Darwinism Is the Scrooge of Science

Character becomes twisted in Darwinism;
righteousness is trashed, and vice is rationalized.

— In Darwinism, there is no reason to do anything of value, and no reason to change bad habits. —

There are two ways that Darwinism destroys virtue: by teaching that

• Human beings are mere animals, and
• Anything a human being does that seems good is really selfish.

The first premise reduces virtue to beast behavior. Darwinians teach that the human race just got lucky in the past, when some accidental mutation gave us bigger brains. Brains in Darwinism are devoid of immaterial souls; they just work to increase “fitness” (whatever that is; see 19 June 2014). Fitness is not a virtue. It is anything that promotes survival of as many offspring as possible. That is selfish.

The second premise exalts beast behavior to virtue. Anything “good” or virtuous done by humans is also done by animals and even bacteria, they say. Fungi, worms, fish and birds can be “altruistic” and display virtues thought to be the sole purview of humanity. So really, righteousness in Darwinism is selfishness—vice in virtue’s clothing—even if it is promoted by apparently “altruistic” members of a group (as in “kin selection” theory).

In extreme Darwinism, it’s the genes that are selfish. Darwinism thus reduces all organisms, even humans, to pawns in an evolutionary game, marionettes in a mindless puppet show.

Recent Examples in the News

Life and death of an ‘altruistic’ bacterium (University of Montreal via Phys.org, 12 Dec 2022). The Darwinists in this study watched bacteria getting “imprisoned” in a biofilm, but breaking free when certain cells in the film committed hara-kiri. This “altruistic” action is said to have freed other members to thrive.

The resulting death of a subset of cells releases DNA, which promotes the dispersal of their live siblings to potentially more hospitable environments, thereby preventing overcrowding that would further reduce environmental quality in the biofilm.

How honorable. Isn’t that just like a courageous soldier throwing himself on a grenade to save his comrades? Darwinists can use their same theory for both. And both examples are really reducible to selfishness masquerading as altruism.

Is vigilance a personality trait? Plasticity is key alongside some contextual consistency (PLoS One, 12 Dec 2022). Is it virtuous to train children to be vigilant? “Should” vigilance be taught to recruits in the armed forces or other protective agencies? Relax. Some animals are more vigilant than others. Some Gouldian finches, for instance, bob their heads more than others, alerting the flock to danger. It all works out. In fact, it’s good that some of the birds just happen to bob their heads less. It allows more “adaptation” to the environment.

Vigilance was highly plastic across situations and affected by group composition. Mixed head colour morph pairs made more head movements, potentially linked to higher social vigilance. Results indicate that vigilance is a highly plastic trait affected by personality rather than a personality trait on its own, which allows adapting vigilance to different situations.

These Darwinists have no explanation for why some members of a species are more vigilant, but that’s not a defect in the theory. The Stuff Happens Law can explain it, and as long as the “scientists” don’t apply any moral value to vigilance, it can get published in a peer-reviewed journal.

The restart effect in social dilemmas shows humans are self-interested not altruistic (PNAS, 2 Dec 2022). Maxwell N. Burton-Chellew from the University of Utah pushes the line that altruism is really disguised selfishness. He chides his fellow Darwinians for being as confused as the humans who only appear to be acting altruistically in evolutionary public-goods games. There’s no need for adding to natural selection with weird ideas like group selection or kin selection. Everything is just plain old selfishness.

These results add to the growing literature showing that human behavior in public goods games is not driven by altruistic motivations and does not require unique evolutionary explanations. In conclusion, evolutionary theory does not need expanding or reformulating to accommodate the results of public goods games.

Behavior doesn’t require “unique” evolutionary explanations; just evolutionary explanations. The good old Darwin kind is sufficient.

Oh, but you can believe that Max is being altruistic by telling his readers something he thinks is true and good for the public. He is not pushing his own selfish ideas. Do you understand, students? ‘I am not selfish! Do you hear me? I am not selfish! Repeat after me: The prof is not selfish; the prof is not selfish…..’

What do evolutionary researchers believe about human psychology and behavior? (University of Michigan via Medical Xpress, 9 Dec 2022). The press office at U Mich imagines that its readers care what evolutionary researchers believe. Do you? Here’s what they believe:

Research in evolutionary psychology attracts considerable attention, from both enthusiasts and critics. Evolutionary researchers devote substantial effort to correcting misperceptions of the field, for example that evolutionary researchers studying humans are genetic determinists.

What? Do they mean to tell us that evolutionists are not genetic determinists? Well, let them explain: “Results from the largest survey ever of evolutionary researchers were just published online in Evolution and Human Behavior.”

Nearly all participants believed that developmental environments substantially shape human adult psychology and behavior, refuting accusations of genetic determinism. Nearly all participants believed that there are differences in human psychology and behavior based on sex differences from sexual selection, and that there are individual differences in human psychology and behavior resulting from different genotypes. These concepts are currently controversial in mainstream social science.

Darwinism and materialism harms real people by dissolving everything of value into its “universal acid.”

Oh, now you get it. Humans are partly environmentally determined, and partly genetically determined. That explains it! It would be a “misperception” to call them genetic determinists. They are genetic+environmental determinists. Darwinian sexual selection determined human behavior, and Darwinian natural selection determined human genes. So you have a choice; it’s like being offered cyanide or hemlock, or a combination of the two, for dissing your free will and conscience. The decision was made for you by “mainstream social science.” They are the fittest, you realize.

Nobody seems to have told these Darwinians that determinism is self-refuting, because “selection” also determined their views and the controversies between them, which implies that they do not (indeed, cannot) mean anything they say.

Since it’s Christmastime, we mustn’t be stingy. Here’s a treat for dessert:

Rethinking Scrooge: Could Dickens’ most famous character be neurodivergent? (University of Notre Dame, 12 Dec 2022). Carrie Gates lets Scrooge off the hook. He wasn’t mean, stingy, and vicious. He had a neurological disorder: he was “neurodivergent.” It’s something like autism. She quotes Notre Dame prof Essaka Joshua who wants to “rethink” Scrooge.

In a new analysis of Scrooge, however, Joshua offers an unexpected perspective, by asking a simple question: What if we were wrong about Scrooge? What if it is, in fact, the characters who surround him who may need more empathy for their fellow man — particularly if that man is neurodivergent?

The old codger couldn’t help himself. He was genetically determined to be stingy, gruff and selfish. He was conditioned.

“It does not matter what condition Scrooge may or may not have. These diagnoses change over time,” she said. “But what happens if we think of Scrooge’s lack of sympathy and other traits as a legitimate part of his personality? Does Scrooge cause harm to himself or others? And is his ‘cure’ consensual or desired?”

In fact, Joshua argues, many of Scrooge’s behaviors can be seen as cognitive and behavioral coping strategies commonly used by neurodivergent individuals to reduce anxiety, by avoiding social interactions, sticking to routines and using verification rituals to calm himself.

Scrooge is actually the hero of the story! He was just coping with his lot, like a bacterium in an overcrowded colony. It’s those intolerant townspeople driving him to distraction with their selfish, insensitive shouts, “Merry Christmas, Mr Scrooge!” They didn’t realize that they were committing the unpardonable sin of loading him down with (gasp!) stigma.

“I think Dickens really drops the question of the personal ethics and whether people have the right to express their personalities in certain ways and supplants it with the social issue,” she said. “Scrooge never consents to or initiates this cure, even though he comes to believe his behavior is both improvable and wrong. This raises an important bioethical dilemma: Is Scrooge experiencing his behavioral traits negatively, or is he experiencing the effects of the social stigma of these traits?

Now we know who was the righteous one. Joshua apparently thinks Bob Cratchit should have just accepted his low wages, lack of a day off for Christmas, and should have kept his “Merry Christmas” humbug to himself. Wouldn’t society be more tolerant if everyone was like Scrooge, saying that the poor children only had themselves to blame for their fate? In Darwinism, every organism can do no better than to act out the effects of their selfish genetic traits and environmental selection pressures. How cruel for his parents to name him Ebenezer: “Thus far the Lord has helped us” (I Samuel 7:12).

Darwin was the Scrooge yelling ‘Bah! Humbug’ to every good deed, the Grinch who stole Christmas from the children, the Ghost of Christmas Future who only sees life as a selfish struggle to a meaningless death. His disciples continue the tradition. Let us sing to them anyway:

Can’t ‘Handel’ the truth.

Joy to the world! The Lord is come.
Let earth receive her King!
Let ev’ry heart prepare Him room,
And heav’n and nature sing,
And heav’n and nature sing,
And heav’n, and hea’n and nature sing!

—Lyrics by Isaac Watts, melody by G.F. Handel