Dr. Forbush Thinks

Fear comes in many flavors.

One of the reasons cited by the religious right in opposition to evolution is that the theory is not moral. The point that evolution is a scientific observation of evidence doesn’t matter, because evolution could lead to ideas that are immoral. The point that nature could be amoral doesn’t occur to these people.

So, we must ask the question, how is the theory of evolution immoral?

The principle of evolution is based on the idea that the environment effects the species. If there is an ice age and the environment changes, the individuals that can deal with the change in climate have a better chance to survive. So, if in a population of 100 animals, some have thick hair and are able to keep their body temperature normal even in the coldest winter nights, they have a better chance of fighting disease and being able to produce the next generation of the species. Those genes get passed on and the weaker genes die with the individuals that are not so gifted.

But, evolution is not that simple. There are many genes, and genes that function one way do not automatically rule out genes that function another way. And, there are mutations that happen in individuals that are most often deadly, but occasionally useful. The environment changes over the thousands of years as does the location of the population of individuals.

For example, a species may have a mixture of genes that relate to metabolism. Some individuals can survive long periods without food while other individuals burn all of there food as energy very quickly. The high metabolism individuals may however, be faster than the low metabolism creatures. High metabolism creatures may be able to hunt more food, since they are quicker. Low metabolism creatures may become obese when the food supply increases. Both aspects of metabolism have there benefits depending on the current conditions, and both aspects benefit the entire group as a whole to survive through the centuries. This is an important aspect of evolution, it does not always eliminate every gene in the gene pool. Useless genes from very long ago continue to be propagated until one day when it might be useful again.

If you don’t understand something, then it becomes easy to jump to conclusions. This seems to be the trait of those who condemn evolution. These people seem to have come to the conclusion that teaching the idea of evolution implies the survival of the fittest, which implies Social Darwinism. Social Darwinism is the idea that society would be better off if we eliminated the weakest individuals.

It is quite interesting that the conservatives are profoundly against Social Darwinism when their political actions actually promote the idea of Social Darwinism. For example, the economically weakest in our society have a much higher mortality rate than those who come from less economically challenged families. This policy is enhanced by the poor health care system our country offers to our poor. The policy is further enhanced by all of the road blocks that are put in place to make it more difficult for these people to get a good education, and then later a high paying job. In fact, the difficulty for the economically weak to move up the social ladder assures us that only the fittest of this class rises to the top to acquire wealth and assure that their genes continue to be passed on to future generations along with their acquired wealth. This seems to be Social Darwinism in operation, but by another name: capitalism.

So, the conservatives tell us that the idea that the natural selection of the species is an immoral theory and should not be taught in school should consider the immoral nature of economics. Perhaps they should move on to prevent the teaching of capitalism in school? But, the real point here is that these people have jumped to the conclusion that the theory of evolution implies Social Darwinism. Just because a process happens in nature does not imply that it should be copied and reproduced in our society. And the hypocrisy is that they know this as well. It is documented that apes masturbate in the zoos in front of the public. I am sure that they do the same in the wild. Are the conservatives advocating that humans should copy nature and do the same? Of course not! Many species of animals have multiple mates including homosexual relationships, are the conservatives implying that since it happens in nature we need to copy it for our society as well? Once again, I believe that the answer is no.
The point is that the conservatives tend to operate on fear. They fear that knowledge is dangerous. If the young in our country somehow find out about the reality of the world they may be scarred. If they know that evolution is an amoral process in nature they may believe that it is moral and should be implemented in society. This fear leads many of these conservatives to believe that children may not be able to figure out that killing the weak in our society might not be a good thing. The truth is that if they actually learned how evolution worked they would learn that killing creatures with an undesirable trait at one point in time may actually doom the society in another later point in time. Just because a trait seems to be undesirable know does not imply that the trait will not be useful in the future. This is why diversity is so important.

I suppose from the conservative point of view that this may make some sense in a twisted sort of way. If we realize that conservatives actually dislike diversity and if they did accept social Darwinism as a principle they might destroy the society by selecting the traits that they deem important. For example, since conservatives dislike the idea of sex in almost any form they may choose to eliminate all those who have sex organs. Or, for example conservatives also dislike the idea that some people aren’t as wealthy as they should be, so they may choose to eliminate those who don’t make enough money. So, if you actually think about this from the conservative point of view you realize that conservatives are actually justified in their fear of Social Darwinism, because they know what they would do if they actively implemented it.





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Don't forget what Stephen Colbert said, "Reality has a well-known liberal bias."


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Politics, Evolution, Social Darwinism, Religion