Atheists, where do you stand on these 2 social philosophies? Social Darwinism or Social Gospel?

Social Darwinism was a bankrupt corruption of Darwin. Survival of the fittest wasn't even his phrase, but Herbert Spenser's, an economist. Evolution predicts survival of the most well adapted. For humans, and other primates, who are all social animals, that means what benefits the troop benefits the individuals. And for the Golden rule, I heartily endorse that, but predates the Gospel by many millennia.

It was sighted by Jesus as the primary moral imperative (Mathew 7:12). Although he may just have been cribbing off of Rabbi Hillel (who, if we trust bible scholars' timelines, died when Jesus was about 12 to 14). Rabbi H said the same thing Jesus would later say (that is the summation of all the law and the writings of the prophets). It's in the Mahabharata. Buddha says it, Lao Tzu says it, and Confucius says it. There are Islamic versions, Native American versions and versions from a variety of ancient Greek and Roman philosophers. For instance, Thales, the father of Greek philosophy, said it 7 centuries before Christ. And I love the Shinto version, “The heart of the person before you is a mirror. See there your own form.” If nothing else, even if it doesn't represent an absolute morality, such an impressive consensus should allow us to use it as if it were an absolute moral standard. Especially as it requires no eternal threats, nor promises of heavenly reward in order to operate, just enlightened self-interest.

Game theory shows that using a strategy based on a such a code leads to viable long term success: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tit_for_tat

Moreover, evolutionary biology and game theory mathematics overlap, and show that such behavior can confer adaptive benefits on a population: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Evolution_and_the_The...

Social Darwinism has been used to justify a lot of terrible things. What people seem to miss when applying Darwin's work to a social context is that evolution relies on the environment controlling the population. We have long since learned to manipulate the environment ourselves, which takes out the need for most of the selection forces.

In theory, Social Gospel is a good idea. It would be great if we could all love each other. In practice, people take their own innate prejudices, find justification in the Bible (you can prove anything if you look hard enough), and then claim they're obeying God's will. It sort of defeats the purpose.

Generally, social engineering ends badly. The thing is, people don't want to change, and no amount of coercion or threatening will change society as a whole.

I'm atheist, hate Social Darwinism, and like Social Gospel.

Social Gospel: the simple biblical concepts of love thy neibor and being a brother's keeper, essentially the idea that mankind must help and support one another

Oh boy, do I have an issue with that statement. That would be one of the things that make theists hypocrites. Because most theists don't love your neighbors. For the record I am not " everyone is for themselves" I love and would do anything for many people.

Social Darwinism doesn't exist. It's a false doctrine invented by idiots looking for an excuse to abuse their fellow humans. Those that wouldn't use Darwin's ideas find their excuses in the Bible, the infinitely malleable book that can be said to mean anything one wants it to mean. Somewhere in "On Origin of Species", Darwin makes a point that survival of the fittest as applied to individual animals was perfectly acceptable, except in the case of Man. For humans, Darwin believed that we should rise above our animal nature. In other words, he believed in the direct opposite of Social Darwinism, a term he never used.

I've never heard of anyone preaching Social Gospel. Nice idea, but utterly irrelevant. We already know these things, we don't need some fifty year old virgin haranguing us from the pulpit with things we understand better than he does.

Theist's distrust of atheists is rooted in their innate distrust of themselves. They can't understand why atheists aren't out there raping and pillaging and murdering and burning and thieving, believing that if it weren't for their own faith, they themselves would be out there doing those things.

The problem with social Darwinism is that it extends the speculation of biological Darwinism to the non-biological context of society. In economics, for example, we benefit ourselves with profit by supplying quality goods and services to others at a price less than what competitors offer. That's a kind of self-interested cooperation--our economic activity is designed to help rather than defeat others.

The problem with the social gospel is that Jesus put a premium on freedom: "Freely have you received, now freely give." In contrast, the social gospel advocates want government to redistribute income to victim groups, an inherently coercive activity. Government redistribution punishes those who produce goods and services to provide negative incentives to blow off school, get addicted to drugs or alcohol, and to practice promiscuity, which leads to illegitimate parenting.

Cheers,

Bruce

I like the idea that mankind should support each other. We need collaboration to improve lives, rather than hindering them. But these principles are not solely attributed to being produced entirely by biblical people. These ideas were of men, before they were of holy text.

Man has great empathy. So survival of the fittest does not have to rule. We're better than that now.

Social Darwinism and all its should's and should not's is a complete misunderstanding of the observational theory of biological evolution. That theory says nothing about every individual being for themselves. It is about how life changes as different genetics lead to different reproductive success. Many times, that success results because the genetics leads individuals to cooperate with one another or even with other species.

I suspect that what you call the 'social gospel' is just the recognition of how cooperation has helped our species to succeed and flourish.

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Regards,

John Popelish

You DO know that "Social Darwinism" is a philosophy from Herbert Spencer, and has nothing to do with biological evolution, right? For that matter, you don't even have the definition of it correct. To think that accepting the evidence of biological evolution leads to accepting the philosophy of Social Darwinism, is as stupid as thinking that accepting the discoveries of Albert Einstein leads to frizzy hair styles.

"Social Gospel" isn't even a real term. More importantly, Christians don't seem to follow what you describe.

No... Social Darwinism is an excuse for genocide, as religion is also at times. Survival of the fittest doesn't apply *as much* to humans, with our technologies like agriculture, medicine, and glasses.