“What can we make of this? Darwin was wrong!” In other words, this devolution in statesmen was proof positive, at least politically, that we did not evolve into a higher species.
Evolution is the organism adapting to its environment, not a straight line ascent to what a human thinks is ‘higher.’ So Nixon was adapted to modern society, for better or worse.
“Evolution is the organism adapting to its environment, not a straight line ascent to what a human thinks is ‘higher.’ So Nixon was adapted to modern society, for better or worse.”
I always find it funny when people uses the theory of evolution as if to infer it always means to improve while completely neglecting the basic mechanisms by which that improvement is achieved(natural Selection).
Politics may only be thought of as an example of evolution on a global scale among competing states. Politicians by contrast are also evolving but they are not the orgizm of the state but rather the parasites that live within it seeking to acquire personal power and influence from it.
Their evolution, and the evolution of their politics is to the detriment and destruction of the state. The state as a whole by contrast does not evolve at all for it is but a single lifeforms living a single life. It’s successors might be said to evolve only to the extent they outlive other states not so well designed to resist the corruption of said parasites and the competition of other state.
To this end the U.S. Constitution represents a very strong organism lasting 100+ years on the world stage before surcoming to its own parasites, and beginning the long slow death. It is not however invulnerable not is it as an individual evolving.
What we’ve witnessed isn’t Darwin; it is poor maintenance.