The fallacies and failure of social Darwinism.

[FBM]

They are legion. I wish more people would be aware of what it entails so that they'd stop making social-Darwinist statements, especially as regards racism and politics.

Social Darwinism is generally understood to use the concepts of struggle for existence and survival of the fittest to justify social policies which make no distinction between those able to support themselves and those unable to support themselves. Many such views stress competition between individuals in laissez-faire capitalism; but the ideology has also motivated ideas of eugenics, racism, imperialism,[4] fascism, Nazism and struggle between national or racial groups.[5][6]

Opponents of evolution theory have often maintained that social Darwinism is a logical entailment of a belief in evolutionary theory, while many biologists and historians maintain that it is rather a perversion of Charles Darwin's ideas.[7] While most scholars recognize historical links between Darwin's theory and forms of social Darwinism, they also maintain that social Darwinism is not a necessary consequence of the principles of biological evolution[8] and that using biological evolution as a justification for policies of inequality amounts to committing the naturalistic fallacy.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Social_Darwinism

[Jason]

But.. Western (I didn't use 'Occidental'! I'm not an intellectual snob! ) economics has adapted 'social Darwinism' since before Enron. It hasn't changed.

[FBM]

Did they fix all the fallacies in it? If so, it's not social Darwinism anymore.

[Jason]

Not so far as I'm aware. I can ask my sister.. who was supposed to have been studying economics at some point at the U of W, but I doubt she'd know. Her teeth or claws weren't up to the task of graduating I'm afraid.

[FBM]

Economic Social Darwinism
Before Darwin ever sailed to the Galapagos Islands, economists were singing the praises of competition. In the 19th century, the emerging middle class of industrialists and bankers were anxious to attack hereditary privilege, in order to undermine the lingering power of the aristocracy. They thus argued that society should allow everyone to compete freely for power and wealth, with the most competent emerging on top, by which they meant themselves. They also said that government should not spend their taxes on helping the lower classes, as it would just give the poor less reason to compete by working hard.

Darwin’s theory of natural selection was seized upon as scientific proof that fierce competition was nature’s method for improving the world. Herbert Spencer, who popularised some of Darwin’s work, coined the phase ‘the survival of the fittest’, which soon became a slogan for unrestrained and ruthless economic competition. This became known as social Darwinism. The trouble with applying natural selection to human economic relations is that the eventual goal of a capitalist is to create a monopoly, at which point competition and evolution cease.

In any case, it was a clear case of the wealthy using a scientific theory as a metaphor to justify their predatory behaviour and avoid paying more taxes. This was the age of 14 hour days for workers, with no pensions, healthcare or education. In no sense could the competition for positions be called fair, as the children of the rich inherited their wealth, giving them an immense advantage, regardless of whatever ability they might possess.

http://darwin200.christs.cam.ac.uk/page ... page_id=e4

[Jason]

I don't know about that source, but it seems plausible. Economic Darinism is known as 'Evolutionary Economics' now apparently, though many authors such as Noam Chomsky are less charitable in their estimation, and it has evolved. The 14 hour workday is no longer.

[FBM]

When someone says that there's some sort of natural selection that explains why some people are wealthier than others, that's a social Darwinist claim. It just doesn't work that way.

[Jason]

I don't see why not.

Don't get me wrong, I'm not a fan. It just seems like reality.

[FBM]

The Republican’s Social-Darwinist Budget Plan

TUESDAY, MARCH 20, 2012
In announcing the Republicans’ new budget and tax plan Tuesday, House Budget Committee Chairman Paul Ryan said “We are sharpening the contrast between the path that we’re proposing and the path of debt and decline the president has placed us upon."

Ryan is right about sharpening the contrast. But the plan doesn’t do much to reduce the debt. Even by its own estimate the deficit would drop to $166 billion in 2018 and then begin growing again.

The real contrast is over what the plan does for the rich and what it does to everyone else. It reduces the top individual and corporate tax rates to 25 percent. This would give the wealthiest Americans an average tax cut of at least $150,000 a year.

The money would come out of programs for the elderly, lower-middle families, and the poor.

...

So what’s the guiding principle here? Pure social Darwinism. Reward the rich and cut off the help to anyone who needs it.

Ryan says too many Americans rely on government benefits. “We don’t want to turn the safety net into a hammock that lulls able-bodied people into lives of dependency."

Well, I have news for Paul Ryan. Almost 23 million able-bodied people still can’t find work. They’re not being lulled into dependency. They and their families could use some help. Even if the economy continues to generate new jobs at the rate it’s been going the last three months, we wouldn’t see normal rates of unemployment until 2017.

...

Republican Social Darwinists are determined that the Bush tax cuts of 2001 and 2003 be made permanent. Those cuts saved the richest 1 percent of taxpayers (roughly 1.4 million people) more money on their taxes last year than the rest of America’s 141 million taxpayers received in total income.

Thank you,House Republicans, for “sharpening the contrast" between your radical Social Darwinism and those of us who still cling to the belief that the most fortunate have a responsibility to the rest.

http://robertreich.tumblr.com/post/19645551397

[FBM]

I don't see why not.

Don't get me wrong, I'm not a fan. It just seems like reality.

Well, for example, are you wealthier than everyone dumber than you? Is everyone richer than you better at something than you? Is the economy a true meritocracy?

[JimC]

It ignores our central hominid truth; we evolved in social groups, where co-operation was utterly vital, both to gain food, and evade nasty predators. The bedrock of our minds is deeply carved by that ancient reality.

The danger lies in the concomitant distrust and fear of other hominid social groups, but that is a different message to the vicious competition between individuals that is at the heart of social Darwinism, and which is simply spin for a vision of heroic, raw, primitive capitalism.

[Svartalf]

I don't know about that source, but it seems plausible. Economic Darinism is known as 'Evolutionary Economics' now apparently, though many authors such as Noam Chomsky are less charitable in their estimation, and it has evolved. The 14 hour workday is no longer.

Don't drag Chomsky into it: I feel dirty when I must agree with him.

[Jason]

I think your first quetion isn't exactly neutral, but if I answer it in the spirit of your second question it might be more neutral: I am wealthier than anyone dumber than I that has not had the environment I have (possibly others, but I don't know) - if I take 'dumber' to mean less apt to make the best out of their situation. For the second: Not necessarily. Much wealth is inherited. The best I can say is that everyone richer than I is either better at something or other than I or their ancestors were.

[FBM]

I think your first quetion isn't exactly neutral, but if I answer it in the spirit of your second question it might be more neutral: I am wealthier than anyone dumber than I that has not had the environment I have (possibly others, but I don't know) - if I take 'dumber' to mean less apt to make the best out of their situation. For the second: Not necessarily. Much wealth is inherited. The best I can say is that everyone richer than I is either better at something or other than I or their ancestors were.

(Not sure what you mean by "neutral". I'm not neutral with regards to social Darwinism. I'm against it because it's a flawed idea.) It's going to be very easy to disprove that last statement. I can do it hypothetically quickly, but if you want empirical evidence I'll have to dig for a minute. Let's say an oil company discovers oil under a poor, dim-witted dirt farmer's farm. Boom. Instant riches for him and his descendants. But he did nothing to get that wealth. He just happened to be in the right place at the right time. And his wealth passes on.

[Jason]

Sure, but the Clampets are outliers surely. Personally, I'd think that kind of rags to riches thing is on the same odds as winning the lottery.