The dissertation criticizes two analogical applications of Darwinism to the spheres of mind and culture: the Darwinian approach to creativity and memetics. These theories rely on three basic analogies: the ontological analogy states that the basic ontological units of culture are so-called memes, which are replicators like genes; the origination analogy states that novelty in human creativity emerges in a "blind" Darwinian manner; and the explanatory units of selection analogy states that memes are "egoistic" and that they can spread independently (...) of our mind. The detailed philosophical analysis offered in the dissertation shows that these three analogies rely on either wrong or trivial statements: they provide either wrong or no new descriptions or explanations of the phenomena at hand. In Chapter One, I introduce the diverse ways, in which contemporary Darwinism is used today outside of evolutionary biology. Chapter Two explains what it means to claim that something evolves in a Darwinian manner. Chapter Three to Five address each of the three analogies separately. Darwinism applied to culture and mind, at least in the way discussed in this study, is not a dangerous idea. It leads either to wrong claims or to a re-telling in Darwinian terms of what we have already known. (shrink)

Continuing Franz Boas' work to establish anthropology as an academic discipline in the US at the turn of the twentieth century, Alfred L. Kroeber re-defined culture as a phenomenon sui generis. To achieve this he asked geneticists to enter into a coalition against hereditarian thoughts prevalent at that time in the US. The goal was to create space for anthropology as a separate discipline within academia, distinct from other disciplines. To this end he crossed the boundary separating anthropology from biology (...) in order to secure the boundary. His notion of culture, closely bound to the concept of heredity, saw it as independent of biological heredity (culture as superorganic) but at the same time as a heredity of another sort. The paper intends to summarise the shifting boundaries of anthropology at the beginning of the twentieth century, and to present Kroeber?s ideas on culture, with a focus on how the changing landscape of concepts of heredity influenced his views. The historical case serves to illustrate two general conclusions: that the concept of culture played and plays different roles in explaining human existence; that genetics and the concept of Weismannian hard inheritance did not have an unambiguous unidirectional historical effect on the vogue for hereditarianism at that time; on the contrary, it helped to establish culture in Kroeber's sense, culture as independent of heredity. (shrink)

In the literature investigating the long history of appeals to ‘nature’, in its multiple meanings, for rules of conduct or justification of social order, little attention has been paid to a long-standing tradition in which medical and physiological arguments merged into moral and social ones. A host of medical authors, biologists, social writers and philosophers assumed that nature spoke its moral language not only in its general economy, but also within and through the body. This is why, for instance, many (...) critics of Malthus argued that physiological self-regulating mechanisms ensured a spontaneous adaptation of fertility to the circumstances. Beliefs in a beneficent economy of nature persisted when Providence was replaced by evolution. To some, they provided reasons for hope even when others worried about ‘unfit’ members of society increasing at a quicker rate than ‘fit’ ones. The nerves gradually replaced food and blood as moral mediators between society and the body. When faith in bio-social progress was shaken by degeneration theories, and fin de siècle anxiety concerned underpopulation rather than overpopulation, not an insignificant proportion of those who emphasised the bad effects of modern civilisation resorted to ideas and arguments based on a view of the body in which physiology and morality worked together. A common language and common assumptions linked the Kulturpessimisten to their optimistic eighteenth-century colleagues, in spite of their different forecasts. The present paper traces continuities and discontinuities in the operation of a persistent set of interrelated ideas and assumptions on the coalescence of the physiological and the moral across disciplines and contexts. (shrink)

In the literature investigating the long history of appeals to ‘nature’, in its multiple meanings, for rules of conduct or justification of social order, little attention has been paid to a long-standing tradition in which medical and physiological arguments merged into moral and social ones. A host of medical authors, biologists, social writers and philosophers assumed that nature spoke its moral language not only in its general economy, but also within and through the body. This is why, for instance, many (...) critics of Malthus argued that physiological self-regulating mechanisms ensured a spontaneous adaptation of fertility to the circumstances. Beliefs in a beneficent economy of nature persisted when Providence was replaced by evolution. To some, they provided reasons for hope even when others worried about ‘unfit’ members of society increasing at a quicker rate than ‘fit’ ones. The nerves gradually replaced food and blood as moral mediators between society and the body. When faith in bio-social progress was shaken by degeneration theories, and fin de siècle anxiety concerned underpopulation rather than overpopulation, not an insignificant proportion of those who emphasised the bad effects of modern civilisation resorted to ideas and arguments based on a view of the body in which physiology and morality worked together. A common language and common assumptions linked the Kulturpessimisten to their optimistic eighteenth-century colleagues, in spite of their different forecasts. The present paper traces continuities and discontinuities in the operation of a persistent set of interrelated ideas and assumptions on the coalescence of the physiological and the moral across disciplines and contexts. (shrink)

Herbert Spencer was one of the most important contributors to the Victorian discourse on social evolution. His theory of evolution in nature and society has been the subject of countless scholarly works over the last hundred years. Nevertheless, not all of its dimensions have been studied in due depth. Contrary to a widespread belief, Spencer did not just design an evolutionary theory of upward, yet branched development. Searching for explanations for the social distance between presumably civilized and primitive societies and (...) between presumably well-conducted and pauperized Victorians, he introduced elements of retrogression into his theory of social evolution. In addition, he biologized social structures and social phenomena by constructing a causal relationship between social and somatic features. This article discusses Spencer's account of the social conditions of the so-called savages and paupers. It aims to shed light on the progressive and retrogressive modes of evolutionary development and the biologistic explanations he employed in his social theory to explain these conditions. (shrink)

: The study of perfection, progress and evolution is a central theme in the history of ideas. This thesis explores this theme seen and understood as part of a discourse in the new fields of anthropology, sociology and psychology in the nineteenth century. A particular focus is on the stance taken by philosophers, scientists and writers in the discussion of theories of human physical and mental evolution, as well as on their views concerning the nature of social progress and historical (...) change. The wisdom and feasibility of improving the human species is discussed alongside an analysis of new methods of investigating and measuring physical and mental attributes of the human organism.The instruments used to assess the development of mind, body and society are described, and are viewed as part of an increased emphasis on the use of technology as an integral part of modern life, and as a means toward the ordered gathering of information in social-scientific practice. An international perspective is taken by observing the way in which ideas about the physical and mental development of humankind was discussed in light and consequence of English and European scientific exploration in the Southern Hemisphere. Further, an evaluation is made of the manner of the spread of new thought in the social sciences from the intellectual and cultural 'centre' of England and Europe to the Anglo-European community located at the 'periphery' in Australia in the late nineteenth century. In particular the educative role played by the non-professional enthusiast as a pivotal conduit for the dissemination of these ideas is highlighted and linked back to a significant tradition of amateur scholarship as a central phenomenon in the study of the history of ideas. (shrink)

Considering the case of Juan de Vilanova y Piera, often celebrated as the first scientist to accept the prehistoric antiquity of palaeolithic paintings, we explore some of the problems related to the concept of ‘precursor’ in the field of the history of science. In the first section, we propose a brief history of this notion focusing on those authors who have reflected critically on the meaning of predecessors. In the second section, the example of Vilanova illustrates the ways in which (...) historians of science have created precursors. From the vantage of modern science, precursors have traditionally been defined as those who first indicated or announced ideas or theories later accepted by the scientific community. As a result, they have been represented as ‘heroes’ struggling hard to defeat the ignorance of their time. As the case of Juan de Vilanova illustrates, this traditional view is unsatisfactory in many ways. For this reason we consider in the third section a number of methodological strategies to promote a more adequate approach to pioneers. In particular, we suggest that the best way to surmount hagiographical approaches to past scientists is to put them in their own intellectual and historical contexts. (shrink)

The late 19th-century Ignorabimus controversy over the limits of scientific knowledge has often been characterized as proclaiming the end of intellectual progress, and by implication, as plunging Germany into a crisis of pessimism from which Liberalism never recovered. My research supports the opposite interpretation. The initiator of the Ignorabimus controversy, Emil du Bois-Reymond, was a physiologist who worked his whole life against the forces of obscurantism, whether they came from the Catholic and Conservative Right or the scientistic and millenarian Left. (...) Du Bois-Reymond’s doubt that scientists would ever elucidate consciousness must therefore be seen as an endorsement, and not a rejection, of his faith in reason. (shrink)

Historically labor has been central to human interactions with the environment, yet environmentalists pay it scant attention. Indeed, they have been critical of those who foreground labor in their politics, socialists in particular. However, environmentalists have found the nineteenth-century socialist William Morris appealing despite the fact that he wrote extensively on labor. This paper considers the place of labor in the relationship between humanity and the natural world in the work of Morris and two of his contemporaries, the eminent scientist (...) Thomas Henry Huxley, and the Fabian socialist Herbert George Wells. I suggest that Morris's conception of labor has much to recommend it to environmentalists who are also interested in issues of social justice. (shrink)