Wallace to Benyus

Wallace to Benyus

By John Taylor; 2007 Aug 07

This spring I ran out of electronic audio materials. I had listened to all of the philosophy available on the audio books server at our library and had no choice but to move on to casual interest number two: biology and evolution. I was very impressed with Wisdom of Your Cells, by Bruce Lipton, who offers insights into evolutionary theory and the history of science that were new since I studied history of science decades ago. For example, the following:

 Most people come up with Charles Darwin rather than Alfred Russel Wallace when they think of evolution because Wallace was of the working class, and Darwin was upper crust. Hey, I am descended from Cockneys, and the success of Darwin over Wallace makes me wonder what kind of bigoted land my ancestors left. But then again, Wallace was a spiritualist, and even then that was considered an embarrassment for a scientist. And Darwin, though he started out studying for the priesthood, ended up after the death of his daughter in 1851, more and more of an atheist. This is in tune with most biologists of today, unfortunately. Wallace's essay on the mechanisms of evolution, Lipton says, remains the most concise, clearest explanation every written. Even today it is the best source.  You can read it at the Darwin Wallace Evolution papers site,

 <http://www.life.umd.edu/emeritus/reveal/pbio/darwin/darwindex.html>

 Before Darwin read Wallace's paper, he was clueless about exactly how modification of species worked. He famously said of Wallace, "He could not have made a better short abstract. Even his terms now stand as heads of my chapters." You can read more about Wallace at:

 http://www.nhm.ac.uk/nature-online/science-of-natural-history/biographies/wallace/alfred-russel-wallace.html

 The author of this site offers the following conclusion,

 "(Wallace) believed that natural selection could not explain the human intellect, and that the human spirit persisted after death. A tireless thinker, he wrote widely on this and other diverse topics including land ownership, workers' rights, law, economics and museums. By the time of his death, Wallace had written more than 20 books and roughly 700 articles and published letters. Wallace, unlike Darwin, is not a household name but increasingly his outstanding achievements are receiving the acclaim they deserve."

 Anyway, Darwin not only was of the ruling class but he, and the publishers of Origin of Species, also understood what would appeal to the mindset of the time. Just pander to those in power, justify the British Empire. That is, just say that in nature the strongest survive and win out over the weak. It is a good thing. If we rule most of the earth's surface, well, it is because we deserve it. We earned all this. We are the top of the evolutionary pyramid. Later, the same glorification of struggle served as a convenient, ready-made ideology for the American Empire and the present day order.

 As a free bonus, Darwinism provided an oh-so-convenient justification for sexual segregation. Men are superior; they have been carefully selected by millions of years of evolutionary weeding for an exclusive domination in the halls of power. Men therefore deserve to dominate everywhere in the world of work. No need to twist around your religion to keep women out like Muslims do -- just twist around your science. Religion, in the West, had already discredited itself. Only science had the cachet needed for such a vast social engineering perversion. As soon as Darwin came along, Lamarck's theory of modification of species, which emphasized free will, harmony with nature, cooperation over competition, and harmonious group decision making, was mocked and laughed out of court.

 After I read that, a few days ago, I ran across a modern, female evolutionary theorist, or perhaps publicist, Janine Benyus. She takes biology right to where it should always have been, to its use as a creative stimulus, a model for imitation. She has opened up our appreciation of the philosophical implications of nature. In her book, Biomimicry, she points out that understanding biology has implications for practical reform and provides a more realistic worldview and exemplar for our technology. You can see her explain all this concisely in a lecture available online at ted.com, a large treasury of fascinating presentations by prominent thinkers that I am systematically watching, often with the kids watching too. You can see the lecture for yourself at:

 <http://www.ted.com/index.php/talks/view/id/18>

 Here is the ted.com blurb for her talk:

 "With 3.8 billion years of research and development on its side, nature has already solved problems that human designers and engineers still struggle with. In this inspiring talk, Janine Benyus provides fascinating examples of biomimicry -- the way humans mimic nature in the products we build and the systems we implement. And because the champion adapters in the natural world are, by definition, those that can survive without destroying the environment that sustains them, biomimicry can contribute to the long-term health of our planet."

 I would like to understand her work better and then relate her lessons from nature to the Baha'i principles. If I succeed, it will become a series of essays on this blog.