A Sikkim woman carrying a British merchant. West Bengal, 1903.
“In my experience, many students of biology—professors and textbook writers included—have gotten so carried away with arguments for evolution that they neglect to question it. They preach it… High standards of scholarship and teaching break down. Propaganda and the pursuit of power replace the pursuit knowledge. Education becomes a fraud.”
George Kocan
These two most important tenets of Darwinism are being instilled in the minds of young students who, for the most part, know little about the world, nature or themselves.
History and biology are two very important subjects in any school’s curriculum. Both of these subjects are about man. Who is man? How was man made? What are man’s functions? What is the history of mankind? According to the school curriculum, man descended from an animal ancestor by way of natural selection in the process of fighting similar creatures. Thus, these two most important tenets of Darwinism are being instilled in the minds of young students who, for the most part, know little about the world, nature or themselves.
Those who are interested in modern science know that scientists have disproved the main tenets of the theory of evolution many times. They have demonstrated that it is impossible for species to develop as a result of mutations and noted the absence of transitional phases between various species.
John Wolfgang Smith, a professor of the University of Oregon, noted that “We are told dogmatically that Evolution is an established fact; but we are never told who established it, and by what means... Then it can be said with the utmost rigor that the doctrine is totally bereft of scientific sanction.”1
Søren Løvtrup, a famous Scandinavian researcher, referred to the evolution theory as “the greatest deceit in the history of science”.2
However, teaching Darwin’s theory in schools is questionable not only because the theory is unscientific, but also because it is inhumane. What does inhumanity have to do with it? Let’s find out.
Understanding their own humanity makes people live as meaningfully as possible.
Prior to the appearance of the theory that stated that one species descended from the other, people believed that everything had an essence. Plato and Aristotle have noted that every phenomenon has its distinctive traits. As such, man has a human essence that is distinct from that of a cow, chicken or monkey. It includes man’s physique, physiology, brain as well as spiritual traits. However, mind, consciousness and will are not the only human characteristics—man’s body, “the temple of soul,” is a part of the essence too. It is difficult to carry this heavy burden, as understanding their own humaneness makes people live as meaningfully as possible, search for certain moral beacons and achieve their moral goals, instead of leading a mindless existence. This is further complicated by the fact that man doesn’t always know for sure what the soul is and how to attain true happiness.
Alexander Sergeyevich Khomenkov Suddenly, the people haunted by these questions are offered a quick answer: It’s simple. Man is a highly organized being, an ingenious animal that succeeded in destroying similar animals, which lead to development of his hands, legs and brain. What a relief! The mystery of man is almost solved! So, most likely, there’s no specific human predestination, no immortal soul and no eternal problem of choosing good over evil. Contemporary biologist A.S. Khomenkov made the following comment on the impact of the theory of evolution on students’ conscious and subconscious minds:
“Such a pseudoscientific explanation renders further reflections on any spiritual matters meaningless. Students will consciously, or rather subconsciously, associate these matters with something “ungenuine”, secondary and derivative of more fundamental physical and chemical laws that are devoid of any spiritual matters.”3
Such pseudoscientific explanation renders further reflections on any spiritual matters meaningless.
Uri Andres noted Darwin’s theory’s influence on the outlook of the great philosopher Nietzsche.
“The theory of evolution produced a profound effect on Nietzsche. He was inspired by Darwin’s idea that the evolution of plants, animals and man was a natural process free from any metaphysical influences or control by external forces. Nietzsche saw Darwin’s theory as a confirmation of the idea that nature does not have a goal, morality or mercy.”4
Based on the fact that all living creatures are procreating in geometric progression, Darwin consistently advocated the necessity of a continual lethal struggle.
“A struggle for existence,” he noted, “inevitably follows from the high rate at which all organic beings tend to increase. Every being… must suffer destruction during some period of its life, and during some season or occasional year, otherwise, on the principle of geometrical increase, its numbers would quickly become so inordinately great that no country could support the descendants.”5
Moreover, disregarding the evidence of many natural phenomena, Darwin stated that “the struggle will almost invariably be most severe between the individuals of the same species, for they frequent the same districts, require the same food, and are exposed to the same dangers.6
According to the theory of evolution, a man-like animal had to destroy another man-like animal to become human in the course of this struggle. This is where the inhumanity of the theory is revealed. In essence, Darwin cannot explain how man acquired mind and soul. Is there any place for them in his theory at all? According to Darwin, wise nature pitted the representatives of the same species against each other, which allowed the fittest to survive and thereby become more perfect. Darwin said that “each organic being… has to struggle for life and to suffer great destruction.” He believed that our only consolation is that “the war of nature is not incessant, that no fear is felt, that death is generally prompt, and that the vigorous, the healthy, and the happy survive and multiply.”7
However, when man learned to deal with nature, his pity for it stood in the way of perfection. Man “does not allow the most vigorous males to struggle for the females” and “does not rigidly destroy all inferior animals, but protects during each varying season, as far as lies in his power, all his productions.” In other words, unlike wild nature that is perfected by way of intraspecific struggle, the nature affected by man is not developing because he doesn’t destroy all “inferior” species.8
Darwin implies that destruction of the weaker individuals would be the right way for future perfection of man.
It is a bit more complicated, when it comes to people. Here Darwin implies that elimination of the weaker individuals would be the right way for future perfection of man, although it currently looks inhumane.
“The surgeon may harden himself whilst performing an operation,” Darwin wrote, “for he knows that he is acting for the good of his patient; but if we were intentionally to neglect the weak and helpless, it could only be for a contingent benefit, with a certain and great present evil. Hence we must bear without complaining the undoubtedly bad effects of the weak surviving and propagating their kind.” 9
Sri Aurobindo This, however, doesn’t mean that in the long-term mankind’s history won’t turn into a constant struggle for “a place under the sun”. The scientist never mentioned anywhere that the evolution had stopped.
“Evolution is not finished; reason is not the last word nor the reasoning animal the supreme figure of Nature. As man emerged out of the animal, so out of man the superman emerges,” said Indian philosopher Sri Aurobindo.10
This means that at a certain point in time a new, more perfect and more evolved man should develop as a result of “severe struggle”. This is, in fact, the conclusion that Charles Darwin comes to.
“Man, like every other animal, has no doubt advanced to his present high condition through a struggle for existence consequent on his rapid multiplication; and if he is to advance still higher, it is to be feared that he must remain subject to a severe struggle.”11
The theory of natural selection gives rise to the cult of violence. It was the this theory that Hitler was following.
As such, the theory of natural selection gives rise to the cult of violence, and it was this theory that Adolf Hitler was following, when he made his forecast:
“A stronger race will drive out the weaker ones… Mankind has grown strong in eternal struggles and it will only perish through eternal peace.”12
Malcolm Bowden, an English scientist, was right to note:
“The evolutionary basis of Nietzsche’s “superman” and the use which Hitler made of his theories in his “Master Race” are well-known. The frightening outcome of taking the evolutionary theory to its logical conclusion by eliminating the “weaker” races has resulted in the horrors of concentration camps in Belsen, Auschwitz and others.”13
Malcolm Bowden As such, human nature seems only temporarily too weak to suppress the “instinct of sympathy”, and this idea is used to justify and explain what people outside of scientific circles call “mercy and compassion”. Considering preservation of weaker people a temporary inevitability, Darwin nevertheless notes that man is more foolish than Nature, which regularly destroyed all that was imperfect.
“How fleeting are the wishes and efforts of man!” he wrote. “How short his time, and consequently how poor will be his results, compared with those accumulated by Nature during whole geological periods! Can we wonder, then, that Nature’s productions should be far “truer” in character than man’s productions; that they should be infinitely better adapted to the most complex conditions of life, and should plainly bear the stamp of far higher workmanship?”14
So, what is this higher workmanship of Nature? It implies not only that stronger and more perfect species should destroy the weaker and less perfect, but also that the species should destroy the ones that are different from them.
According to Darwin, “Nor ought we to think that the occasional destruction of an animal of any particular colour would produce little effect; we should remember how essential it is in a flock of white sheep to destroy a lamb with the faintest trace of black. We have seen how the colour of hogs, which feed on the “paint-root” in Virginia, determines whether they shall live or die.15
V.E. Bagdasaryan Man is not treated as an exception in Darwin’s theory. The title of one of his main works speaks for itself: On the Origin of Species by Means of Natural Selection, or the Preservation of Favoured Races in the Struggle for Life (London, 1859).16
“Do the races or species of men, whichever term may be applied, encroach on and replace one another, so that some finally become extinct?” Darwin ponders. “We shall see that all these questions, as indeed is obvious in respect to most of them, must be answered in the affirmative, in the same manner as with the lower animals.”17
According to Darwin’s theory, races could be savage, primitive and even “higher”.18 Naturally, the outcome of their struggle is predetermined.
He forecasted that “At some future period, not very distant as measured by centuries, the civilised races of man will almost certainly exterminate, and replace, the savage races throughout the world.”19
The theory of natural selection establishes not only the evolutionary hierarchy of species, but the hierarchy of races as well.
V.E. Bagdasaryan, doctor or historical sciences, stated that “Charles Darwin himself was undoubtfully an outright racist. His theory of natural selection established not only the evolutionary hierarchy of species, but the hierarchy of races as well. His book Origin of Man and Sexual Selection leaves no doubts about that.”20
Following the logic of Social Darwinism, until such time as nature bequeaths to people the requisite cold-bloodedness to continue severe intraspecific struggle, people still have a chance to follow natural selection at least by way of the “proper” procreation, that is by continuing the procreation of more perfect species and stopping the procreation of all inferior ones. This led to the appearance of yet another “science”—eugenics, which was founded by none other than Francis Galton, who happened to be Darwin’s cousin.
Eugenics was founded by none other than Francis Galton who happened to be Darwin’s cousin.
Galton stated that man’s abilities are pre-determined at birth and depend on the abilities of the child’s mother and father. Hence, the proper selection of parents may turn high intelligence from an accidental quality into a constant quality. He justified the necessity of selection by the fact that human nature was degenerating and that civilization had higher demands for the intellectual abilities of people. Galton wanted to create a higher quality gene pool by influencing human “breeding”. He also came up with the criteria for comparing natural abilities of different races, e.g. “Negro” and Anglo-Saxon, and came to the conclusion that white Anglo-Saxons have an indisputable inherent superiority over the black Africans.21 Darwin held Galton’s work in high esteem.
“I am inclined to agree with Francis Galton in believing that education and environment produce only a small effect on the mind of anyone”, he wrote, “and that most of our qualities are innate.”22
As in the case of racial struggle, scientific theories were followed by “fairly scientific” practices. Sixty thousand “retarded” and “asocial” individuals were sterilized in Sweden in the period from 1935–1975.23 Maya Routsis published her doctoral thesis in 1998. She found documents in the secret archives of the medical department of Sweden that contained evidence that in a suburb of Gothenburg, all students of a school for troubled youth were sterilized upon graduation.24
From 1907–1920, fifteen American states adopted statues that authorized or prescribed sterilization of retarded individuals and certain categories of criminals. By 1920, there were 3,233 cases of forced sterilization, and quite often sterilization was performed on people who committed so-called “crimes against morality”.25 In Virginia, indigenous people were castrated unless they could prove that they had lived in the state before the arrival of colonists. Laws of mandatory sterilization were adopted in Japan, Austria and Switzerland.26
Adolf Hitler, of course, was the most “successful” in this “scientific” practice.
“There is only one right that is sacrosanct,” he stated, “and this right is at the same time a most sacred duty… The purity of the racial blood should be guarded, so that the best types of human beings may be preserved and that thus we should render possible a more noble development of humanity itself.”27
The contemporary researcher Y. V. Khen published the following information:
“The total outcome of racial hygiene measures in Germany was as follows: 300,000 to 400,000 people were forcibly sterilized under the law of 1934, and many of such sterilizations were racially motivated. Approximately 100,000 patients of psychiatric clinics, including thousands of children, were shot or exposed to lethal gas as part of the so-called Action T4 program (euthanasia of inferior individuals). Even after the official termination of the program in 1942, 120,000 patients had been starved to death because they were denied food as “low-value” individuals.”28
Schools offer somewhat contradictory education. Children know that in nature, where everything is so reasonably arranged, it would be appropriate to destroy a weaker or an imperfect specimen. The poor children are taught about this in their biology classes, yet at the same time they are told that they should be kind and caring, and that they shouldn’t bully overweight classmates because they look different.
Whereas every public school student is now well instructed in the evils of Hitler, they are almost never taught that it was all founded on evolutionism.
The situation with teaching history is just as contradictory. While Nazism, racism and other manifestations of “natural selection” are condemned, children are not expected to know about the source of these inhumane phenomena.
Henry Morris, and American scientist, noted justly that “In fact, whereas every public school student is now well instructed in the evils of Hitler and his National Socialism, they are almost never taught that it was all founded on evolutionism. This has been an amazing cover-up, even a rewriting of history.”29
The harmful effect of Charles Darwin’s pseudo-scientific and inhumane theory on raising and educating young generations seems obvious. Why do then school textbooks still promote the evolutionist paradigm as one of the main elements of the current worldview?
