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Scientific Certitude 100 years ago

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From the 11th edition of the Encyclopedia Britannica (1911):

“[T]he negro would appear to stand on a lower evolutionary plane than the white man, and to be more closely related to the highest anthropoids.”

“Mentally the negro is inferior to the white.”

“[A]fter puberty sexual matters take the first place in the negro’s life and thought.”

Comments
One day, before we have grown to old to notice, Darwinism will have collapsed. It will happen quietly, but one morning Darwinism will be gone.SaintMartinoftheFields
March 17, 2009
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Denise O'Leary: Was the ol’ Brit toff projecting onto “the negro” attitudes that many people of his generation considered improper (but could be safely discussed if projected onto people considered “inferior”?) Dunno That you "dunno" is correct. And one thing that many of us do know is that the quote in the O.P. is from someone writing in an encyclopedia in 1911, and is certainly not an opinion of the "'ol Brit toff". In your posts in relation to Darwin and race on this blog, I've seen no evidence that you've actually read what he wrote on the subject. If you have read it, then you've clearly not understood what you were reading, and I'd be happy to go through it point by point and explain if you find the science difficult.iconofid
March 17, 2009
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Are you aware of the Judge Basile's statement during the Loving vs. Virginia case? He surely didn't need Darwin to be racist.sparc
March 16, 2009
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"[A]fter puberty sexual matters take the first place in the negro’s life and thought." interested (Comment 1) is right, of course; After puberty, sexual matters take the first place in EVERYONE'S life and thought, for a while. (That is what puberty IS!) With adulthood come responsibilities (like children). Nothing like a wailing baby to turn one's attention to something other than sex. Was the ol' Brit toff projecting onto "the negro" attitudes that many people of his generation considered improper (but could be safely discussed if projected onto people considered "inferior"?) Dunno. Dr. Freud, meet Mr. Darwin. Mr. Darwin, meet Dr. Freud. I bet you two will find something to talk about over dinner.O'Leary
March 16, 2009
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Merriam-Webster's definition of racism:
racism: 1 : a belief that race is the primary determinant of human traits and capacities and that racial differences produce an inherent superiority of a particular race 2 : racial prejudice or discrimination
And
prejudice 2 a (1) : preconceived judgment or opinion (2) : an adverse opinion or leaning formed without just grounds or before sufficient knowledge b : an instance of such judgment or opinion c : an irrational attitude of hostility directed against an individual, a group, a race, or their supposed characteristics
So, in the sense that humans think and preconceive, and to the extent that humans in novel situations will resort to preconceptions, only the comatose exhibit no racism. The best one can hope for is to let his racism do no harm. Indeed, prejudging based on past learning is part of what makes a human a human (although other creatures also exhibit this trait.) As many of you would fear a vicious looking pit-bull, so a person from Nanking educated after the cultural revolution would fear a blue-eyed devil, and loathe the Japanese; and so a person who grew up in a gang ridden neighborhood would know when it's time to cross the street to avoid confrontation with a group of young hoodlums. In the first case, the prejudice is based mostly on propaganda, and perhaps some family experience, while in the second case, based on past real world anecdotal experience deemed to be prudent more often than not. Racial prejudices are normal. Yes, they are most often irrational, but not always. That being said, educated westerners have been programmed to mask or discount such prejudices. Consequently, it would be difficult to find ten evolutionary biologists who have left a paper trail documenting overtly racist viewpoints. Allen_MacNeill's is a loaded challenge. A better question is whether or not evolutionary theory has lent credibility to irrational racism and racist propaganda. Many evolanders claim that evolution is science, but when somebody brings up James Watson, well, he's discounted as a mere scientist, yes, a scientist who made a significant contribution to biology, but a scientist speaking on subjects outside of his area of expertise. And, he is not an evolutionary biologist. Again, loaded challenge. Whether or not evolutionary theory bolsters or fosters racism is a legitimate question, but it is orthogonal to the question of whether extrapolating observed evolution to common descent is scientific, or whether RM+NS is sufficient to explain common descent (if you believe as Behe seems to that man and ape are biological cousins.) Recent history is littered with figures for whom evolutionary theory, racism, and political power reacted synergistically with disastrous consequences. To act as though evolutionary theory were no more consequential to these horrendous episodes than, say the typewriter, is to deny the logical conclusions, obvious direction, and clear language of evolutionary theory. Evolved, adapted, differentiated, trait, etc.William Wallace
March 16, 2009
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In a day when racism is decidedly not de rigueur, it will be natural for Darwinists to disavow it and IDists to point the finger. Instead we need to be aware of the political wind, of the mood of the mob, of current trends. Is racism the problem of the moment? It’s always there, lurking, and vigilance is always in order. But in this day of postmodernist mindlessness, of fawning deference to celebrity, of politically correct indigeneity, might it be reason itself that’s under attack? Witness campus speech codes, the shouting down of contrary ideas, and what issues incite the erudite to obfuscation and bitter name calling. Once again, as in the Thirties, hatred is in the air. For the past decade it has been ubiquitous and palpable as also viscereal and irrational. And because of this I don’t think I need point out the more powerless objects of this hatred. The point is that we need the moral compass to combat it, nip it in the bud before it overwhelms us. Darwinian materialism is not up to the task—in fact I believe it is the cause, or maybe better, the cover. It is because of this that ID is at the forefront of the Kulturkampf.Rude
March 16, 2009
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Racism is an epithet at the apex of the politically correct lexicon. To label someone a racist is to destroy him. And so let’s not let ourselves get into that territory, for it’s not people’s inner motives that interest us. It’s their ideas. And Darwinism is surely a dangerous idea (for which see Daniel Dennett’s Darwin’s Dangerous Idea: Evolution and the Meanings of Life, 1995). Darwinian materialism is dangerous because 1) it is a Theory of Everything which, as Jacques Monod showed, denies purpose by admitting only chance and necessity into the lexicon of explanation, and consequently 2) is utterly ill equipped to speak to moral issues. That does not mean that Darwinists (or atheists) cannot be moral people, it just means that we cannot trust their philosophy to deliver a credible public morality. And, yes, it is also true that those who embrace a right standard of morality don’t always abide by it, even as also there are those of evil motive who may come in the name of a benevolent philosophy. Nothing takes away from the fact that we must try each philosophy as to its ability to deliver the goods. And so I’m with Dave Scott in that we should be careful not to hurl the politically incorrect epithet at PEOPLE, and I’m with Ben Stein in that we must not flinch from pointing out the consequences of IDEAS. It matters not a whit whether Darwin was a “racist” in the modern politically correct sense. What matters is the consequences that his ideas have had in history and whether or not those ideas are adequate to avert the next holocaust. Ideas have consequences, and so not only does the veracity of ideas matter, so do their consequences.Rude
March 16, 2009
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Hermagorus,
Joseph, it’s quite right that race classifications existed outside creationist thinking.
Of course it did.
But the people who said the human races were separate species, such as Linnaeus and Agassiz, happened to be creationists.
And how do you know what non-Creationists said? Where YOU present during EVERY conversation they ever had? Linne said that tghe human races were separate species? Do you have a reference?
So while the idea of human “races” isn’t creationist, the idea “different human race = different species” seems to be. SEEMS TO BE? Translation: DK doesn't have any actual data but propagnda will do.
Joseph
March 16, 2009
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Allen_MacNeill, This thread is about 100 years ago. NOT TODAY. The point being science changes. And in 100 years from now people will look back and laugh at what today's scientific consensus. That is because the theory of evolution is nothing but propaganda. And seeing that you believe that Creation = the fixation of species, I would say the propaganda is working. You talk about evidence and the best you can do is to erect strawman after strawman.Joseph
March 16, 2009
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I don't think the point of this post concerns racism per se, but merely that the "random variation/natural selection" explanation of evolutionary history will look about as asinine 100 years from now as the "scientific" racism of 100 years ago looks today: quaint, clueless, and totally wrong.Matteo
March 15, 2009
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"The theory of evolution is an explanatory theory of nature. It is not about artificial selection." And a poor one at that. Which group of humans is more successful reproductively? Aryan Indians, Mongoloid Chinese, or Causasian American/Europeans/Australians? Let's see now: Indians: 1.1 billion Chinese: 1.3 Billion, Americans/Europeans/Australians: 800 million. So Causasians are currently lagging behind quantitatively. Is it because of their lack of reproductive success, or rather is it due to 'self-selection' acting upon lifestyle variation? That's a hard one.Oramus
March 15, 2009
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Mapou "If a group of individuals within a species are more successful at reproducing, they are clearly superior at it. I realize I am not a brilliant (highly evolved and superior, of course) evolutionary biologist but please do not insult my intelligence with such lame arguments. I don’t insult yours. Do you mean that you would describe those individuals within a species who have the most kids a race? And when nature favours them with selection, is nature racist? The theory of evolution is an explanatory theory of nature. It is not about artificial selection.iconofid
March 15, 2009
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MacNeill:
How do you manage to contort your mind into “increased reproductive success” meaning “superior”?
HAYSOOS Martinez! Are you kidding me or are you just another dishonest evolutionist? If a group of individuals within a species are more successful at reproducing, they are clearly superior at it. I realize I am not a brilliant (highly evolved and superior, of course) evolutionary biologist but please do not insult my intelligence with such lame arguments. I don't insult yours.
Does this lead one to conclude that horseshoe crabs are somehow “superior” to humans?
Have you stopped beating your wife, too?Mapou
March 15, 2009
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Sigh, I miss real ID topics.SCheesman
March 15, 2009
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go ahead, Mapou, just make your unsupported assertion all over again, without citing evidence. I'm finished with this thread. "Against stupidity the gods themselves contend in vain." - Friedrich Schiller (1801), Die Jungfrau von Orleans, Act III, sc. vi (Anna Swanwick, trans.)Allen_MacNeill
March 15, 2009
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What books have you been reading, Mapou? In all of the evolutionary biology textbooks I've read (including the one I'm currently writing)"fitness" is clearly defined as "increased reproductive success". How do you manage to contort your mind into "increased reproductive success" meaning "superior"? Every evolutionary biologist for the past fifty years has been very clear on this point: nothing in evolutionary biology leads one to conclude that one species (or whatever taxon you wish to cite) is "superior" or "inferior". As just one example, it is clear that horseshoe crabs (Limulus polyphemus) are an unusually "successful" taxon. They have existed almost unchanged (and in great abundance) for almost 500 million years (i.e. about 100 times longer than humans). Does this lead one to conclude that horseshoe crabs are somehow "superior" to humans? Don't be ridiculous. The idea that certain taxa are "superior" or "inferior" are not part of evolutionary biology. They are, quite simply, political concepts, invented by politicians in the pursuit of political ends.Allen_MacNeill
March 15, 2009
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Mapou "You have not refuted anything. You are brilliant only in your own mind. If a species survives through natural selection, it follows that some members of the species will be inferior (in terms of fitness) and others superior. This is evolution 101. And this is where the racist conclusions come from. Like it or lump it." Ah! Now individuals are races, are they? And in order for natural selection to be guilty of "racism" against these individuals, nature must be sentient. Wow. So that's how an I.D. advocate thinks! Did you know that Darwin was actually one of the first people to question the existence of "race" in humans, as most people understand it? He called it "so called race". Also, do you think that Darwin was responsible for Plato's eugenics?iconofid
March 15, 2009
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MacNeill, Wrestling with a strawman of your own making, I see. Why don't you respond directly to my argument instead beating around the bush? I don't think I argued anywhere that evolution leads to individuals or nations becoming racists. I believe that children are not as knowledgeable as adults and yet I harbor neither condescension nor ill will toward children. I don't expect evolutionists to automatically harbor ill will toward certain races because evolution teaches that they are inferior to others in as far as their ability to compete for resources is concerned. My argument is that evolution does teach that individual members within a species compete for resources and that natural selection favors those who are more successful. This immediately leads to the conclusion that subgroups within a species or entire species will be more or less adept at competing against other groups. That is what fitness and selection are all about. How can selection work if it does not discriminate? Fitness means superiority and it further means that some subgroups (races) are more or less superior than others. This is the definition of racism that is being employed in this discussion, right? Deny at your own detriment. If fitness is not part of evolutionary theory, then you and I have been reading the wrong books.Mapou
March 15, 2009
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Allen wrote,
"Ergo, Mapou and all of the other anti-Darwinists at this website have utterly failed to produce the name of even one contemporary evolutionary biologist who is on record as supporting any form of racism whatsoever."
The point that Mapou is making is that the notion of natural selection says that the world governs what is worthy and not worthy of survival based upon their attributes and their relation to their enviornment. Of course one of the most common ways to corrolate natural selection with living things is by grouping them in races. Hence there is a nation of natural racism embedded into the mechanism of natural selection. Now it is important to note that NS is just one side of the evolutionary coin- the other side is the random mutation part. However at times it can become difficult to determine what is random from what is non random- for example certain species and races have certain kinds of mutations that are likely or common to them- but within that race there maybe no way to know exactly which individuals will get the mutation and which ones will avoid it. So the idea of random mutation is a grey area- ultimately natural selection decides which groups are worthy of going on. While mutations are absolutly necessary to create any speciation they may not be directly realted to the decision of which species live on or die off. This does bring up the interesting idea of how a random mutation that kills off a species might be viewed... would that mutation be viewed as simply a random mutation or also as an act of "natural selection"? Obviously Obviously those two mechanisms while powerful are not isolated from the totality of the evolutionary reality- the point being that there can not be any "explanation" which fully explains and encompasses all of the evolutionary phenomena into a predictable formula- hence the need for the term "random." But my point is that the random mechanism of evolution IS a raciest one. It is not exclusively raciest but as a general statement it tends to eliminate races. No the beleif in the evolutionary synthesis does not require that a person must be raciest themselves- but it does require that they admit that the evolutionary reality of the world that they live in and take part in is generally raciest- and that leaves open the possibility they they themselves may be inherently raciest beyond any choice since NS and RM within the evolutionary framework work within the human race themselves- that is there is nothing in the modern synthesis that excludes man from its principles. So depending on how one defines "species" and "races" it is important to note that evolution tends to discriminate among them and that man kind is part of the evolutionary model. However if you believe in intelligent design that leaves open the possibility- though reason- that man can go against the grain- that man is ultimately chosen for this purpose- because ultimately there is a greater purpose than the impersonal system of modern evolutionary theory.Frost122585
March 15, 2009
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My goodness, Mapou, but you are persistent. Okay, if evolutionary biology leads directly to racism, then those populations in which evolutionary biology began and in which they have flourished should be the most racist, right? Furthermore, since (as most anti-"Darwinists" argue, evolutionary thought is becoming more and more widespread, the longer a population has accepted evolutionary theory, the more racist it should be. So, let's make another list. This time, it's nations that have become more racist since evolutionary biology has become accepted by its scientists: Germany (up until 1945, but not since then) Japan (up until 1945, but not since then) Hmm. Okay, how about those countries that have become less racist since the publication of Darwin's Descent of Man in 1871 (major countries only, to preserve bandwidth): Australia Austria (especially after 1945) Belgium Canada China Czechoslovakia Denmark England Finland (especially after 1945) France Georgia Greece Hungary Iceland India Ireland Italy (especially after 1945) Mexico The Netherlands New Zealand Norway Poland Portugul Spain (especially after 1945) Sweden Switzerland Russia (formerly the USSR) Almost all of South America (Argentina is an ambiguous case) Ukraine The Union of South Africa The United States of America Conspicuously absent from this list are most of the nations of Africa, southeast Asia, and most nations in which Islam is the dominant religion. Odd, that last part; I thought that most Muslims were creationists? Does this mean that creationism (especially the Muslim version) necessarily predisposes people to racism? Anyway, Mapou's assertion (and that's all it is) has once again been shown to have no evidence at all behind it, whereas the opposite assertion (actually, it's a testable hypothesis) is supported by the evidence. Thanks, Mapou, for once again demonstrating the complete intellectual bankruptcy of your position, and for flushing all of your supporters out of the cracks in the floor. One wonders if you might not be a double-agent for the other side...Allen_MacNeill
March 15, 2009
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Kellogg, You have not refuted anything. You are brilliant only in your own mind. If a species survives through natural selection, it follows that some members of the species will be inferior (in terms of fitness) and others superior. This is evolution 101. And this is where the racist conclusions come from. Like it or lump it.Mapou
March 15, 2009
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Mapou,
You’re jumping on a strawman and too quick to declare victory
You asked me to "refute" your "argument" and now, when I do, you back away from any connection between your own contiguous sentences. Apparently I was taking your notion of "refutation" seriously. In truth, you have not offered any argument worth refuting, merely a necklace of anecdotal beads strung together by leaps of faith and unwarranted assumptions.David Kellogg
March 15, 2009
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@ Allen, I know you have borne the brunt of grossly unfair insults from a particular former contributor here, but I wonder if you appreciate the irony of his ultimately futile attempt to halt this unfortunate descent into , well, this current antithesis of reason.Arthur Smith
March 15, 2009
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Kellogg:
If human races are not species, as they are not in Darwin or in evolutionary biology writ large, then the sentence “Does not evolution teach that the species struggle or compete for survival?” does not apply to human races. You can’t substitute “human races” for “species” on a whim. What is so hard to understand about that?
You're jumping on a strawman and too quick to declare victory. The fact is that evolution not only teaches that species compete for survival and resources but so do the individual members within every species. In fact, natural selection acts within species through normal procreation.Mapou
March 15, 2009
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mapou
Isn’t racism the assumption that some races are superior?
and
Refute that and I’ll shut up.
Presumably anybody who understood "evolution" would realise that there is only one "race" or "species" of human and as such racism based on such percieved differences is not based on "evolution", but rather an incomplete or invalid understand of evolution. So, misunderstanding evolution might lead to racism but if you have a correct understanding of it it will not.George L Farquhar
March 15, 2009
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And, for the record, let's all agree shall we that this thread represents the core argument of ID: propaganda, pure and simple. No arguments about evidence, no arguments about science, no recognition at all that ID was supposed to be a revision of evolutionary theory, not its replacement, and (most of all) that virtually all of ID "theory" consists of arguments by assertion, character assassination, guilt by association, and ad hominem attacks. Thank you all, and especially thank you, Denise, for making all of this so very, very clear!Allen_MacNeill
March 15, 2009
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Icd:
Perhaps we should stop trying to tar and feather the science community as there are far too many Christians who do not act in a Christian manner at all.
Both so-called Christians and so-called scientists need to be tarred and feathered, in my opinion. The point that I am making is that, given the evidence, one cannot make the case that the Bible advocates racism (the opposite is the truth as shown by countless examples in these discussions and elsewhere), whereas one can certainly make the case that evolution leads to racism as a consequence of its fundamental principles re the struggle for survival among organisms (even and especially within species). Neo-evolutionary thought does not erase those basic evolutionary principles, as far as I know.Mapou
March 15, 2009
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Oops again, typing and pasting too fast and getting doubles sorry y'allBorne
March 15, 2009
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There is plenty of discussion about the science here, just not on this thread.
Indeed, this thread
has been a marathon of discovery about Dawkins and his "weasel" program. As always, you can be relied on for an incisive comment, Jerry.
Arthur Smith
March 15, 2009
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Mapou, Here is one of many possible refutations: If human races are not species, as they are not in Darwin or in evolutionary biology writ large, then the sentence "Does not evolution teach that the species struggle or compete for survival?" does not apply to human races. You can't substitute "human races" for "species" on a whim. What is so hard to understand about that?David Kellogg
March 15, 2009
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