Darwin Day In America: How Our Politics and Culture Have Been Dehumanized in the Name of Science

America's fervent embrace of Social Darwinism and eugenics touched every corner of life in the early 20th century. After WWII, this history was muted for obvious reasons. A century later, Social Darwinism is back. This readable book is a must, explaining then, and now.

`Social Darwinism' is a term which refers to the social and political ramifications of biological Darwinism and the materialism which it is imbedded in. Darwin regarded humans as basically higher animals, and as the social sciences became more and more tinged by the Darwinian outlook, humans increasingly began to be treated as mere animals, or machines.This volume looks at how the materialistic worldview of Darwinism has impacted on a wide range of fields. As academics, scientists and politicians apply the Darwinian view of man to various social sciences, some very negative outcomes have ensued. We have steadily become dehumanised and depersonalised as we have taken on board the logical implications of evolutionary materialism.West offers a far-reaching and profound look at numerous areas clouded by the Darwinist mindset. He examines the fields of law, education, business, economics, sociology and ethics to see how the revolutionary ideas of Darwin have penetrated every aspect of Western culture. Scientific materialism, flowing forth from Darwin and the Neo-Darwinists, today underpins much of public policy in the West.Consider how extensive scientific materialism has become in public life. The title of this book refers to the move to make February 12 Darwin Day in the US, a date usually associated with the birth of Abraham Lincoln. But so great has the influence and impact of Darwin's ideas become that he has now risen to the status of a secular saint in many quarters.West is certainly right to argue just how far and deep the influence of Darwin has been. Consider the issue of crime and punishment. For much of human history crime was about punishment and restitution, based on the belief that humans had free will and were morally responsible for their actions.But with the advent of Darwin - in part - academics and elites increasingly began to view humans as simply animals who needed treatment, not punishment. After all, if we are simply the products of our biology, how can we be held accountable for our actions? Such thinking flows directly out of Darwin's materialistic account of evolution.Thus Clarence Darrow, for example, took materialistic Darwinism to its logical conclusion and argued that criminals are basically programmed by material forces. If men are simply machines, powerfully determined by their heredity and background, then crime and punishment must be radically redefined.Crime began to be studied not only in terms of one's biology, but also in psychosocial terms. Crime was seen as a mental illness, not wilful immorality. Criminals came to be seen as victims, and punishment was replaced with rehabilitation and therapy. If crime is just an illness, then cure, not punishment, was required.West also reminds us that the ugly eugenics movement also flowed very nicely out of the Darwinian worldview. Eugenics was the idea that man could "take control of his own evolution by breeding a better race". The father of the eugenics movement, Francis Galton, happened to be a cousin of Darwin, and was inspired by The Origin of the Species to "improve" the human race.Of course the rest of the title of that book reads, The Preservation of Favoured Races in the Struggle for Life. People like Margaret Sanger - who founded Planned Parenthood - simply took all this to its logical conclusion. Compulsory sterilisation of the "unfit", lobotomies, electric shock treatments and other coercive measures were all features of the eugenics movement. And it found its fullest and most ghastly expression in the Nazi death camps.West shows how the materialism of Darwinism leads to the Nazi worldview. Hitler argued that eugenics had a scientific basis, and that race betterment was a result of the biological principles articulated by Darwin. Indeed, the three great genocidal regimes of last century - Nazi Germany, Soviet Russia and Communist China - were all firmly grounded on the principles of scientific materialism.Mention can also be made of Alfred Kinsey and the radical sex education movement which also finds its roots in the Darwinian view of humanity. West covers this in sordid detail, along with other contentious social issues of the day. For example, some evolutionary psychologists are now arguing that rape and adultery can be fully explained, if not excused, on a biological basis. All sexually deviant behaviour is simply the outworking of our evolutionary adaptation and programming. Kinsey sought to scientifically justify all sexualities, including bestiality and paedophilia.West makes a solid case for how all such ugly social and cultural radicalism finds solid ideological grounding in the ideas of Darwin. For too long there have been apologists for Darwin who have sought to argue that a large gulf looms between the biological ideas of Darwin and Social Darwinism. West very capably demonstrates that there is in fact very little distance between the two.Ideas have consequences, and bad ideas have bad consequences. West superbly makes the case that Darwin had plenty of bad ideas, and we are seeing plenty of ugly consequences today as a result. This very important book deserves to be widely read and discussed.

I liked the clarity of his writing. First off, I do not believe in Darwinian evolutionary theory. It is nothing more than a mythical fairytale by which complex living organism developed into increasingly complex living forms by haphazard chance guided by magical force dubbed natural selection; no mention on how the first life form came into being. John West explains how this materialist fairytale has resulted in the acceptance of social and political narratives directly responsible for Marxism and its socialistic corollaries. If you wonder where these current cockeyed social ideas like struggle for existence, eugenics, master race ideologies, soft or tolerant treatment of criminals, etc. John explains it.

This new book by Professor John West is, in my judgment, his best by far. His theme is, if Neo-Darwinism is true, this has profound implications for not only society but all human activities from the obvious one, religion, to sexual norms, economics and even corrections. Neo-Darwinism is defined as progression from molecules to humans by way of the living world caused by natural selection selecting genetic variety ultimately produced by mutations (copying errors). West carefully, and with almost 100 paged of footnotes in small print (page 377-472), documents his conclusions. West has shown the critically important influence of the ideas of Darwin's cousin Sir Francis Galton F.R.S. (1822-1911), especially the idea of eugenics (conclusions that Darwin stated he agreed with, not because he wanted to keep the family peace (he strongly disagreed with Galton on topics such as the core mechanism of evolution), but because, as is clear from his own writings, he sincerely believed Galton was correct. Fundamentalist Darwinists may go spastic over the material on eugenics in West's book, but dozens of books and peer reviewed journal articles have well documented this event of history and West's conclusions cannot be denied. West also covers the infamous and irresponsible Kinsey sex research in a well done chapter titled Junk Science in the Bedroom, documenting how critical Darwinism was in Kinsey's work and conclusions. One example is on page 180 of Kinsey's Sexual Behavior in the Human Male is a section that today would land the perpetuators in jail. This chapter shows just how much negative influence that Darwinism has had in our society. This book will create much controversy, but cannot be ignored. I see West as a reporter, documenting the facts to help scholars and the public to understand the nefarious influence of Darwinism on society. As Francisco J. Ayala Department of Ecology and Evolutionary Biology, University of California, 321 Steinhaus Hall, Irvine, CA 92697, wrote in his May 15, 2007 PNAS article titled "Darwin's greatest discovery: Design without Designer", the theory of evolution is a result, not of intelligence, but of chance and necessity, randomness and determinism that jointly enmeshed to produce the stuff of all life and all life. This conclusion, besides not being science but religion, has profound implications for all of society.

I found this book very enlightening in explaining much of our societal ills in which the Doctrine of Depravity of man has been authenticated in the horrific influence of the pseudo science Darwinism. Darwinism gives the field of scientific the license to justify the thought devaluing human life and the justification for the destruction of the Judea/Christian idea of the family unit, thus we have the absurdity of Infanticide by way of abortion and the militant aggression of the LGBT community as embraced by the Leftist Liberal Global Socialist.