Lysenkoism Part II: Collectivist Science

As I continue to ponder Elsberry and Perakh's denouncement of the comparison of  Darwinism to Lysenkoism, I find it funny that their attempt to "turn the tables" on ID proponents includes appeals to their alleged "self-aggrandizing puffery."  Apparently, they are offended by the effrontery of not exhibiting the proper humility and this, to them, makes them "Soviet-like" and Nazi-like. But this is (perhaps unintentionally) a red herring.

What is the most salient connection between the bullying and harrassment by the anticreationist coalition and the initimidation of totalitarian regimes is the urgency to suppress dissent and make sure that it has serious consequences.

Elsberry and Perakh try to steer the reader in the direction of seeing ID as kin of Lysenkoism.  ID and Lysenkoism are both against the neo-Darwinian Synthesis, for one.  Secondly, both are allegedly unproductive, whereas the Modern Synthesis supposedly can be credited with the great advances of modern biology.

In many ways, even though I think E and P's arguments on the matter are fallacious, I believe it is a red herring to argue at all based on which theory any one group's model of theory choice supports.  Fervent neo-Darwinist advocate (and contemptuous anticreationist) Jerry Coyne disagrees with E and P about the practical success of neo-Darwinism.  Many science defenders are aware of this inconvenient truth, but it is often considered impolitic to point it out.  But even if it could take credit as a productive heuristic, it is still not a good argument for suppressing alternative views or for excusing suppression.

The big problem with Lysenko's Michurinism was not really that it was unproductive or wrong.  The problem was that its shortcomings were foisted on people through intimidation and the use of state power to enforce a hegemony.  If dissent and controversy had been tolerated in the universities and if various firms and organizations had been free to pursue the erroneous theory of their choice, all of the public agriculture's eggs would not have been in the Michurinist basket -- maybe only a few government-sponsored experiments.   A free marketplace of ideas would have been ideal then as now.