberia and/or shot.
First, as Dr. Bergman points out, it was Stalin’s abandonment of Christianity in favor of Darwin’s atheist creation myth that led him down the path to communism (read: revolutionary evolutionism). Second, Stalinism was an abberation from Marxist-Leninism. Lenin did not want Stalin to succeed him, and the Communists who succeeded Stalin all denounced him for setting up a cult of personality. So trying to portray Stalin as representative of Communism in general is either naive or disingenous on your part.
==The Communists preferred Lamarck’s ideas of inheritance of acquired traits.
What a crock. Stalin flirted with Lamarck via Lysenko back when Darwin was being rejected and Lamarck was making a comeback amongst Evos throughout the West. And it is not surprising that Stalin held on to Lysenko’s bogus ideas even after the ascent of the neo-Darwinian synthesis, as the Communists lag behind the West in virtually everything—and this was particularly so during the atypical reign of Josef Stalin. But that does not negate the fact that Darwinism is what Stalin seized upon to renounce Christianity and justify his switch to atheism. And it was Darwinism that Marx and Engles seized upon as a naturalistic justification for their revolutionary evolutionism. And the same holds true for just about every other communist revolutionary before Stalin, or since. And finally, no matter which way you slice it, every single one of these communist bastards were revolutionary materialists who rejected God and embraced materialistic evolution in one form or another. This is precisely what we will see when your fellow Evos are finally forced to abandom the HMS Beagle. Like the Communists and the Western materialists who lived during the “eclipse of Darwinism”, they will simply replace it with a new God-denying evolutionary ship (”for we cannot allow a divine foot in the door!”). Of course, the main difference this time around is that there won’t be anything left to temporarily rescue Darwood’s atheist creation myth.
See my reply to dreamer.
But thanks for again reminding everyone that I have an advanced degree in Molecular Biology while you are a (chortling to myself) Communications major. LOL!!! Communications!!! Ha Ha!!
The Communists under Stalin preferred the idea of inheritance of acquired characteristics (Lamarck's idea) and DESPISED the idea of natural selection (Darwin's theory).
Teaching or learning about natural selection for the majority of the time that Russia was Communist, and all of the time of the “Robber Barons” would get you imprisoned, exiled and/or shot.
The Robber Barons didn't think that poor people would acquire the traits of the successful (Lamark’s idea); they justified their eventual death and elimination in terms of natural selection; calling it “survival of the fittest”.
Lamarks idea was that any organism could become “fit” by its behaviors changing what it passed on to its descendants; not that the less fit would die off.
The Robber Barons embraced Darwin's theory as justification for their predatory practices.
The Communists of that time rejected Darwin's theory because they ALSO agreed with the Robber Barons that it sounded like a justification for unfettered CAPITALISM.
LOL. As I explained way back in post # 53, "Well, the papers documenting the effects observed might have been based on the scientific method, but if the conclusions were 'evolution' then they are firmly based in logical fallacy as noted above."
Remember that you were going to provide a scientifically valid proof of evolution that does not rely on logical fallacy? You do not seem to understand that current observations are not scientifically valid proofs of 'evolution' unless you invoke one or several logical fallacies. You also do not seem to understand that by invoking fallacy you move into the realm of philosophy, not science.
"You seem to consider yourself quite an expert on the subject of evolution. Yet from your comments I find it difficult to believe that you have any formal training in biology."
You seem to consider yourself quite an expert on the subject of evolution. Yet from your comments, I find it difficult to believe that you have any training in critical-thinking skills.
Did they teach you what to think rather than how to think in biology class?
One of the most ridiculous comments I have ever read on FR.
Did they teach you what to think rather than how to think in biology class?
LOL. At least I took biology classes!
One of the most transparent attempts to avoid the issue I have ever read on FR.
"LOL. At least I took biology classes!"
LOL. And believed what they told you to think rather than thinking for yourself!
==When you call me dreamer; I call you gutless. It is a 1:1 ratio. Stimulus response cycle. Just come to expect it -when you call me dreamer, I will call you gutless.
And when you call me gutless, I call you a gutless dropout, so it’s not a 1:1 ratio.
==But thanks for again reminding everyone that I have an advanced degree in Molecular Biology while you are a (chortling to myself) Communications major. LOL!!! Communications!!! Ha Ha!!
I never told you I was a communications major. I told you I have a BA in Religious Studies, and an Administrative Master’s degree. If you want to poke fun at my education, at least know what you are poking fun at, otherwise you just wind up looking silly. But given everything else you have been flat-out wrong about, I doubt making yourself look foolish or silly bothers you all that much.
==The Communists under Stalin preferred the idea of inheritance of acquired characteristics (Lamarck’s idea) and DESPISED the idea of natural selection (Darwin’s theory).
No, the Communists under Stalin were forced to accept Lysenkoism (who had a clown-like understanding of Lamarck) on pain of death.
==The Robber Barons didn’t think that poor people would acquire the traits of the successful (Lamark’s idea); they justified their eventual death and elimination in terms of natural selection; calling it “survival of the fittest”.
Again, the chief philosopher and spokesman for the Robber Barons was Herbert Spencer. And he described survival of the fittest in Lamarckian terms. But either way, whether it be the evolutionist Robber Barons, or the evolutionist Commies, godless materialism is EVIL...not just because of its evil consequences, but because it is a lie and an affront to the Word of God.
==The Communists of that time rejected Darwin’s theory because they ALSO agreed with the Robber Barons that it sounded like a justification for unfettered CAPITALISM.
And your point is? The Communists also rejected Nazism. Does that make Nazism the antithesis of Communism? In all cases, whether you are talking about Darwinist Robber Barons, Darwinist Nazis, or Darwinist Commies, they are all Godless materialists who have tried at various times to implement this demonic doctrine in their own way—and you are helping the Temple of Darwin do it in our own country, dreamer.
Also one does not “drop out” when one receives an advanced degree in Molecular Biology after defending ones thesis; and only a moron would characterize defending a thesis as “dropping out”.
Science is based upon the empirical method or “methodological materialism”.
Science is not an affront to God.
During the time of the “Robber Barons”, both the Soviet Communists and the “Robber Barons” agreed that Darwin's theory of natural selection was philosophically aligned with capitalism and antithetical to communism.
If the Soviet Communists were such fans of Darwin, why did they arrest, exile or shoot anybody who learned or taught it?
==During the time of the “Robber Barons” and the reign of Stalin both Capitalists and Communists agreed that the theory of natural selection was philosophically antithetical to Communism.
“You really are clueless, aren’t you dreamer. The chief philosopher and champion of the so-called “Robber Barons” was none other the Herbert Spencer, and he described the survival of the fittest in Lamarckian terms.”
—I’m a bit puzzled as to how your response is an objection to what allmendream said.
“First, as Dr. Bergman points out, it was Stalin’s abandonment of Christianity in favor of Darwin’s atheist creation myth that led him down the path to communism (read: revolutionary evolutionism).”
—Well, Dr. Bergman made the claim, but he doesn’t “point out” where he got the idea.
What do you mean by “revolutionary evolutionism”?
“What a crock. Stalin flirted with Lamarck via Lysenko back when Darwin was being rejected and Lamarck was making a comeback amongst Evos throughout the West.”
—1. The Lysenko period was after the “Eclipse of Darwinism” period and Lamarckism was essentially dead. and 2. Julian Huxley was being a bit silly in who he was considering “non-Darwinists” - most of them were not Lamarckists but were indeed Darwinists.
“And it was Darwinism that Marx and Engles seized upon as a naturalistic justification for their revolutionary evolutionism. And the same holds true for just about every other communist revolutionary before Stalin, or since. And finally, no matter which way you slice it, every single one of these communist bastards were revolutionary materialists who rejected God and embraced materialistic evolution in one form or another.”
—Marx seized (it still seems silly to call a couple of sentences among thousands of pages of private letters as “seizing”) from everywhere to try to justify his philosophy. I’ve seen Communists use the Bible to justify Communism. As for the communists being evolutionists, of course they were - just about all educated people, then as now, were evolutionists. With enough quote mining, one can find a few (very few) quotes where Darwinism was used to justify Communism - but the same is for EVERY OTHER economic and political system under the sun. One can find FAR more example of Darwinism used to justify capitalism.
Contrary to your unsupported assertions, I am in fact exactly correct in my post and exactly correct in pointing out sloppy scholarship. You may note that the point of reference cited by YOU and pointed to by ME was:
“....and was judged by his teachers ‘moderately proficient’ in theology (his first written work was on the ‘love of Christ’)8-10 until he encountered Darwin’s writings and ideas at the University of Berlin. Marx ….“
Since the University of Berlin is in fact in Berlin, in the English I speak YOUR CITATION says that Marx read Darwin while he was there and clearly implies that Darwin’s writings somehow led Marx away from Christ. This is the central propaganda point of the entire piece and the departure for attempting to savage Darwin by association, implying accountability for communism and its many sins and failings.
As to facts which can be documented, in Germany, Marx resided at in Trier where he was born and raised, not far away in Bonn where he first attended University, Berlin beginning in 1835 where he completed his education, and Cologne at a couple of points post Berlin. But he resided in Berlin only between 1835 and 1841.
Marx’s life is well known. If he lived in Berlin any other time, either earlier or later, you will be able to produce a credible scholarly source. Have at it. And at whatever point you establish Marx as having read Darwin (in Berlin or otherwise), validity of your central point requires establishing that Marx was still then a “good Christian” rather than avowed atheist. Since you now seem to be claiming maybe Marx read Darwin “in Germany” (not Berlin as written) “in 1848”, then you also have the impossible burden of establishing that Marx was not by then firmly in the atheist camp.
Note also that any scholarly source which establishes Marx read Darwin in Berlin would also make clear what bit of Darwin he read. If there is any truth at all to the assertion that Marx read Darwin between 1835 and 1841, the only plausible bit of Darwin was the First Edition account of the Beagle voyage – which is mute on “Darwin’s Theory.” Even the second edition does not provide much more than an omen of thoughts to come.
As a lesson in geography examine a German map. Trier is within spitting distance of Cologne and Bonn in far western Germany and not far from Brussels, Belgium where he also lived (with Engles) between 1844 and 1848. Berlin is better than 400 kilometers to the northeast from a Brussels, Cologne, Bonn, Trier axis. Economically, Marx was a miserable failure and hung out in this neighborhood because it made it easy to sponge off of family. Add a little time in Paris and 1849 until death in London and you have Marx’s life geography.
Marx’s return to “Germany” that you so ignorantly cite as proving your point was to Cologne, not Berlin. THAT is clearly documented. For someone that most certainly did not know there was any difference between the First and Second editions of Darwin’s account of the Beagle voyage before I pointed it out (and is unlikely to have read either) and persists in having no real idea in where Marx was when, claiming my scholarship is shoddy is pretty amazing,
In the meantime, let us examine some of YOUR new words:
“ …As such, he could have very well read it during this time period. But who really knows, since Dr. Bergman only mentions the connection between Marx, Darwin, and the University of Berlin in passing, with no date or footnote.
As to “could have”, it is possible I suppose that you are not an idiot. But possibility is not evidence and conjecture is not scholarship. Perhaps you are admitting as much when you say “who really knows?” But the real killer is implying that is OK to pass off a lie so long as it is not dated or footnoted.
The BIG LIE “Dr Bergman” is pushing is trashing Darwin by saying that Marx read him. Educated people prone to crudity would say BFD. Hitler read the Bible and Billy Graham probably read Mein Kampf.
What makes this insinuated “guilt by association” especially contrived and perfidious is the point I attacked: the assertion and bald LIE that Darwin somehow led Marx away from Christ with follow on nonsense to the effect that Darwin is in some measure accountable for Soviet atrocities. Darwin made Marx an atheist. Ergo, Darwin is responsible for the actions of godless Communists. The derivative propaganda point for your obviously not very astute followers seems to be to keep your children away from Darwin or they will become godless communists!
If not parody, such dissociated thinking is ordinarily called deranged, especially when there is no truth or foundation to the premise. As to Marx’s “conversion”, the propagandists at CMI might look at who Marx was hanging out with before Darwin published anything.
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