Social Darwinism: Science and Myth in Anglo-American Social Thought"The most systematic and comprehensive effort yet made to assess the role played by Darwinian ideas in the writings of English-speaking social theorists of the late-nineteenth and early-twentieth centuries." --Isis "In seeking to set the record straight, Bannister cuts through the amalgam with an intellectual shredder, exposing the illogic and incompatibility involved in fusing Charles Darwin's On the Origin of Species with Herbert Spencer's Social Statics.... Bannister's familiarity with relevant texts and their reception by contemporary social theorists, scholars, and critics on both sides of the Atlantic is impressive." --Journal of Interdisciplinary History "A fine contribution to Anglo-American intellectual history." --Journal of American History |
Contents
| 3 | |
1 The Scientific Background | 14 |
2 Hushing Up Death | 34 |
3 Philanthropic Energy and Philosophic Calm | 57 |
4 Amending the Faith | 79 |
5 William Graham Sumner | 97 |
6 The Survival of the Fittest Is Our Doctrine | 114 |
7 NeoDarwinism and the Crisis of the 1890s | 137 |
8 A Pigeon Fanciers Polity | 164 |
Other editions - View all
Social Darwinism: Science and Myth in Anglo-American Social Thought Robert Bannister No preview available - 1989 |
Common terms and phrases
American appeared argued argument attack Biology Carnegie century charge Charles Charles Darwin civilization competition concerning concluded conservative cosmic critics Darwinian debate decade defended doctrine Dreiser earlier economics Edward essays Ethics eugenicists eugenics evolutionary evolutionism evolutionists fact final Fiske fittest forces George H. L. Mencken Henry Herbert Spencer heredity History Hofstadter Holmes human Huxley Huxley's Ibid ideal individualism insisted intellectual issue John Journal Kidd laissez faire later laws of nature Lester Ward liberal logic London Malthus Mencken modern moral Nation natural law natural selection Negro neo-Darwinism Nietzsche Nietzsche's Origin of Species philosophy political Popular Science Principles progress quoted race racial racism reform Darwinism religion result Review scientific seemed sense social Darwinism social Darwinist Social Evolution social science Social Statics social thought socialist society sociologist Sociology Spencerians struggle for existence survival term theory tion University Wallace Ward Weismann William Graham Sumner winism wrote York Youmans