Social Effect of Evolutionary Theory - Evolution and Ethics

Evolution and Ethics

The theory of evolution by natural selection has also been adopted as a foundation for various ethical and social systems, such as social Darwinism, an idea that preceded the publication of The Origin of Species, popular in the 19th century, which holds that "the survival of the fittest" (a phrase coined in 1851 by Herbert Spencer, 6 years before Darwin published his theory of evolution) explains and justifies differences in wealth and success among societies and people. A similar interpretation was one created by Darwin's cousin, Francis Galton, known as eugenics, which claimed that human civilization was subverting natural selection by allowing the less bright and less healthy to survive and out-breed the more smart and more healthy. Later advocates of this theory would suggest radical and often coercive social measures to attempt to "correct" this imbalance. Thomas Huxley spent much time demonstrating through a series of thought experiments that it would not only be immoral, but impossible, Stephen Jay Gould and others have argued that social Darwinism is based on misconceptions of evolutionary theory, and many ethicists regard it as a case of the is-ought problem. After the atrocities of the Holocaust became linked with eugenics, it greatly fell out of favor with public and scientific opinion, though it was never universally accepted by either, and at no point in Nazi literature is Charles Darwin or the scientific theory of evolution mentioned.

Neo-creationist Polemics single out "Darwinism" as the cause of many, if not all, of modern society's ills. In the controversial book From Darwin to Hitler by Richard Weikart, Weikart claims that Darwinism's impact on ethics and morality played a key role not only in the rise of eugenics, but also in euthanasia, infanticide, abortion, and racial extermination, all ultimately embraced by the Nazis. Many critics contend this.

In his book The End of Faith, Sam Harris argues that Nazism was largely a continuation of Christian anti-Semitism. Jim Walker has compiled a list of 129 quotes from Mein Kampf in which Hitler described himself as a Christian or mentioned God or Jesus or a biblical passage. Some argue that six million of the people killed during the Holocaust were killed because of their religion (Judaism) not their race, "strength," or any reason with an obvious link to the mechanism of Darwinian evolution. Hitler often used Christian beliefs like, "Jews killed Jesus," to justify his anti-Semitism.

Research for Weikart's book was funded by the Discovery Institute, which has been very active in promoting intelligent design as an alternative to evolution in public school science classrooms, and whose "Wedge document" and former mission statement expand on the theme: "The cultural consequences of this triumph of materialism were devastating. Materialists denied the existence of objective standards binding on all cultures, claiming that environment dictates our moral beliefs." ... "materialism spawned a virulent strain of utopianism. Thinking they could engineer the perfect society through the application of scientific knowledge, materialist reformers advocated coercive government programs that falsely promised to create heaven on earth." Archived June 8, 1997 at the Wayback Machine

The notion that humans share ancestors with other animals has also affected how some people view the relationship between humans and other species. Many proponents of animal rights hold that if animals and humans are of the same nature, then rights cannot be distinct to humans.

Charles Darwin, in fact, considered "sympathy" to be one of the most important moral virtues — and that it was, indeed, a product of natural selection and a trait beneficial to social animals (including humans). Darwin further argued that the most "sympathetic" societies would consequently be the most "successful." He also stated that our sympathy should be extended to "all sentient beings":

As man advances in civilization, and small tribes are united into larger communities, the simplest reason would tell each individual that he ought to extend his social instincts and sympathies to all the members of the same nation, though personally unknown to him. This point being once reached, there is only an artificial barrier to prevent his sympathies extending to the men of all nations and races. If, indeed, such men are separated from him by great differences in appearance or habits, experience unfortunately shows us how long it is, before we look at them as our fellow-creatures. ... This virtue, one of the noblest with which man is endowed, seems to arise incidentally from our sympathies becoming more tender and more widely diffused, until they are extended to all sentient beings. As soon as this virtue is honored and practiced by some few men, it spreads through instruction and example to the young, and eventually becomes incorporated in public opinion.
- Charles Darwin; The Descent of Man, 1871