Log in

View Full Version : Trofim Denisovich Lysenko



careyprice31
9th March 2008, 18:40
What are your opinions on this Stalinist agronomist?

I do not think he was very good at science, real science, his actions had more to do with toeing the party ideology than with science, and he caused much damage to russia within the scientific spehere of things, so that Russia was probably set back about 50 years behind the western world mainly due to Lysenkoism. and it is still holding Russia back today even though Lysenko was denounced later by Nikita Khrushchev after stalin's death.

I wrote an essay on Lysenko and Lysenkoism some years ago and what I think of Lysenko is very negative.

I have a scientific background myself, when I was younger I loved science and studied much of it, mainly entomology, the study of insects but I studied a lot of animal behavior and how animals interact with their environment.

I can definitely say for sure that Lysenkoism is pseudoscience.

btw anyone wanting to find out who Lysenko was and what were the ideas behind it there is an excellent paper on the net called "Who was Lysenko? What was Lysenkoism?" written by Helena Sheehan. Just go to google and type it in.

I cant paste the link here because the darn computer here won't let me for some reason.

I used it as one of the sources for my big essay I wrote. Its really worth a read.

Herman
9th March 2008, 18:48
I agree. Lysenko had it all wrong when it came to science. He probably damaged the Soviet Union more than he helped it. Whether he was a "stalinist" I don't know, but he was too loyal to the party for his own good.

Scientists should be creative.

Die Neue Zeit
9th March 2008, 19:07
He was the full expression of Kautsky's and especially Plekhanov's BS (and reductionist) notion that Marxism had a "complete, integral world-outlook." :glare:

Hit The North
9th March 2008, 19:42
He was the full expression of Kautsky's and especially Plekhanov's BS (and reductionist) notion that Marxism had a "complete, integral world-outlook." :glare:

Please explain.

Rosa Lichtenstein
9th March 2008, 20:21
It shows that the one and only pratical application of dialectics in genuine science was a total disaster.

But that should only be a problem for those who think truth is tested in practice...:rolleyes: