Richard Weikart

Archives

Darwinism, the Meaninglessness of Life, and of Death

_{Richard Weikart
April 8, 2016}

"Evolution is the greatest killer of belief that has ever happened on this planet," says an evolutionist.

Darwinism and Humanity: A Matter of Life and Death

_{Richard Weikart
April 5, 2016}

Does Jerry Coyne seriously think we should round up stray humans and put them in the pound?

Reflecting on Social Darwinism at the Hundredth Anniversary of World War I

_{Richard Weikart
August 20, 2014}

Before and after the war, some American and British intellectuals expressed concern that Darwinism was a key motivation behind German militarism.

Is Robert Richards Right to Deny that Hitler Was a Darwinian?

_{Richard Weikart
January 8, 2014}

Richards claims that I played a "sly trick" by translating "Entwicklung" as "evolution" in some passages in Mein Kampf.

Ignoring Evidence, Caricaturing Critics: Robert J. Richards’s Was Hitler a Darwinian?

_{Richard Weikart
January 7, 2014}

Now let's examine the second major problem with Richards's analysis.

"Was Hitler a Darwinian?" Reviewing Robert Richards

_{Richard Weikart
January 6, 2014}

A scholar disputes the Hitler-Darwin connection and snipes at "the Intelligent Design crowd."

Rescuing Darwin: Another Major Problem with Peter Bowler’s Counterfactual History

_{Richard Weikart
July 20, 2013}

We should not deny the obvious historical connections between Darwinism and other historical events, no matter how unsavory they may be.

Did Darwinism Give Birth to Social Darwinism?

_{Richard Weikart
July 19, 2013}

Peter Bowler's new book, Darwin Deleted: Imagining a World without Darwin, asks a counterfactual historical question: What if Darwin had died before formulating his theory?

Paul Johnson on Social Darwinism

_{Richard Weikart
November 24, 2012}

Johnson tries to tar far too many historical figures with the social Darwinist brush.

From Paul Johnson, a Contrarian Portrait of Darwin

_{Richard Weikart
November 23, 2012}

Adopting a contrarian viewpoint can sometimes produce valuable insights, some of which are on display in this work.

Appreciating Historian Jacques Barzun’s Critique of Darwinism

_{Richard Weikart
November 1, 2012}

Barzun rejected the Darwinist insistence that purpose and design are illusory or epiphenomenal. He castigated scientism for its intellectual imperialism.

Did Hitler Use the Term “Evolution” in Mein Kampf?

_{Richard Weikart
August 27, 2012}

Some critics of my scholarship have tried to argue that Hitler did not believe in human evolution at all.

Richard Weikart on Dr. Ben Carson and the Implications of Evolutionary Ethics

_{Richard Weikart
May 14, 2012}

On this episode of ID The Future, professor and Center for Science & Culture fellow Dr. Richard Weikart discusses a recent attack on esteemed neurobiologist Dr. Ben Carson for his doubts about Darwinian evolution. Carson is the speaker at Emory University’s 2012 Commencement. Last week, an open letter from a handful of Emory faculty members appeared in the school’s newspaper criticizing Carson’s lack of respect for evolution and accusing him of making inappropriate statements about ethics and morality. Weikart explores the implications of evolutionary ethics and sheds light on this current academic freedom issue. Read more about this issue at Evolution News & …

At Emory University, Consternation over Ben Carson, Evolution, and Morality

_{Richard Weikart
May 10, 2012}

The idea that evolution undermines objective moral standards is hardly a recent discovery of sociobiology.

Rallying to Darwin’s Defense: Robert J. Richards and the Historical Record

_{Richard Weikart
November 28, 2011}

Richards argues that "Darwinian evolutionary theory held no special place within the community of biologists supportive of National Socialism...and officials in that party utterly rejected Darwinian theory."

Where the “Science-Religion” Dichotomy Came From

_{Richard Weikart
November 9, 2011}

Most theistic evolutionists use this dichotomy to try to insulate religion from scientific and historical critiques. Of course, it also removes religion from the realm of reality.

Can Darwinists Condemn Hitler and Remain Consistent with Their Darwinism?

_{Richard Weikart
October 27, 2011}

Applying Darwinian insights to morality is not distorting the theory at all (as it would be for someone to draw moral implications from relativity theory). Rather, it is explicitly part and parcel of Darwin's own theory of human evolution.

Can Ruse’s View of Ethics Save Us from Hitler?

_{Richard Weikart
September 20, 2010}

Michael Ruse recently criticized my work in From Darwin to Hitler: Evolutionary Ethics, Eugenics, and Racism in Germany, which examines the way that evolutionary ethics in the late nineteenth and early twentieth centuries undermined Judeo-Christian views of ethics, especially the sanctity-of-life ethic. Ruse opposes my claim that evolutionary ethics as proposed by Darwin and other evolutionists in the late nineteenth and early twentieth centuries exerted a powerful influence on Hitler’s ideology. Given his own views on the evolution of ethics, I’m wondering what Ruse has to offer us to counter Hitler’s own ethics. Ruse has written on several occasions that ethics is “illusory” and an “illusion” that is biologically innate, helping us survive …

Darwin’s Racism and Darwin’s Sacred Cause

_{Richard Weikart
September 17, 2010}

Pointing out Darwin’s anti-slavery sentiments has been a favorite tactic for many years by those wanting to deny Darwin’s racism. However, Adrian Desmond and James Moore raised this discussion to an entirely new level by claiming in their 2009 book, Darwin’s Sacred Cause, that abolitionism was the driving force behind Darwin embracing biological evolution. This is especially remarkable because Desmond and Moore stated in their earlier biography of Darwin: “Social Darwinism” is often taken to be something extraneous, an ugly concretion added to the pure Darwinian corpus after the event, tarnishing Darwin’s image. But his notebooks make plain that competition, free trade, imperialism, racial extermination, and sexual inequality were written into the …

Ruse’s Spin on Darwin’s Racism

_{Richard Weikart
September 16, 2010}

One of the biggest errors in Ruse’s recent op-ed piece in Huffington Post is his claim about Darwin’s racism. While admitting that Darwin upheld conventional Victorian racial views, Ruse still tries to distance Darwin from any connection to racial extermination. When discussing Darwin’s Descent of Man Ruse claims, “Darwin was explicit that when the races met and (as so often was the case) the non-Europeans suffered, it came not from intellectual and social superiority but because non-Europeans caught the strangers’ diseases and suffered and died.” Yes, Darwin did claim that disease was an important cause of racial extermination when Europeans encountered other races. However, Ruse conveniently forgot that Darwin also mentioned (on the same page of …