First, a lecture by Philip Pullman, on "theocratic absolutism" - which he applies to the Soviet Union as well as theistic regimes:
* There is a holy book, a scripture whose word is inerrant and may not be doubted, which has such absolute authority that it trumps every other. Everything, even the discoveries of science, has to be judged against what the scripture says, and if there is a contradiction, the scripture wins. This scripture might be the Bible, it might be the Koran, it might be the works of Karl Marx.
* There are doctors of the church, who interpret the holy book and pronounce on its meaning: it might be St Augustine, it might be the Ayatollahs, it might be Lenin.
* There is a priesthood with special powers and privileges, which can confer blessings on the laity, or withdraw them. Entry into the priesthood is an honour; it`s not for everyone; and the authority of the priesthood tends to concentrate in the hands of elderly men: as it might be, the Vatican, or the politburo in the Kremlin.
* There is close control of the news media, and ferocious censorship of books. It was the Catholic Church of the Counter-Reformation that invented the word propaganda, and the Soviet Union that took it up with enthusiasm and incorporated it into their term agitprop.
And there are many more characteristics of this sort of system, which we can find parallels for in both religious and atheist forms of totalitarianism:
* There is the concept of heresy and its punishment.
* There is the concept of apostasy.
* There is an Inquisition with the powers of a secret police force, or a secret police force with the powers of an Inquisition.
* There is a complex procedural apparatus of betrayal, denunciation, confession, trial and execution.
* There is a teleological view of history, according to which human society is moving inexorably towards a millennial fulfilment in a golden age.
* There is a fear and hatred of external unbelievers.
* There is a fear and hatred of internal demons and witches.
* There is the notion of pilgrimage to sacred places and holy relics - the Turin Shroud, Red Square, the birthplace of Chairman Mao.
And so on, ad nauseam. In fact, as far as the way they behaved in practice is concerned, there are remarkable similarities between the Spain of Philip II, the Iran of Ayatollah Khomeini, and the Soviet Union under Stalin. We might see some parallels with the United States in the time of McCarthy. We might even see some resemblances to the present time.
http://www.philip-pullman.com/pages/content/index.asp?PageID=113http://www.democraticunderground.com/discuss/duboard.php?az=show_mesg&forum=263&topic_id=16189&mesg_id=16189and secondly, the relevance of Stalin and Lysenko to what Bush has been trying to do to science in the USA:
In any case, Michurin's views on evolution found favor with the party leadership in the Soviet Union. When the rest of the scientific world were pursuing the ideas of Mendel and developing the new science of genetics, Russia led the way in the effort to prevent the new science from being developed in the Soviet Union. Thus, while the rest of the scientific world could not conceive of understanding evolution without genetics, the Soviet Union used its political power to make sure that none of their scientists would advocate a genetic role in evolution.
It was due to Lysenko's efforts that many real scientists, those who were geneticists or who rejected Lamarckism in favor of natural selection, were sent to the gulags or simply disappeared from the USSR. Lysenko rose to dominance at a 1948 conference in Russia where he delivered a passionate address denouncing Mendelian thought as "reactionary and decadent" and declared such thinkers to be "enemies of the Soviet people" (Gardner 1957). He also announced that his speech had been approved by the Central Committee of the Communist Party. Scientists either groveled, writing public letters confessing the errors of their way and the righteousness of the wisdom of the Party, or they were dismissed. Some were sent to labor camps. Some were never heard from again.
Under Lysenko's guidance, science was guided not by the most likely theories, backed by appropriately controlled experiments, but by the desired ideology. Science was practiced in the service of the State, or more precisely, in the service of ideology. The results were predictable: the steady deterioration of Soviet biology. Lysenko's methods were not condemned by the Soviet scientific community until 1965, more than a decade after Stalin's death.
http://skepdic.com/lysenko.htmlThere are enough parallels between Bush and Stalin to fill books - it's a better analogy than certain other WW2 dictators, IMHO. They have both taken an ideology, used it in ways that many 'true believers' think awful, removed those who question them from power, have taken advantage of an attack to paint their country as the complete victim, despite earlier military collaboration with their attacker, and themselves as the glorious war leader (but whose own competance looks distinctly dodgy), and they have both shown a complete lack of sympathy to the suffering of their own people - whether in Ukraine or New Orleans.
And now we see how much Bush demands that science support his views, not objective research.
http://www.democraticunderground.com/discuss/duboard.php?az=show_mesg&forum=364&topic_id=692521&mesg_id=693804
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