Childhood
Origins Of Adult
Resistance To Marxism
By Thomas Riggins
27 May, 2007
Countercurrents.org
Why is it so difficult to
build a Marxist mass movement in the US? There are Marxist movements
of considerable size, in comparison to the US, both in many Third World
nations and in countries more advanced than the US. Not only is Marxism
seemingly at a disadvantage in the US but a scientific world outlook
is similarly hindered with respect to a favorable growth outlook. At
the same time many views and outlooks characteristic of medieval obscurantism
(fundamentalist religious beliefs-- for example), blatant superstition
(astrology), superficial intellectually childish “philosophical”
trends (Ayn Rand, Deepak Chopra, etc.), are flourishing.
There may a scientific explanation
for Aduld Resistance to Marxism (ARM). In this article I will explore
the causes of ARM and propose possible remedies to this serious mental
deficiency which severely prevents those who are victims of this disorder
from properly functioning in their social environment and maximizing
their abilities to provide the best possible existential conditions
for the flourishing of themselves and their loved ones.
The scientific information
on which this article is based is critically culled from the article
“Childhood Origins of Adult Resistance to Science” by Paul
Bloom and Deena Skolnick Weisberg (SCIENCE 18 May 2007 VOL 316).
The authors of this article
are concerned about the negative social consequences of the resistance
that many American adults have to the acceptance of scientific ideas.
I believe that ARM results from some of the same fundamental causes
that Bloom and Weisberg list for the rejection of science and that the
same negative results are involved with ARM.
The authors maintain that
“a scientifically ignorant public is unprepared to evaluate policies
about global warming, vaccination, genetically modified organisms, stem
cell research, and cloning.” There are social repercussions as
a result of this ignorance.
I hasten to add, that as
a result of ARM the public is also ignorant with respect to the proper
attitudes to take on the issues of war and peace, racism, international
relations, employment and unemployment, proper education polices and
health issues, among many other social problems.
The authors use developmental
psychology to suggest that two basic characteristics about children
may make some resistance to ideas based on science “a human universal.”
This would also explain the origin of ARM if their views are correct.
The authors claim that, "The
main source of resistance concerns what children know before their exposure
to science." We are told that "recent psychological research"
shows that babies are not "blank slates" [the authors, however
start with one year olds for their argument] and that children know
all sorts of things about the world-- objects are solid, people react
emotionally to appropriate situations, etc. What they call "naive"
physics and psychology.
Bloom and Weisberg think
this is a problem. Children don't have an accurate perception of the
world in a scientific sense, according to them. Scientific views are
so different from normal common sense (Einstein, Quantum Theory, Darwin,
etc.). This makes it difficult to teach scientific theories to them.
This is hogwash. Children
learn by trial and error and learn from their mistakes. They are natural
born scientists using the empirical method and induction (as well some
deduction after many experiences.) They learn the same way all mammals
do. The scientific method is simply a more sophisticated extension of
this "naive" common sense approach to understanding the world.
They also have basic moral intuitions such as fairness and empathy which,
if they were properly educated, would reinforce socialist ideals of
equality and non-expoitation in adulthood.
The authors, however, think
this intuitive approach leads to a resistance to science and ultimately
to belief in things such as ESP, astrology, ghosts, fairies, divination,
and creationism. None of these things, by the way, follow from the common
sense view of the world any more than do scientific theories, indeed
rather less so.
Children have natural developmental
stages that they go through. If they are taught properly, at age appropriate
levels, there will be no untoward resistance to science education and
understanding. Almost all the examples the authors give of childhood
scientific resistance is the result of bad educational methods and poor
nurturing. If this "resistance" really were "inborn"
science would never have gotten off the ground in the first place.
The second fact, having,
I hope, disposed of the bogus first factoid (what children spontaneously
intuitively know), has more merit. This is "how children learn."
This basically has to do with the fact that children trust the adults
that raise them and tend to believe what they are told as long as it
doesn't conflict completely with common sense.
The children of uneducated
and ignorant adults will tend to be more ignorant and uneducated that
those of knowledgeable educated adults-- and vice versa. This is hardly
startling. Take the example of creationism versus evolution. Children
trust their parents and their teachers. But if their parents are creationists,
other things being equal, the children will likely be so too.
This is because they spend far more time around their parents and their
like-minded parent's friends, etc., than they do around
their science teachers.
The authors hold that the
evidence suggests these science resistant people maintain their beliefs
for reasons "not necessarily rooted in an appreciation of the evidence
and arguments." But this surely a problem of nurture not nature.
The reason, they say, that
this nonscientific, or even antiscientific group of people resists scientific
rationality is "because they trust the people who say it [the unscientific
explanation] is true." All of this can be explained by education,
class and culture without recourse to any inborn psychological propensities
to be found in babies.
The authors finally arrive
at the amazing conclusion that "recent studies" suggest that
children, just as adults, "rely on the trustworthiness of the source
when deciding which asserted claims to believe." And if the educational
system has done its job of providing a basic scientific analysis, I
think, of the world system for people they will also be able to rely
on the objective
evidence for an assertion as well.
It is for the same reasons
that Marxism is not objectively taught in the US that science is also
played down. Namely, there are too many vested interests that benefit
from the ignorance of the population. In our class riven society neither
science nor a Marxist understanding are in the interests of the ruling
corporate elites or the political parties and forces that control the
levers of power.
The authors seem to recognize
this when they write that unscientific beliefs in the US "are particularly
likely to be endorsed and transmitted by trusted religious and political
authorities." But instead of having a Marxist analysis of why this
so in a capitalist society, the authors fall back on the notion that
"developmental data suggest that resistance to science will arise
in children when scientific claims clash with early emerging intuitive
expectations." This is a cop out as the so called "clash"
can only take place when age inappropriate teaching methods are applied
to the education of young children, or anti-scientific (also anti-socialist)
attitudes are deliberately cultivated.
It is the fact that our ruling
class is not committed to a universal scientific education for children,
not "intuitive expectations" that is responsible for the backward
educational climate in the US. The fact that the authors don't see that
Marxism, or scientific socialism, is as important a part of education
as neuroscience and evolutionary biology only shows that many scientists
themselves have a resistance to science. Perhaps they should have entitled
their paper "Adult Origins of Childhood Resistance to Science."
Finally, antiscientific outlooks,
as well as ARM, will only be eliminated by a reorganization of the educational
system, especially early childhood education, with an emphasis on independent
critical thinking, scientific method, and the banning of religious propaganda.
Thomas Riggins
is the book review editor of Political Affairs and can be reached at
[email protected].
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