{"id":466,"date":"2014-09-26T21:57:44","date_gmt":"2014-09-26T21:57:44","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/genotopia.peachpuff-wolverine-566518.hostingersite.com\/?p=466"},"modified":"2014-09-26T21:57:44","modified_gmt":"2014-09-26T21:57:44","slug":"cardboard-darwinism","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/scienceblog.com\/genotopia\/466\/cardboard-darwinism\/","title":{"rendered":"Cardboard Darwinism"},"content":{"rendered":"

My recent review<\/a>\u00a0in\u00a0Nature<\/em> of Nicholas\u00a0Wade<\/a>‘s, Michael Yudell<\/a>‘s, and Robert Sussman<\/a>‘s new books\u00a0criticizes all three. The first comes out of the political right wing and is slyly allied with the racist, Pioneer-Funded scientific camp; the latter two identify with the Left’s argument that race is purely a cultural construct.\u00a0Wade’s argument is far more dangerous than Yudell’s or Sussman’s, but I didn’t like any of the books. It is just as wrong-headed to argue that science proves that race isn’t genetic as it is to argue that it is.<\/p>\n

Interesting, then, that the Orwellian HBD\u00a0crowd, whose newspeak<\/a> renders\u00a0white power as\u00a0“biodiversity”\u00a0and anti-racism “new creationism,” is jumping down my throat for criticizing their current darling but ignoring my criticism of their antagonists. Since the piece came out, I’ve fended off\u00a0attacks on Twitter and on\u00a0white-supremacist sites (Nature wouldn’t let me call them\u00a0that; it’s good to get it off my chest) such as Stormfront (I refuse to link to them; you can Google it if you want).<\/p>\n

And then this\u00a0missive from Larry Arnhart, a not-quite Dead White Male political scientist:<\/p>\n

\n
Dear Professor Comfort,<\/div>\n
You might have some interest in my blog post on your Nature <\/em>review:\u00a0 http:\/\/darwinianconservatism.blogspot.com\/2014\/09\/the-confusion-in-scientific-study-of.html<\/a><\/div>\n<\/blockquote>\n
\n

Very little, in fact. The gist of Professor Arnhart’s argument is that he doesn’t understand mine. Actually, I’ll give him that much–his\u00a0commentary makes it\u00a0abundantly clear that he can’t follow the thread of my reasoning. But that’s a pretty weak rhetorical position, n’est pas? If the book reviews in Nature<\/em> are over his\u00a0head, perhaps he\u00a0should stick with lighter fare<\/a>.<\/p>\n

Arnhart’s basic stance is typical of the people who like Wade’s book.\u00a0Darwinism, they say,\u00a0is inherently a politically conservative ideology. This is laughable. Shall we start with those\u00a0ardent Darwinians Karl Marx and Friedrich Engels? From them forward, a thick cord of Leftist Darwinian thought\u00a0courses through the history of evolutionary biology, down through Richard Lewontin and Stephen Jay Gould.<\/p>\n

A cord of right-wing politics, similar in girth, twines around it. You have your\u00a0Herbert Spencer<\/a> , your\u00a0William Graham Sumner<\/a>, your Charles Davenport<\/a>, etc., on up to Jared Taylor<\/a>. But really, are those the kind of people you want to associate\u00a0with?<\/p>\n

One important\u00a0difference between Marxist\u00a0Darwinians and right-wing Darwinians is that the Marxists don’t use Darwin to justify<\/em> their politics the way the right-wingers do. The HBD types wrap themselves in the flag of Darwinism–and anything one says against them is taken as unpatriotic to Darwin and to science.<\/p>\n

You can use science, just as\u00a0you can use history, to support any ideology you want. But Darwinism has not been kind to right-wingers–it tends to make them\u00a0look like ignorant bigots.<\/p>\n

The HBDers hide their faces behind a cardboard\u00a0Darwin stapled to a stick. They\u00a0make that gentle and egalitarian soul stand for hatred, arrogance, and xenophobia. It must be the most cynical appropriation of science I’ve ever seen.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n

<\/div>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

My recent review\u00a0in\u00a0Nature of Nicholas\u00a0Wade‘s, Michael Yudell‘s, and Robert Sussman‘s new books\u00a0criticizes all three. The first comes out of the political right wing and is slyly allied with the racist, Pioneer-Funded scientific camp; the latter two identify with the Left’s argument that race is purely a cultural construct.\u00a0Wade’s argument is far more dangerous than Yudell’s … Read more<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":19,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"jetpack_post_was_ever_published":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_access":"","_jetpack_dont_email_post_to_subs":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_tier_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paywalled_content":false,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":"","_links_to":"","_links_to_target":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-466","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-uncategorized"],"yoast_head":"\nCardboard Darwinism - Genotopia<\/title>\n<meta name=\"robots\" content=\"index, follow, max-snippet:-1, max-image-preview:large, max-video-preview:-1\" \/>\n<link rel=\"canonical\" href=\"https:\/\/scienceblog.com\/genotopia\/466\/cardboard-darwinism\/\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:locale\" content=\"en_US\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:type\" content=\"article\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:title\" content=\"Cardboard Darwinism\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:description\" content=\"My recent review\u00a0in\u00a0Nature of Nicholas\u00a0Wade‘s, Michael Yudell‘s, and Robert Sussman‘s new books\u00a0criticizes all three. The first comes out of the political right wing and is slyly allied with the racist, Pioneer-Funded scientific camp; the latter two identify with the Left’s argument that race is purely a cultural construct.\u00a0Wade’s argument is far more dangerous than Yudell’s ... Read more\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:url\" content=\"https:\/\/scienceblog.com\/genotopia\/466\/cardboard-darwinism\/\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:site_name\" content=\"Genotopia\" \/>\n<meta property=\"article:published_time\" content=\"2014-09-26T21:57:44+00:00\" \/>\n<meta name=\"author\" content=\"Nathaniel Comfort\" \/>\n<meta name=\"twitter:card\" content=\"summary_large_image\" \/>\n<meta name=\"twitter:label1\" content=\"Written by\" \/>\n\t<meta name=\"twitter:data1\" content=\"Nathaniel Comfort\" \/>\n\t<meta name=\"twitter:label2\" content=\"Est. reading time\" \/>\n\t<meta name=\"twitter:data2\" content=\"2 minutes\" \/>\n<script type=\"application\/ld+json\" class=\"yoast-schema-graph\">{\"@context\":\"https:\\\/\\\/schema.org\",\"@graph\":[{\"@type\":\"Article\",\"@id\":\"https:\\\/\\\/scienceblog.com\\\/genotopia\\\/466\\\/cardboard-darwinism\\\/#article\",\"isPartOf\":{\"@id\":\"https:\\\/\\\/scienceblog.com\\\/genotopia\\\/466\\\/cardboard-darwinism\\\/\"},\"author\":{\"name\":\"Nathaniel Comfort\",\"@id\":\"https:\\\/\\\/scienceblog.com\\\/genotopia\\\/#\\\/schema\\\/person\\\/1678c350e13f229dfc3ce10d37d5ef41\"},\"headline\":\"Cardboard Darwinism\",\"datePublished\":\"2014-09-26T21:57:44+00:00\",\"mainEntityOfPage\":{\"@id\":\"https:\\\/\\\/scienceblog.com\\\/genotopia\\\/466\\\/cardboard-darwinism\\\/\"},\"wordCount\":517,\"commentCount\":6,\"inLanguage\":\"en-US\",\"potentialAction\":[{\"@type\":\"CommentAction\",\"name\":\"Comment\",\"target\":[\"https:\\\/\\\/scienceblog.com\\\/genotopia\\\/466\\\/cardboard-darwinism\\\/#respond\"]}],\"copyrightYear\":\"2014\",\"copyrightHolder\":{\"@id\":\"https:\\\/\\\/scienceblog.com\\\/#organization\"}},{\"@type\":\"WebPage\",\"@id\":\"https:\\\/\\\/scienceblog.com\\\/genotopia\\\/466\\\/cardboard-darwinism\\\/\",\"url\":\"https:\\\/\\\/scienceblog.com\\\/genotopia\\\/466\\\/cardboard-darwinism\\\/\",\"name\":\"Cardboard Darwinism - Genotopia\",\"isPartOf\":{\"@id\":\"https:\\\/\\\/scienceblog.com\\\/genotopia\\\/#website\"},\"datePublished\":\"2014-09-26T21:57:44+00:00\",\"author\":{\"@id\":\"https:\\\/\\\/scienceblog.com\\\/genotopia\\\/#\\\/schema\\\/person\\\/1678c350e13f229dfc3ce10d37d5ef41\"},\"breadcrumb\":{\"@id\":\"https:\\\/\\\/scienceblog.com\\\/genotopia\\\/466\\\/cardboard-darwinism\\\/#breadcrumb\"},\"inLanguage\":\"en-US\",\"potentialAction\":[{\"@type\":\"ReadAction\",\"target\":[\"https:\\\/\\\/scienceblog.com\\\/genotopia\\\/466\\\/cardboard-darwinism\\\/\"]}]},{\"@type\":\"BreadcrumbList\",\"@id\":\"https:\\\/\\\/scienceblog.com\\\/genotopia\\\/466\\\/cardboard-darwinism\\\/#breadcrumb\",\"itemListElement\":[{\"@type\":\"ListItem\",\"position\":1,\"name\":\"Home\",\"item\":\"https:\\\/\\\/scienceblog.com\\\/genotopia\\\/\"},{\"@type\":\"ListItem\",\"position\":2,\"name\":\"Cardboard Darwinism\"}]},{\"@type\":\"WebSite\",\"@id\":\"https:\\\/\\\/scienceblog.com\\\/genotopia\\\/#website\",\"url\":\"https:\\\/\\\/scienceblog.com\\\/genotopia\\\/\",\"name\":\"Genotopia\",\"description\":\"Here Lies Truth\",\"potentialAction\":[{\"@type\":\"SearchAction\",\"target\":{\"@type\":\"EntryPoint\",\"urlTemplate\":\"https:\\\/\\\/scienceblog.com\\\/genotopia\\\/?s={search_term_string}\"},\"query-input\":{\"@type\":\"PropertyValueSpecification\",\"valueRequired\":true,\"valueName\":\"search_term_string\"}}],\"inLanguage\":\"en-US\"},{\"@type\":\"Person\",\"@id\":\"https:\\\/\\\/scienceblog.com\\\/genotopia\\\/#\\\/schema\\\/person\\\/1678c350e13f229dfc3ce10d37d5ef41\",\"name\":\"Nathaniel Comfort\",\"image\":{\"@type\":\"ImageObject\",\"inLanguage\":\"en-US\",\"@id\":\"https:\\\/\\\/secure.gravatar.com\\\/avatar\\\/92625f3c761b7e3f723c76a73bc4328259839fbe8530a221b68040b9b4483a99?s=96&d=mm&r=g\",\"url\":\"https:\\\/\\\/secure.gravatar.com\\\/avatar\\\/92625f3c761b7e3f723c76a73bc4328259839fbe8530a221b68040b9b4483a99?s=96&d=mm&r=g\",\"contentUrl\":\"https:\\\/\\\/secure.gravatar.com\\\/avatar\\\/92625f3c761b7e3f723c76a73bc4328259839fbe8530a221b68040b9b4483a99?s=96&d=mm&r=g\",\"caption\":\"Nathaniel Comfort\"},\"description\":\"Nathaniel Comfort is a professor in the Department of the History of Medicine at The Johns Hopkins University. From 1997 to 2002, he was on the history faculty at The George Washington University, where he also served as Deputy Director of the Center for History of Recent Science. The Center\u2019s director and founder was Horace Freeland Judson (The Eighth Day of Creation), who, along with John McPhee and Monty Python, Comfort considers among his biggest writing influences. Comfort\u2019s books include The Science of Human Perfection: How Genes Became the Heart of American Medicine (Yale, 2012), The Tangled Field: Barbara McClintock\u2019s Search for the Patterns of Genetic Control (Harvard, 2001), and the edited volume, The Panda\u2019s Black Box: Opening Up the Intelligent Design Debate (Johns Hopkins, 2007). In addition to scholarly articles, he has written for Natural History, the New York Times Book Review, National Public Radio, Nature, Science, New Scientist, The Believer, and other publications. Should he expire tomorrow, he would be survived, in decreasing size order, by a son, a wife, a daughter, a dog, a cat, another cat, and still another cat.\",\"sameAs\":[\"http:\\\/\\\/genotopia.peachpuff-wolverine-566518.hostingersite.com\"],\"url\":\"https:\\\/\\\/scienceblog.com\\\/genotopia\\\/author\\\/genotopia\\\/\"}]}<\/script>\n<!-- \/ Yoast SEO Premium plugin. -->","yoast_head_json":{"title":"Cardboard Darwinism - Genotopia","robots":{"index":"index","follow":"follow","max-snippet":"max-snippet:-1","max-image-preview":"max-image-preview:large","max-video-preview":"max-video-preview:-1"},"canonical":"https:\/\/scienceblog.com\/genotopia\/466\/cardboard-darwinism\/","og_locale":"en_US","og_type":"article","og_title":"Cardboard Darwinism","og_description":"My recent review\u00a0in\u00a0Nature of Nicholas\u00a0Wade‘s, Michael Yudell‘s, and Robert Sussman‘s new books\u00a0criticizes all three. The first comes out of the political right wing and is slyly allied with the racist, Pioneer-Funded scientific camp; the latter two identify with the Left’s argument that race is purely a cultural construct.\u00a0Wade’s argument is far more dangerous than Yudell’s ... Read more","og_url":"https:\/\/scienceblog.com\/genotopia\/466\/cardboard-darwinism\/","og_site_name":"Genotopia","article_published_time":"2014-09-26T21:57:44+00:00","author":"Nathaniel Comfort","twitter_card":"summary_large_image","twitter_misc":{"Written by":"Nathaniel Comfort","Est. reading time":"2 minutes"},"schema":{"@context":"https:\/\/schema.org","@graph":[{"@type":"Article","@id":"https:\/\/scienceblog.com\/genotopia\/466\/cardboard-darwinism\/#article","isPartOf":{"@id":"https:\/\/scienceblog.com\/genotopia\/466\/cardboard-darwinism\/"},"author":{"name":"Nathaniel Comfort","@id":"https:\/\/scienceblog.com\/genotopia\/#\/schema\/person\/1678c350e13f229dfc3ce10d37d5ef41"},"headline":"Cardboard Darwinism","datePublished":"2014-09-26T21:57:44+00:00","mainEntityOfPage":{"@id":"https:\/\/scienceblog.com\/genotopia\/466\/cardboard-darwinism\/"},"wordCount":517,"commentCount":6,"inLanguage":"en-US","potentialAction":[{"@type":"CommentAction","name":"Comment","target":["https:\/\/scienceblog.com\/genotopia\/466\/cardboard-darwinism\/#respond"]}],"copyrightYear":"2014","copyrightHolder":{"@id":"https:\/\/scienceblog.com\/#organization"}},{"@type":"WebPage","@id":"https:\/\/scienceblog.com\/genotopia\/466\/cardboard-darwinism\/","url":"https:\/\/scienceblog.com\/genotopia\/466\/cardboard-darwinism\/","name":"Cardboard Darwinism - Genotopia","isPartOf":{"@id":"https:\/\/scienceblog.com\/genotopia\/#website"},"datePublished":"2014-09-26T21:57:44+00:00","author":{"@id":"https:\/\/scienceblog.com\/genotopia\/#\/schema\/person\/1678c350e13f229dfc3ce10d37d5ef41"},"breadcrumb":{"@id":"https:\/\/scienceblog.com\/genotopia\/466\/cardboard-darwinism\/#breadcrumb"},"inLanguage":"en-US","potentialAction":[{"@type":"ReadAction","target":["https:\/\/scienceblog.com\/genotopia\/466\/cardboard-darwinism\/"]}]},{"@type":"BreadcrumbList","@id":"https:\/\/scienceblog.com\/genotopia\/466\/cardboard-darwinism\/#breadcrumb","itemListElement":[{"@type":"ListItem","position":1,"name":"Home","item":"https:\/\/scienceblog.com\/genotopia\/"},{"@type":"ListItem","position":2,"name":"Cardboard Darwinism"}]},{"@type":"WebSite","@id":"https:\/\/scienceblog.com\/genotopia\/#website","url":"https:\/\/scienceblog.com\/genotopia\/","name":"Genotopia","description":"Here Lies Truth","potentialAction":[{"@type":"SearchAction","target":{"@type":"EntryPoint","urlTemplate":"https:\/\/scienceblog.com\/genotopia\/?s={search_term_string}"},"query-input":{"@type":"PropertyValueSpecification","valueRequired":true,"valueName":"search_term_string"}}],"inLanguage":"en-US"},{"@type":"Person","@id":"https:\/\/scienceblog.com\/genotopia\/#\/schema\/person\/1678c350e13f229dfc3ce10d37d5ef41","name":"Nathaniel Comfort","image":{"@type":"ImageObject","inLanguage":"en-US","@id":"https:\/\/secure.gravatar.com\/avatar\/92625f3c761b7e3f723c76a73bc4328259839fbe8530a221b68040b9b4483a99?s=96&d=mm&r=g","url":"https:\/\/secure.gravatar.com\/avatar\/92625f3c761b7e3f723c76a73bc4328259839fbe8530a221b68040b9b4483a99?s=96&d=mm&r=g","contentUrl":"https:\/\/secure.gravatar.com\/avatar\/92625f3c761b7e3f723c76a73bc4328259839fbe8530a221b68040b9b4483a99?s=96&d=mm&r=g","caption":"Nathaniel Comfort"},"description":"Nathaniel Comfort is a professor in the Department of the History of Medicine at The Johns Hopkins University. From 1997 to 2002, he was on the history faculty at The George Washington University, where he also served as Deputy Director of the Center for History of Recent Science. The Center\u2019s director and founder was Horace Freeland Judson (The Eighth Day of Creation), who, along with John McPhee and Monty Python, Comfort considers among his biggest writing influences. Comfort\u2019s books include The Science of Human Perfection: How Genes Became the Heart of American Medicine (Yale, 2012), The Tangled Field: Barbara McClintock\u2019s Search for the Patterns of Genetic Control (Harvard, 2001), and the edited volume, The Panda\u2019s Black Box: Opening Up the Intelligent Design Debate (Johns Hopkins, 2007). In addition to scholarly articles, he has written for Natural History, the New York Times Book Review, National Public Radio, Nature, Science, New Scientist, The Believer, and other publications. Should he expire tomorrow, he would be survived, in decreasing size order, by a son, a wife, a daughter, a dog, a cat, another cat, and still another cat.","sameAs":["http:\/\/genotopia.peachpuff-wolverine-566518.hostingersite.com"],"url":"https:\/\/scienceblog.com\/genotopia\/author\/genotopia\/"}]}},"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","jetpack_shortlink":"https:\/\/wp.me\/pgtNP1-7w","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"jetpack_likes_enabled":true,"jetpack-related-posts":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/scienceblog.com\/genotopia\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/466","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/scienceblog.com\/genotopia\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/scienceblog.com\/genotopia\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/scienceblog.com\/genotopia\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/19"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/scienceblog.com\/genotopia\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=466"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/scienceblog.com\/genotopia\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/466\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/scienceblog.com\/genotopia\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=466"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/scienceblog.com\/genotopia\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=466"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/scienceblog.com\/genotopia\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=466"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}