"I do not believe that the atrocious war into which the Germans plunged Europe in August, 1914, and which has subsequently involved all lands and all peoples, would ever have been fought, or at least would have attained its actual gigantic proportions, had the Germans not been made mad by the theory of survival of the fittest." - William Roscoe Thayer in his 1918 address to the American Historical Association.


A book that talks about the influence of Darwin on Germany. In 1878 Darwin wrote a friend and told him that Germany was the most enthusiastic nation in embracing his theory. In the years leading to WWI books on ethics and the changes in ethics with the view of Darwinism were non-fiction best sellers in Germany. The idea of the survival of the fittest and that humans were just animals who should not be given any better treatment than animals changed the philosophical landscape in Germany. It influenced German thoughts on the advisability of WWI and ultimately led to the Holocaust.

A fascinating book though if feels as if it is written by an academic for academics. Lots of footnotes so you can check the author's info out. Not a lot of editorial commenting from the author. Overall he does a good job of letting the people he introduces to the reader tell them what they think about society and how Darwinism changes things. ( )

Pop Quiz: Which of the following quotations comes from Adolf Hitler?

"Therefore one should guarantee to them only the measure of protection that they need as a race inferior to us, in order to survive, but no more, and only so long as they are useful to us -- otherwise [allow] free competition, which in my opinion means [their] demise! This viewpoint sounds almost brutally egoistic -- but whoever thinks through the racial concept and the points portrayed in the above section on "Psychology," cannot take any other view."

"[In the contest between Europeans, Asians, and Africans], only one group can remain as ruler. The two others will be destroyed, where they are in the way of the stronger race, and enslaved, where they can serve them... We Germans have the power to destroy and smash the might and future of the two other groups, if we clearly see this necessity, vigorously arm ourselves, and keep our blood pure..."

"In the next century people will be slaughtered by the millions for the sake of one or two degrees on the cephalic index [i.e., cranial measurements popular with physical anthropologists]...the superior races will substitute themselves by force for the human groups retarded in evolution, and the last sentimentalists will witness the copious extermination of entire peoples."

Ok, so it's a trick question. These quotations come from Eugen Fischer, Klaus Wagner, and Vacher de Lapouge, respectively -- two Germans and a Frenchman, respected scholars writing in the early 1900s. They represent a fraction of the academics, doctors, and scientists -- all Darwinists -- who appear in From Darwin to Hitler, many of them in English for the first time. The point is this: We often think of Adolf Hitler as an aberration, a unique and amoral monster. But I think this book's exhaustive documentation of the, ahem, evolution of Darwinist thought and the eugenics movement in Germany in the late 1800s/early 1900s demonstrates that Hitler's ethic (and it was a strong ethic, indeed) grew from fertile soil well-sown by respected German academics.

Weikart is careful to clarify that Darwinism does not necessarily lead to, say, Nazism, which is good because that would be silly. However, Weikart does say that without the work that Darwinism did -- encouraging the devaluing of human life, upending traditional morality, providing a scientific basis for virulent racist thought, etc -- it would have been much more difficult for Hitler to gain the support and accomplish the things that he did. And lest we doubt that Darwinism did, in fact, accomplish those things, Weikart has exhaustively documented the evidence and connected the dots in this book.

In fact, the only thing that keeps me from giving this book five stars is that so little of the book is spent on Hitler. It's almost like an afterthought at the end of the book. I suppose Weikart assumed that readers would be much more familiar with Hitler's ideas than the myriad other relevant German thinkers, and he's right, of course. And perhaps the connection is self-evident. But I still wish more time would have been spent on the "to Hitler" part of this book.

All in all, though, this book is an invaluable consideration of the possible consequences of theories in general and Darwinism in particular. A must-read if you're at all interested in the subject. ( )

An excellent historical reference of the insidious impact Darwinism had on western thought. A must read for anyone studying the politics of the second half of the nineteenth through the first half of the twentieths centuries. Clearly describes the evolution (pun intended) of western thought to justify colonialism, Imperialism and the dehumanization and exploitation of peoples deemed inferior. Germany was the center of social Darwin theory, but the ideas quickly spread to the rest of Europe and the United States where the 'concept' was adapted by progressive intellectuals and politicians. ( )