Don't Mention Darwin,

in a social or political context, except in jest.

Nostalgia for the Grace of George H.W. Bush

by Jon Meacham, Oct 15 2016 (LINK to article, which was approved & published)

"As Henry Adams once remarked of the movement from Washington to Grant, the journey from George H. W. Bush to Donald J. Trump disproves Darwin."

Many a true word is spoken in jest. Only, it's not that Darwin is disproved, so much as mentioned at all in a political context, which is, of course, only permissible as a joke, Darwin having been banned from all political thought in the aftermath of WW2 and the Holocaust.

He was banned, because the Nazis hijacked and abused, for their own evil purposes, the half-baked ideas of social Darwinism.

They may have been half-baked and largely misconceived, but they didn't deserve to be demonised the way they were, and still are.

Darwinian logic has a vital role to play in understanding ourselves, Homo sapiens, human societies and civilisation at large, and the fact that a taboo has been made of it is comparable to the Catholic Church once having made a taboo of the Copernican view of the universe, only much more serious. The taboo on Copernicus delayed our understanding of the universe by just a few decades, while the taboo on applying Darwin to our own species may delay our understanding of civilisation permanently, i.e. fatally.

The reason the world is in such a mess and heading towards an even bigger mess (civilisational breakdown, no less) is because of the complete lack of a human-evolutionary, i.e. Darwinian, perspective in the social and political sciences.

I've made a start on correcting this HERE. 

The Darwinian Nature of Human Situation

The World Loves Refugees, When They’re Olympians

By Roger Cohen, August 8 2016 (LINK to article)

"There is talk of making the United States great again — read making the United States white again." 

America was founded as a "white nation", by people (the founding fathers) who, were they to return from the grave, would be horrified at Roger's contempt for his own race.

Why such racial self-contempt? they would ask. And I would explain to them that it is an extreme overreaction to the extraordinary evils of Nazism and the Holocaust.

What Roger fails to understand is that the Holocaust itself was an expression of white racial self-hatred, which he, in effect, with his own racial self-denial and self-contempt, is perpetuating.

"Nobody wants refugees."

 In Europe, everyone with any sense does not want large numbers of refugees of different race or ethnicity from our own settling here, because that would be inviting ethnic tensions and conflict for decades, if not centuries, to come. We have enough people of our OWN and enough problems without adding to them.

What Roger and his "progressive" colleagues also fail to understand is the Darwinian nature of our situation, a previous generation of academics having made a taboo of it, again in overreaction to the Nazis, this time for having hijacked the half-baked ideas of social Darwinism and abused them for their own evil purposes.

There is a natural rivalry between different human races, as the full title of Darwin's book On the Origin of Species indicates. One does not have to use this as a justification for racial supremacism, let alone for genocide, as the Nazis did, but going to the opposite extreme of denying its existence, along with that of race itself, is an extremely dumb thing to do.

Roger provides a classic example of good intentions (along with the moral supremacism that often accompanies them) paving the way to hell.

See BLOG in which I elaborate further.

The System is Inherently "Corrupt"

The Panama Papers’ Sprawling Web of Corruption

By the Editorial Board, April 5 2016 (LINK to editorial)

"[a ]Sprawling Web of Corruption"

"Corruption" is a misleading word, because it implies that a non-corrupted state has become corrupted, that the system which is supposed to serve society has failed.

The truth is that the system is doing the job it has always done of facilitating society's SELF-exploitation to the personal advantage of its ruling elites and favoured (especially wealthy and academic/formerly priestly) clients, at the expense of society at large.

When the truth is revealed, as in the present case of the Panama Papers, our political elite acts surprised and indignant, perhaps with sincerity, but if so, with little understanding of how and for whom the system works.

Why have academics (and political editors), who are paid good money as authorities on understanding the system, not recognised its true nature?

Like their medieval predecessors and counterparts, academics (and editors) are privileged clients and employees of the state, i.e. of the system, with a massive personal self-interest (subconscious more than conscious) in rationalising and defending its role, self-image (as our "nation") and ideologies (social, political, economic and ethical), on which the state bases its claim to moral and knowledgeable authority.

Current academic (and editorial) understanding of the system is on the level of Ptolemaic astronomy or Galenic medicine, because still stuck in a pre-Darwinian dark age, as a consequence of a previous generation of academics having made a taboo of viewing their own species from a Darwinian perspective, it in overreaction to the Nazis having hijacked and abused the half-baked ideas of social Darwinism.

The Uncertainty Principle of Human Beliefs

God Is a Question, Not an Answer

By William Irwin, March 26 2016 (LINK to article)

"a doubt of desire approaches the question with the hope that a higher power could be found that would provide greater meaning and value to human existence"

This pretty much describes what has long been my own position, based on the philosophical equivalent of Heisenberg's "uncertainly principle": the only think I'm certain of is my own uncertainty - and, of course, I'm not absolutely certain of that either.

One is always dealing with probabilities, but in order not to be paralysed by indecision, one must sometimes act, or refrain from acting, on the assumption that one has certainty, even while knowing that one doesn't.

"the open-minded search for truth can unite believers and nonbelievers"

I like that, because united we might stand, i.e. survive and prosper long into the future, but divided as we ARE, in countless different ways, we will most certainly  fall (with a probability of I estimate at  >99.99 %) - and pretty soon, unless we can pull of the seeming miracle of uniting.

The truth we urgently need to face up to is that of our own Darwinian nature and its implications or understanding ourselves, our civilisation and situation, which a previous generation of academics made a taboo of doing, in OVERREACTION to the Nazis having hijacked and abused, for their own EVIL purposes, the half-baked ideas of social Darwinism.

If we are to overcome this taboo, we must understand its source: The West's Overreaction to Nazism.

Civilisation itself is Deeply Flawed

America Is Flint

By Nicholas Kristof Feb. 6, 2016 (LINK to article)

"Millions of children continue to suffer brain impairment because of the greed of the lead industry."

Funny how there is always someone else to blame, an individual (e.g. George Bush for the Iraq war), a company (e.g. Volkswagen for an emissions scandal), or a whole industry (e.g. the tobacco industry for delaying legislation restricting promotion of its harmful products).

What Mr Kristof overlooks is the bigger picture, which reveals the SYSTEM itself to be at fault, which ultimately - certainly in a democracy like America - we are all responsible and thus to blame for.  However, this would involve much introspection and self-criticism, which we are not good at. We are far better at and disposed towards blaming others.

It is what the ancient Greeks and Romans did as their civilisations were declining. It is, I believe, what caused the decline and demise of all past civilisations, and will soon result in the precipitous decline and demise of our own, western, civilisation.

However, we are not all equally to blame. Most of the responsibility rests with academics, whom the rest of us, including our political leaders, look to as authorities in their particular disciplines at understanding the system and providing knowledgeable and moral guidance.

They make a show of providing such guidance (as indeed they must, because it is their profession and expected of them), but to put it bluntly, it's crap, on a par with the kind of guidance that a Galenic doctor might have given to an ailing patient, before the advent of modern medicine.

Western civilisation is like a patient with a terminal illness, which modern medicine would have no difficulty curing, but which the Galenic understanding and medicine of present-day social and political science academics will only hasten to his grave (continued in following post).

If I were to go back in time and point out their failing to Galenic doctors they would simply laugh and dismiss me. They wouldn't stand for anyone - certainly not me - challenging their authority.

And so it is today with the social and political sciences, which are still stuck in a pre-Copernican, i.e. pre-Darwinian, dark age.

Yes, "pre-Darwinian". And stuck, because, in overreaction to the Nazis having hijacked and abused the half-baked ideas of social Darwinism, a previous generation of academics made a taboo of applying Darwin's ideas to our own species, civilisation and situation.

The question is, can academics recognise and develop an understanding of the perverted Darwinian nature of civilisation, which results in a perpetual cycle of civilisational boom and bust, before the approaching bust of our own civilisation catches up with us?

The realistic answer is, probably not. But for my part, at least, I will keep on trying, in the same spirit, I like to imagine, that Britain continued facing up to Nazi Germany, even after the fall of France, when there was no realistic chance of victory.

On its own, Britain was, of course, in a hopeless situation, but fate, in the form of Hitler himself declaring war, first on the Soviet Union and then on America, provided Britain with two powerful allies, who between them were able to defeat him. I can't help suspecting that at a subconscious level Hitler wanted to be defeated and to take as many fellow Germans and Europeans (including European Jews) with him as possible.

I'm in an analogous position to Britain in 1940, hoping that fate (or Providence) will intervene and that soon I will have some powerful allies in academia.

Here's a primer (not brilliant, but the best I have to offer) on what they need to understand: LINK

Religion, Moral Authority & Power

How Politics Has Poisoned Islam

By Mustafa Akyol Feb. 3, 2016 (LINK to article)

Until modern times, religion, i.e. its priesthood, served the state as a source of knowledgeable and moral authority. William the Bastard of Normandy made sure he had the Pope's approval, before embarking on his invasion and subjugation of the English in 1066. In return, he massively supported the Church, so it was a good deal for both parties, but not so much for the English, who suffered under the Norman yoke for centuries, one might even argue, to this day.

The state has to legitimise itself and it was to the moral authority of religion that it turned. This is still the case, it seems, in the Muslim world, although brute force clearly also continues to play a big role.

In the West, brute force and the authority of priests are no longer considered acceptable. The state looks instead to a secular priesthood of academics, who base their authority not on sacred scripture, as in the past, but on their claim to possess objective facts, reason and rationality. Only, their facts, reason and rationality are not nearly as sound or objective as they would have us - and themselves, no doubt - believe they are.

This is because, largely in overreaction to Nazism, a previous generation of academics made a taboo of viewing their own species, society and civilisation from a human-evolutionary perspective, which is the only way to develop a realistic understanding of these things and of our own situation. See BLOG in which I elaborate.

Civilisational Boom & Bust

What If?

By Thomas Friedman, Jan. 20 2016 (LINK to article)

What if consumer capitalism is inherently unsustainable on our finite, vulnerable and overpopulated planet, which I and many others recognised it to be more than 40 years ago, before Ronald Reagan, Margret Thatcher and Helmut Schmitt led the world in putting it into turbo mode?

We (mine and previous generations of white men) have screwed up badly, with America now leading western civilisation, and the rest of the world following, towards the abyss.

Not that I'm blaming America. A big part of our problem is that we all try to blame others for what's gone wrong, rather than admitting our own part in it.

Nothing new has gone wrong. Ever since the first states and civilisations emerged from a tribal society, they have been subject to a continuous cycle of civilisational boom and bust, just not on the global scale or level of technological development that we are now experiencing, or with such a huge dependent human population that will suffer the consequences.

It doesn't have to be like this, but to put an end to this cycle of boom and bust, we need to view and understand our own species and civilisation from a human-evolutionary, i.e. Darwinian, perspective, which tragically, a previous generation of academics made a taboo of doing, in OVERREACTION to the Nazis having hijacked and abused the half-baked ideas of social Darwinism for their own evil purposes.

It is probably too late now to avoid bust entirely, but it is not too late to reduce the scale and death toll. Here is where to START.

The West's Overreaction to Nazism

Western civilisation, especially in America, is to a large extent defined and shackled by its OVERREACTION to Nazism and the Holocaust, something which, without realising it, the NYT itself warns about in an editorial response, The Price of Fear, to the Islamic terror attacks in Paris earlier this month (LINK to article)):

“In the reaction and overreaction to terrorism [evil] comes the risk that society will lose its way.”

By far the most important example of this was the overreaction to Nazism, which has gone virtually unrecognised for decades, not least, because of its very profoundness, magnitude and all-pervasiveness, and because of the personal, professional and power-political self-interests that quickly became bound up with it.

The Nazis took the natural ethnic/racial basis of national identity and nationhood to criminally insane extremes in their efforts to exploit it for their own evil, power-political purposes. In overreaction to this we, i.e. our parents' and grandparents’, went to the opposite extreme of denying the natural ethnic basis of national identity and nationhood altogether, along with the very existence of race itself, which we are now obliged to believe, is just a “social construct”, only of importance to bigots and racists.

Only race is not a "social construct" (except when you try dividing closely related peoples from the same subcontinent into different races, as the Nazis insanely did), but real and important. Not in the way that racial supremacists, like the Nazis or supporters of Jim Crow or Apartheid, believe it is, but because central to any deep and meaningful sense of both personal and group, i.e. genuine national, identity.

The Nazis also hijacked the half-baked ideas of social Darwinism, which they abused to rationalise and justify their insane racial ideology, eugenics and euthanasia programmes, and wars of aggression, which also resulted in a massive overreaction on the part of a previous generation of academics, who made a taboo of the whole subject of applying Darwinian logic to the human situation, society and civilisation.

This was a tragedy we are still suffering under, because how else are we understand ourselves, our society, civilisation and situation if not from a human-evolutionary, i.e. Darwinian, perspective? Are we not, like other animals, a product of Darwinian evolution? Such a perspective reveals profound insights into the nature of society and the state, which academics have been unable to view objectively or dispassionately, because of their own dependency on it, and which are crying out for our urgent attention.

There will be understandable fears that to remove the taboos would once again lead to the abuse of Darwin’s ideas, which, of course, can’t be ruled out, but we can guard against it by being proactive in developing a rational and humane Darwinian ethics of our own, which is what we urgently need anyway.

Extricating ourselves from these overreactions and taboos is going to be difficult, because over more than half a century they have become deeply imbedded in the very fabric of academia, which is looked upon as a moral and knowledgeable authority, just as the church once was, whose values and attitudes are hugely influential and difficult even to challenge, let alone change.

Challenges to church authority were often condemned, not because they were considered unjustified, but because of fears of the consequences, not just for the church, but for society at large, which, it was feared could descend into anarchy; however, if those fears had been heeded by everyone the Reformation might never have happened and the Catholic Church would have kept its iron grip on western society, much as Islam has kept its grip on the Muslim world.

Further reading:

1) The Paradox of Race Does and Doesn't Matter

2) The Method to the Madness of Post-Racial Multiculturalism

3) On the Perverted Darwinian Nature of Civilisation

4) Contrapot

5) The Political Implications of Evolutionary Psychology