Bourgeois pseudoscience

Bourgeois pseudoscience (Russian: Буржуазная лженаука) was a term of condemnation in the Soviet Union for certain scientific disciplines that were deemed unacceptable from an ideological point of view^[1][2] due to their incompatibility with Marxism–Leninism. For example, genetics was not acceptable due to the role of random mutations of an individual organism in evolution, which was perceived as incompatible with the "universal laws of history" that applied to masses universally, as postulated by the Marxist ideology.^[3] At various times pronounced "bourgeois pseudosciences" were: genetics,^{[notes 1]} cybernetics, quantum physics, theory of relativity, sociology and particular directions in comparative linguistics (Japhetic theory). This attitude was most prevalent during the rule of Joseph Stalin.

Notably, the term was not used by Stalin himself, who rejected the notion that science can have a class nature. Stalin removed all mention of “bourgeois biology” from Trofim Lysenko’s report, The State of Biology in the Soviet Union, and in the margin next to the statement that “any science is based on class” Stalin wrote, “Ha-ha-ha!! And what about mathematics? Or Darwinism?”^[4] The term was mostly used by Stalinist philosophers, such as Mark Moisevich Rosenthal and Pavel Yudin, who use it in the 1951 and 1954 editions of their Short Philosophical Dictionary: "Eugenics is a bourgeois pseudoscience",^[5] "Weismannism-Morganism - bourgeois pseudoscience, designed to justify capitalism".^[6]

Psychology was declared "bourgeois pseudoscience" in People's Republic of China during the Cultural Revolution (1966-1976).^[7] Sociology was banned in PRC in 1952,^[8] and it remained banned for over 30 years.^[9]

See also

• Suppressed research in the Soviet Union
• Cybernetics in the Soviet Union
• Censorship in the Soviet Union
• Soviet historiography

Notes

1. See Lysenkoism and its impact in the other countries of the Soviet Bloc

References

1. Loren R. Graham (2004) Science in Russia and the Soviet Union. A Short History. Series: Cambridge Studies in the History of Science. Cambridge University Press. ISBN 978-0-521-28789-0.^{[page needed]}
2. Mark Walker (2002) Science and Ideology. A Comparative History. Series: Routledge Studies in the History of Science, Technology and Medicine. Routledge. ISBN 978-0-415-27122-6.^{[page needed]}
3. "Karl Kautsky: Nature and Society (1929)". www.marxists.org. Retrieved 2020-02-21.
4. Liu, Yongsheng; Li, Baoyin; Wang, Qinglian (September 2009). "Science and politics". EMBO Reports. 10 (9): 938–939. doi:10.1038/embor.2009.198. PMC 2750069. PMID 19721459.
5. "Евгеника".
6. "Вейсманизм - морганизм".
7. Wang, Zhong-Ming (January 1993). "Psychology in China: A Review Dedicated to Li Chen". Annual Review of Psychology. 44 (1): 87–116. doi:10.1146/annurev.ps.44.020193.000511.
8. Feuchtwang, Stephan; Bruckermann, Charlotte (13 July 2016). Anthropology Of China, The: China As Ethnographic And Theoretical Critique. World Scientific Publishing Company. p. 22. ISBN 978-1-78326-985-3.
9. Li, Cheng (1 October 2010). China's Emerging Middle Class: Beyond Economic Transformation. Brookings Institution Press. p. 62. ISBN 978-0-8157-0433-1.