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The Lessons of Lysenkoism undoing of the more famous and infa- ic's apparent success is due to die enlightening rebuttal to the 1991 vol- mous psychics that have gone before. faulty recollection of what he or she ume The Blue Sense (Mysterious Press, You must also beware of die doubters actually said; fourth, psychics tend to New York) by Arthur Lyons and and nonbelievers—and those skeptics deal in vague generalities—nothing is Marcello Truzzi, who found some who have read this book—will snicker ever very specific; fifth, other psychics sense and substance in die paranormal maliciously at your boasts and claims. frequently benefit from after-die-fact claims of these psychic pretenders. Nickell has, however, neatly enumer- interpretations, i.e., retrofitting predic- If you want to own die one best ated these traps for all you players in his tions and outcomes; sixth, and finally, if book on die topic of psychic detectives Introduction: first, some famous cases it weren't for all those other social and and their alleged powers, as well as of successful crime-solving never actual- psychological factors that cause people their lack of same, Nickell's volume is to accept die accuracy of dubious infor- ly happened; second, psychics used the one to get. mation—you'd be dead in die water. ordinary means for getting information that they then presented as having been Taken as a whole, Psychic Sleuths Robert A. Baker is professor emeritus of psychically obtained; third, much of a serves as a timely, definitive, and psychology at the University of Kentucky The Lessons of Lysenkoism GRAYDON JOHN FORRER ^ Lysenko and the Tragedy of Soviet Science. By Valery N. Soyfer ^^^^•^^^^•^^^^•^••1 ^ (translated by Leo and Rebecca Gruliow). Rutgers University Press, New Brunswick, N.J., 1994. 379 pp. Hardcover. $35. alery Soyfer has written an impor- die Soviet biological community in its meager education in science and agron- Vtant book for all skeptics and thrall for more than 40 years. Those omy, rose to dominate the Soviet bio- those who would defend die scientific methodwho questioned Lysenko a nodr thhies cadreright s to frelogicae inquiryl establishmen. t through the use of The lesson of Soyfer's Lysenko and the were purged from government and guile and a keen sense of the political Tragedy of Soviet Science is that freedom academia without mercy. Indeed, die and ideological wind blowing through of thought is a fragile flower that may full power of die Stalinist police state the Stalinist state. be easily crushed by charlatans, fakes, was employed by Lysenko and his For Lysenko, scientific ignorance and demagogues unafraid of using the adherents to terrorize and silence all was a positive attribute. He was the power of the state for their own cynical who challenged Lysenko's pseudoscien- "Peasant Scientist," the self-made, self- ends. The book is a warning about tific theories. Thousands of biologists, taught new Soviet man. By his exam- both the power of the state and die geneticists, and agronomists were dis- ple, the wonders and promise of mod- appeal of pseudoscience. More impor- missed from their jobs, many served ern science and technology would be tant, die book is a call to action for all time in the Gulag, and made available to all with- who watch with passive disdain the rise some paid for their dissent with their l i v e s . Even todayout an, y fuss or bother over of such modern Lysenkoist practices as die biological and genetic LYSENKO the niceties of proof or untested alternative medicine, New sciences in the former mid the analysis. He championed a Age philosophies, creation science, and Soviet Union suffer as a TRAGEDY new science that could be the demagoguery of the religious right. result of Lysenko's reign of applied directly to the vast While die story of Lysenko and terror. SOVIET economic and agricultural Lysenkoism is not new, Soyfer's intelli- SCIENCE challenges facing the new gent and authoritative retelling makes Soyfer, a professor and Soviet state. He would, he for compelling reading. Beginning in director of the Laboratory proclaimed, revolutionize the late 1920s, die government of the of Molecular Genetics at VALERY M. SOYFER agriculture just as Stalin rev- Soviet Union embraced die biological George Mason University, olutionized the world. He and agricultural theories of Trofim knew Lysenko as a young shrilly denounced those Lysenko (1898-1976) to the exclusion biology student in Moscow during die who questioned his theory and method of traditional biology and genetics. 1950s. He vividly and expertly details as bourgeois enemies of socialism and Lysenkoist Biology became die official the systematic destruction of Soviet the new Soviet society, and a credulous biology of both party and state and held biology and genetics under Stalin. He and scientifically ignorant political chronicles how Lysenko, with only a leadership latched on to Lysenko as die SKEPTICAL INQUIRER • MAY/JUNE 1995 45 savior of Soviet agriculture. They pro- couraged as a plot by the bourgeoisie to Today, we find an American public ever moted him, disguised his failures, and enslave the peasant class. All question- more leery of the promise of science silenced his opponents. ing of method was deemed politically and technology to provide solutions to Lysenko brazenly declared that suspect. Academic inquiry and analysis complex global problems. The public, modern, Mendelian genetics was bunk were insults to the great Soviet people woefully ill-informed on the means, and propounded a theory that plants and consequently stifled. All progress in structure, and method of scientific and their unique genetic characteristics genetics, agriculture, and biology inquiry, readily embraces philosophies could be quickly "trained" to serve achieved in the West was dismissed as a and ideologies that seem to offer easy Soviet agricultural interests. Lysenko fraud. All independent biology and solutions. Unfortunately, the public's postulated that, through a process called genetics in the Soviet Union halted misguided acceptance—for example, "vernalization," plants could "learn" to unless it had Lysenko's approval. of the promises of untested alternative grow in any fashion that the Marxist At the peak of his power, Lysenko medicines and parapsychology—has state needed in its effort to revolutionize controlled the Soviet Academy of made it easy prey for those who, like Soviet agriculture. Where traditional Science and served as one of the chair- Lysenko, posit solutions without proof biologists and geneticists argued that men of the Supreme Soviet—the titular and who argue that Western scientific many generations and many years were rulers of the country. He commanded methods and standards cannot be necessary to change basic plant charac- the car of Stalin and later Khrushchev applied to the intangible universal truth teristics and develop new varieties, with impossible promises of the quick they seek to reveal. Lysenko asserted that progress could be and vast expansion of Soviet agriculture Soyfer's book makes a compelling achieved with the breakneck speed of that would demonstrate the superiority argument for standing up and engag- one or two generations. of Soviet science while burying the ing in vigorous debate with those who Thus, for instance, spring wheat West. In the end, the Soviet state would bedazzle the public with scien- could be transformed in a mere genera- ordered the adoption of Lysenko's tific and logical sleight of hand. More tion into winter varieties. Elm trees method on a huge scale. The result was important, it underscores the need for could be trained to be hickory trees. an unprecedented, manmade agricul- the community of skeptics to patiently Nonliving matter could be transformed tural disaster causing untold human and without condescension engage the into living matter. Lysenko, in short, suffering and environmental damage public in a continuing national dia- strove to relegate Mendelian biology that continues to plague Russia today. logue about what science is and what it and proved agricultural practices to the Lysenko and the Tragedy of Soviet can and cannot do. waste-bin of history as the dying rem- Science provides a rare, firsthand insight nant of an immoral capitalist science. into how a terrorist state uses and abus- Graydon J o h n Forrer is a confidential assis- Through all his years of dominat- es public trust and ignorance to under- tant to the Undersecretary of Agriculture, ing Soviet biology, Lysenko and his mine freedom. It is also a stern warning Food and Consumer Services, U.S. cronies never offered any tangible proof for those who believe that some form of Department of Agriculture, Washington, for his theories. Peer review was dis- Lysenkoism could not happen here. DC 20250. Good-humored Adventure in the Congo JOHN H. ACORN ^ Drums Along the Congo: On the Trail of Mokele-Mbembe, the Last ^^^^^H^^^^^M ^^ Living Dinosaur. By Rory Nugent. Houghton Mifflin, Boston, Mass., 1993. 243 pp. Paper, $10.95. nlike claims for die existence of port. The 1985 Disney movie Baby, took the underlying idea seriously. Udie Loch Ness Monster or the Secret of the Lost Legend brought the After all, it's a silly idea. Sasquatch, the idea of a living sauro- "Mokele-Mbembe" to a wide audience, Cryptozoologists, on the other pod dinosaur in the Lake Tele region of but in my judgment, based on work hand, are often incapable of grasping the Congo Basin of Africa has never with educational books, films, and the extent of their own silliness, and as quite captured its share of popular sup- exhibits about dinosaurs, few people a casual observer of cryptozoology I get 46 SKEPTICAL INQUIRER • MAY/JUNE 1995 .
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