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[_ Old Earth _] Alleged Homo Neladi

Odd then, that Stalin outlawed Darwin, and killed or imprisoned Darwinian scientists. Soviet Biology is still recovering from that disaster. Stalin correctly argued that Darwinian evolution was contrary to Marxist beliefs.

The why did Marxism embrace it? There were many distinctions between DarwinISM and Communism but Darwin's natural selection and survival of the fittest fit nicely with the struggle for survival among the classes.

Engels was very excited about Darwin’s theory. He wrote to Marx about it saying Origin of Species was

the book which contains the basis in natural history for our view.” See Karl Marx and Friedrich Engels, Selected Correspondence 1846–1895 (New York: International Publishers, 1975), 126 in MECW vol. 41, 232.

In a letter to his friend (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.

In Reminiscences of Marx and Engels (Moscow: Foreign Languages Publishing House, n.d.), 106. Marx is quoted as saying “when Darwin drew the conclusions from his research work and brought them to the knowledge of the public, we spoke of nothing else for months but Darwin and the enormous significance of his scientific discoveries.

Marxism fully embraces Darwin....Lenin was a staunch Marxist....Stalin claimed to be a staunch Leninist....its hard to see him as opposed to Darwin....
 
Barbarian observes:
Odd then, that Stalin outlawed Darwin, and killed or imprisoned Darwinian scientists. Soviet Biology is still recovering from that disaster. Stalin correctly argued that Darwinian evolution was contrary to Marxist beliefs.

The why did Marxism embrace it?

Stalin outlawed it. Doesn't sound like an "embrace" to me. Bear hug, maybe. Darwinists were fired, and killed or imprisoned.

There were many distinctions between DarwinISM and Communism but Darwin's natural selection and survival of the fittest fit nicely with the struggle for survival among the classes.

It was assailed by the communists of being a bourgeois justification for humans to compete with each other and to oppress each other.

Lysenko presented himself as a follower of Ivan Vladimirovich Michurin, a well-known and well-liked Soviet horticulturist. However, unlike Michurin, he advocated a form of Lamarckism, insisting on using only hybridization and grafting, as non-genetic techniques. With this came, most importantly, the implication that acquired characteristics of an organism — for example, the state of being leafless as a result of having been plucked — could be inherited by that organism's descendants. This is why Lysenko claimed vernalization would give greater productivity than it did; he believed the ability of his vernalized seeds to flower faster and produce more wheat would be passed on to the next generation of wheat seeds, thus causing vernalization to further amplify the process.


Support from Joseph Stalin gave Lysenko even more momentum and popularity. In 1935, Lysenko compared his opponents in biology to the peasants who still resisted the Soviet government's collectivization strategy, saying that by opposing his theories the traditional geneticists were setting themselves against Marxism. Stalin was in the audience when this speech was made, and he was the first one to stand and applaud, calling out "Bravo, Comrade Lysenko. Bravo." This event emboldened Lysenko and gave him and his ally Prezent free rein to slander the geneticists who still spoke out against him. Many of Lysenkoism's opponents, such as his former mentor Nikolai Ivanovich Vavilov, were imprisoned or even executed because of Lysenko's and Prezent's denunciations.


On August 7, 1948, the V.I. Lenin Academy of Agricultural Sciences announced that from that point on Lysenkoism would be taught as "the only correct theory". Soviet scientists were forced to denounce any work that contradicted Lysenko's research.[6] Criticism of Lysenko was denounced as "bourgeois" or "fascist", and analogous "non-bourgeois" theories also flourished in other fields in the Soviet academy at this time (see Japhetic theory; socialist realism). Interestingly, perhaps the only opponents of Lysenkoism during Stalin's lifetime to escape liquidation came from the small community of Soviet nuclear physicists: as Tony Judt has observed, "It is significant that Stalin left his nuclear physicists alone and never presumed to second guess their calculations. Stalin may well have been mad but he was not stupid."[7]

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lysenkoism

Engels was very excited about Darwin’s theory. He wrote to Marx about it saying Origin of Species was

the book which contains the basis in natural history for our view.” See Karl Marx and Friedrich Engels, Selected Correspondence 1846–1895 (New York: International Publishers, 1975), 126 in MECW vol. 41, 232.

He was. He even sent a letter to Darwin, which (like a lot of correspondence sent to Darwin, never got opened). However, he agreed with Marx that a very brief period of state control would have to give way to a complete lack of government. As you might have noticed, communists aren't very good Marxists in that regard. Stalin completely rejected Englels' opinion with regard to the state and with regard to Darwin.

Lenin was a staunch Marxist....

I don't see any sign that Lenin was planning on the state withering away, as Marx demanded. Nor do I see any sign that Lenin had any special regard for Darwin's theory.

Stalin claimed to be a staunch Leninist...

Perhaps. He certainly didn't agree with Marx and Engels on the end of government.

its hard to see him as opposed to Darwin....

Other than his support for a Lamarckist biology, his outlawing of Darwinism, and his habit of killing and imprisoning Darwinists, that is.

C'mon.
 
Leninism is practical proletariat in action just like in Marxist Maoism....850 million communists militantly rule 1.35 billion...the State (the alleged proletariat) runs everything and controls the means of production
 
From a Marxist:
Darwinism served as a tool to the bourgeoisie in their struggle against the feudal class, against the nobility, clergy-rights and feudal lords. This was an entirely different struggle from the struggle now waged by the proletarians. The bourgeoisie was not an exploited class striving to abolish exploitation. Oh no. What the bourgeoisie wanted was to get rid of the old ruling powers standing in their way. The bourgeoisie themselves wanted to rule, basing their demands upon the fact that they were the most important class, the leaders of industry. What argument could the old class, the class that became nothing but useless parasites, bring forth against them? They leaned on tradition, on their ancient divine rights. These were their pillars. With the aid of religion the priests held the great mass in subjection and ready to oppose the demands of the bourgeoisie.


It was therefore for their own interests that the bourgeoisie were in duty bound to undermine the “divinity” right of rulers. Natural science became a weapon in the opposition to belief and tradition; science and the newly discovered natural laws were put forward; it was with these weapons that the bourgeoisie fought. If the new discoveries could prove that what the priests were teaching was false, the “divine” authority of these priests would crumble and the “divine rights” enjoyed by the feudal class would be destroyed. Of course the feudal class was not conquered by this only, as material power can only be overthrown by material power, but mental weapons become material tools. It is for this reason that the bourgeoisie relied so much upon material science.


Darwinism came at the desired time; Darwin’s theory that man is the descendant of a lower animal destroyed the entire foundation of Christian dogma. It is for this reason that as soon as Darwinism made its appearance, the bourgeoisie grasped it with great zeal.
Anton Pannekoek Marxism and Darwinism Charles H. Kerr & Company, Chicago, 1912


Note the erroneous assumption Marxists share with creationists. The foundations of Christianity have nothing whatever to do with the way God created man physically.

So the hostility of the communists to Darwinism after 1918 was due to two important things:
1. The theoretical finding that Darwinism was a "tool of the bourgeoisie"
2. The opposition of Darwinian theory to the crackpot Lamarckian notions of one of Stalin's pet biologists.

As
you have seen, communism, as it was practiced in the 20th century, was opposed to the theories of Marx and Engels, in several ways. Most notable was the rejection of the very basis of Marxism, that of the rapid "withering away" of the state. But also, the rejection of Engels' enthusiasm for science generally and Darwinism in particular.
 
Leninism is practical proletariat in action

Nonsense. Lenin's first great deviation from Marxism was his rejection of Marx's idea that revolution must come from the proletariat and the intellectuals must follow them. He ridiculed it as "observing the rumps of the workers." Lenin's reworking of Marxism considered the proletariat as ignorant and unable to follow their own best interests. So, he reasoned, their betters must do the revolution for them. And the betters must, for revolutionary reasons, be accorded power, respect, and comfort.

This is what Orwell was alluding to when he has the human, Pilkington, joke with Napoleon, the pig who has become the dictator of Animal Farm that:
"If you have your lower animals to contend with … we have our lower classes!"

Mao completely agreed. The Chinese Communist Party makes no pretense at all of being subject to the proletariat. He went so far as to suggest scrapping the Chinese system of writing for the Latin Alphabet. (a crazy idea, considering that China has several major, mutually unintelligible languages, and Chinese writing is understandable to a person of any language, if they know the writing system)

Orwell's prediction was validated in the present-day government of China, which has completely tossed out Marxist principals,and has embraced the worst aspects of robber baron capitalism.

I was reading an article by a journalist who was investigating corruption in China. He was on a "campus" of a large factory complex, when his hosts started to realize what he was actually doing there. They took him to their offices and said he couldn't leave until they figured out what to do. One of his associates called the local police on a cell phone. The police came, and after some negotiation, convinced the factory manager to let them go.

Think about that. The supposedly Marxist government had to negotiate and persuade a business owner to obey the law. Orwell knew exactly what was coming.

 
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Orwell's prediction was validated in the present-day government of China, which has completely tossed out Marxist principals,and has embraced the worst aspects of robber baron capitalism.

I have to agree with this one even though that ruthless Mao was a staunch Marxist and believed Darwin
 
Barbarian observes:
Orwell's prediction was validated in the present-day government of China, which has completely tossed out Marxist principals,and has embraced the worst aspects of robber baron capitalism.

I have to agree with this one even though that ruthless Mao was a staunch Marxist and believed Darwin

Mao also believed electricity and in chemistry. I don't see a point. Orthodox Marxism-Leninism denounced Darwin's ideas, but Mao was far from an orthodox Marxist.

I note that ISIS has banned Darwin from schools under their control as well.

And note that Engels saw capitalism as Darwinian:
Frederick Engels: Socialism: Utopian and Scientific
Finally, modern industry and the opening of the world-market made the struggle universal, and at the same time gave it an unheard-of virulence. Advantages in natural or artificial conditions of production now decide the existence or non-existence of individual capitalists, as well as of whole industries and countries. He that falls is remorselessly cast aside. It is the Darwinian struggle of the individual for existence transferred from Nature to society with intensified violence. The conditions of existence natural to the animal appear as the final term of human development. The contradiction between socialized production and capitalistic appropriation now presents itself as an antagonism between the organization of production in the individual workshop and the anarchy of production in society generally.

https://www.marxists.org/archive/marx/works/1880/soc-utop/ch03.htm

Precisely the opposite of what you were told about his ideas.
 
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Why not let Engels have the last word?
Finally, modern industry and the opening of the world-market made the struggle universal, and at the same time gave it an unheard-of virulence. Advantages in natural or artificial conditions of production now decide the existence or non-existence of individual capitalists, as well as of whole industries and countries. He that falls is remorselessly cast aside. It is the Darwinian struggle of the individual for existence transferred from Nature to society with intensified violence. The conditions of existence natural to the animal appear as the final term of human development.
 
Nonsense.

2For our struggle is not against flesh and blood, but against the rulers, against the powers, against the world forces of this darkness, against the spiritual forces of wickedness in the heavenly places.13Ephesians 6

It is the struggle against sin, that the creation groans. Our earth has been cursed becasue of our sin.

Then to Adam He said, "Because you have listened to the voice of your wife, and have eaten from the tree about which I commanded you, saying, 'You shall not eat from it'; Cursed is the ground because of you; In toil you shall eat of it All the days of your life. "Both thorns and thistles it shall grow for you; And you shall eat the plants of the field; (Genesis 3:17-18)

Darwinists misinterpret all of this as macro-evolution when all we see is micro.

I am all for letting God have the last word...

A New Heaven and a New Earth
3And I heard a loud voice from the throne, saying, "Behold, the tabernacle of God is among men, and He will dwell among them, and they shall be His people, and God Himself will be among them, 4and He will wipe away every tear from their eyes; and there will no longer be any death; there will no longer be any mourning, or crying, or pain; the first things have passed away."5And He who sits on the throne said, "Behold, I am making all things new." And He said, "Write, for these words are faithful and true."…

 
Darwinists misinterpret all of this as macro-evolution when all we see is micro.

Two errors there. First, speciation is an observed fact, and most creationists now admit it.

Second, pushing the creationist redefinition of "macroevolution" to "evolution so great that no human could live long enough to see it happen" fails for the same reason that arguing against a giant redwood growing from a seed fails.

It's rather obvious. I don't know why creationists even try it.
 
Are you a creationist Barbarian? Do you believe God created this Universe? Planets Stars? Do you believe Jesus knew what He told the Apostles? Was He Lord and thus knew the truth, or was He somehow deceived or in error?
 
I know God created the universe. The primary difference between us, is that I don't disapprove of the way He did it.
 
Of course God gave life to living things. As the Bible says, He used nature to do this. As Genesis says, He created the Earth to bring forth living things as He willed it to be.

I don't remember "infused", though. Do you have a verse?
 
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I know God created the universe. The primary difference between us, is that I don't disapprove of the way He did it.
Dear Brother Barbarian, I’m not sure what you’re saying here, but do you believe that Jesus created the world, or was just in agreement with its creation?

John 1:10 (Douay-Rheims) He (Jesus) was in the world: and the world was made by Him: and the world knew Him not.
Thanks.
 
Dear Brother Barbarian, I’m not sure what you’re saying here, but do you believe that Jesus created the world, or was just in agreement with its creation?

According to Genesis, God created the earth, and then, as He willed it to be, the Earth brought forth living things. Jesus is God, one in being with the Father, and with the Holy Spirit, having existed eternally as three persons in one God.
 
Of course God gave life to living things. As the Bible says, He used nature to do this. As Genesis says, He created the Earth to bring forth living things as He willed it to be.

I don't remember "infused", though. Do you have a verse?

HE breathes the breath of life into His creatures
 
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