by Charles Brown
Comments on Ian Argus’s article on unity of Marxism and Darwinism ; Issue 65 ISR
https://isreview.org/issue/65/marx-and-engelsand-darwin/index.html
When Marx read Origin a year later, he was just as enthusiastic, calling it “the book which contains the basis in natural history for our view.”2 In a letter to the German socialist Ferdinand Lasalle, 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… Despite all shortcomings, it is here that, for the first time, “teleology” in natural science is not only dealt a mortal blow but its rational meaning is empirically explained.3
Charles Brown However , the Darwinian struggle for existence is not directly between members of the same species ; but the class struggle is . The Darwinian struggle for existence is a struggle for individual survival - get enough to eat , not get eaten , not freeze or overheat to death , not fall out of a tree . Very rarely is this a conflict between members of the same species .
/
“ After five years of scientific research on the Beagle and two more years of study at home, Darwin came to a heretical conclusion: species were not immutable. All animals were descended from common ancestors, different species resulted from gradual changes over millions of years, and God had nothing to do with it.
It is difficult, today, to appreciate just how shocking this idea would be to the middle and upper classes of Darwin’s time. Religion wasn’t just the “opium of the masses”—it gave the wealthy moral justification for their privileged lives in a world of constant change and gross inequality.”
Natural selection
In Origin, Darwin argued that three factors combine to create new species: population pressure, variation and inheritance, and natural selection.
1) Population pressure: All organisms tend to have more offspring than can survive in the local environment. Many individuals either do not survive or are not able to reproduce.
CB : Yes , however , all organisms are mortal . All of them eventually don’t survive in the local environment. The simpler way of describing the distinction between fit and unfit , selected for and against, is between those who _reproduce and those who don’t reproduce_. Those who die before reproducing and , therefore do not pass on their genotype, unfit , and those who pass on their genotype ( or approximately half of it ), fit.
(I know the above language is from Darwin. Frankly , I have a hypothesis that Darwin new this formulation was off for really describing his theory , but was allying /appealing to Malthus in Darwin’s political struggle with the religious powers-that-be ; in other words , Darwin was using an idea similar to the _parson_ Malthus’ idea on overpopulation ; he was using Malthus for religious cover. )
At any rate, my point here ( and please argue against it , if you would ) is that most of the struggle for existence, to survive long enough to reproduce does not occur _ directly between_two animals of the same species ( using modern definition of “species”, two organisms of opposite sexes able to mate and produce fertile offspring) . It is not struggle, for example , between two tigers over the same dead prey , one trying to take it from the other . Rather , it is success or failure of the predator or prey in the struggle for existence between them - the prey escaping and surviving , and the predator starving ; or the predator surviving and prey dying .
Times of extreme scarcity would produce intra-species struggles ; I’m thinking these are rare in a species’s history.
So, since the class struggle is between members of the same species, it does not derive from the Darwinian struggle for existence , which is not mainly within the same species. Another aspect of this is seen from the fact that the exploited working classes in history reproduce at higher rates than the rich ruling classes . So, though the rich win the class struggle , the poor win the Darwinian reproductive struggle- the rich get richer and the poor get children.
Tuesday, August 24, 2021
Thursday, August 12, 2021
Darwin’s claim of superiority of men over women contradicts his own theory that fitness is measured by population growth of a species, because women have a superior role in perpetuation of our species
by CHARLES BROWN
Darwin’s claim of superiority of men over women is refuted by his own theory that fitness is measured by population growth of a type ; women play a superior role in perpetuation of the human species .
- @@@@ Here’s the direct refutation of Darwin’s claim * that human males are superior to human females .
@@@@ Superior in what sense ? For Darwin the most important superiority would be playing a superior role in raising our species’s fitness , playing a superior role in our being selected for , no ?
@@@"@ Secondly , for Darwin , the ultimate measure of fitness is size and trend of the _population_ **. If it’s increasing , the species is fit; if decreasing toward extinction, unfit or selected against . Women play a superior role to men in reproducing our species population , pregnancy , birth , childcare . Therefore , women are superior to men in Darwin’s own theory of natural selection as applied to the human race; women are more important than men in increasing population; the logic of Darwin’s theory refutes his statement that men are somehow superior to women.
@@@@@@ Over 100,000’s of years , our species population has been increasing as compared with other primates and mammals . That’s our claim to Darwinian fame . Women can claim more than half of the credit.
@@@@ * “ In The Descent of Man, Darwin argued that evolution made man “superior” to woman. For Darwin, that superiority largely played out in the intellectual and artistic realm. He wrote: “If two lists were made of the most eminent men and women in poetry, painting, sculpture, music—comprising composition and performance, history science and philosophy … the two lists would not bear comparison.” Spencer echoed Darwin’s sentiments and went further, postulating that in order for the human race to flourish, women must devote their lives to reproduction.“
@@@ Ironically, Spencer states the fact that makes women superior to men in raising the Darwinian fitness of Homo sapiens.
https://www.smithsonianmag.com/science-nature/woman-who-tried-take-down-darwin-180967146/
@@@ Blackwell made a successful critique of Darwin and Spencer. She asserted that balance and cooperation within the human species played a more important role than competition and savage rivalry in humans successful perpetuation and growth of the human population.
@@@@@@@@"" “ Blackwell chose to highlight balance and cooperation rather than struggle and savage rivalry. She criticized Darwin for basing his theory of evolution on "time-honored assumption that the male is the normal type of his species".[7] She wrote that Spencer scientifically subtracts from the femaleand Darwin as scientifically adds to the male.[6] It was not until one century later[8] that feminists were working from inside the natural sciences, and could address Darwin's androcentricity.[1]”
@@@@ https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Sexes_Throughout_Nature
“ Darwin concludes in his book, The Descent of Man, saying that men attain "a higher eminence, in whatever he takes up, than can women—whether requiring deep thought, reason, or imagination, or merely the use of the senses and hands."[2]“
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Darwin_and_women CB : However, women attain a higher imminence in _reproduction_ , the key practice for perpetuating and increasing the population size of our species - the Darwinian test of fitness. @@@
** Some discussions of Darwinian fitness focus on individuals passing on genes . However , Darwin’s theory concerns the increase or decrease in the population of a _type_ or species , a phenotype, not an individual's success . Darwin did not know about the modern concept of genes , but extending his theory to genes , it concerns perpetuation or extinction of geno-TYPES and GENOMES .
@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@ @@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@ @@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@ That's not idealistic . It's MATERial , real , fact; Females pregnate, birth and childcare the males and the females, both . Those are the key projects for perpetuation of the species. Perpetuation of the species is the Darwinian test of fitness , being selected for.
- @@@@ Here’s the direct refutation of Darwin’s claim * that human males are superior to human females .
@@@@ Superior in what sense ? For Darwin the most important superiority would be playing a superior role in raising our species’s fitness , playing a superior role in our being selected for , no ?
@@@"@ Secondly , for Darwin , the ultimate measure of fitness is size and trend of the _population_ **. If it’s increasing , the species is fit; if decreasing toward extinction, unfit or selected against . Women play a superior role to men in reproducing our species population , pregnancy , birth , childcare . Therefore , women are superior to men in Darwin’s own theory of natural selection as applied to the human race; women are more important than men in increasing population; the logic of Darwin’s theory refutes his statement that men are somehow superior to women.
@@@@@@ Over 100,000’s of years , our species population has been increasing as compared with other primates and mammals . That’s our claim to Darwinian fame . Women can claim more than half of the credit.
@@@@ * “ In The Descent of Man, Darwin argued that evolution made man “superior” to woman. For Darwin, that superiority largely played out in the intellectual and artistic realm. He wrote: “If two lists were made of the most eminent men and women in poetry, painting, sculpture, music—comprising composition and performance, history science and philosophy … the two lists would not bear comparison.” Spencer echoed Darwin’s sentiments and went further, postulating that in order for the human race to flourish, women must devote their lives to reproduction.“
@@@ Ironically, Spencer states the fact that makes women superior to men in raising the Darwinian fitness of Homo sapiens.
https://www.smithsonianmag.com/science-nature/woman-who-tried-take-down-darwin-180967146/
@@@ Blackwell made a successful critique of Darwin and Spencer. She asserted that balance and cooperation within the human species played a more important role than competition and savage rivalry in humans successful perpetuation and growth of the human population.
@@@@@@@@"" “ Blackwell chose to highlight balance and cooperation rather than struggle and savage rivalry. She criticized Darwin for basing his theory of evolution on "time-honored assumption that the male is the normal type of his species".[7] She wrote that Spencer scientifically subtracts from the femaleand Darwin as scientifically adds to the male.[6] It was not until one century later[8] that feminists were working from inside the natural sciences, and could address Darwin's androcentricity.[1]”
@@@@ https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Sexes_Throughout_Nature
“ Darwin concludes in his book, The Descent of Man, saying that men attain "a higher eminence, in whatever he takes up, than can women—whether requiring deep thought, reason, or imagination, or merely the use of the senses and hands."[2]“
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Darwin_and_women CB : However, women attain a higher imminence in _reproduction_ , the key practice for perpetuating and increasing the population size of our species - the Darwinian test of fitness. @@@
** Some discussions of Darwinian fitness focus on individuals passing on genes . However , Darwin’s theory concerns the increase or decrease in the population of a _type_ or species , a phenotype, not an individual's success . Darwin did not know about the modern concept of genes , but extending his theory to genes , it concerns perpetuation or extinction of geno-TYPES and GENOMES .
@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@ @@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@ @@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@ That's not idealistic . It's MATERial , real , fact; Females pregnate, birth and childcare the males and the females, both . Those are the key projects for perpetuation of the species. Perpetuation of the species is the Darwinian test of fitness , being selected for.
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