The Way of the Social Organism[1]

Lewis Henry Morgan makes a number of a priori statements, in that, the Western-American civilization was superior, evolved, and civilized. He deemed that aboriginal cultures less primitive based, in part, because of their lack of technology. In comparison, Herbert Spencer judgments of a modern society can be viewed along the same lines. In his discourse, of The Social Organism, he purports society as aliving organism. Of course, the Victorian culture was the most highly evolved and thus superior to those who are not as modernor technology advance.

Both of these gentlemen recognized that the Western-American culture was in era where science took the lead over religion. The era of secularization was ascending and the view of Christianity was being examined.

Moreover, humanity had seemingly evolved at its highest point. This was the outlook, in part, of the Victorians and American intellectuals, such as Spencer and Morgan.

In the view of Spencer, he felt that the Western-American culture was strong, resilient, due to its fitness, while Morgan believed that evolutionarily speaking, that ethnical growth levels were based on race and moral maxims, and the others, the aboriginal cultures were low. Their modernity was primitive as compared to the Western-American culture (Warms and McGee p. 48-50). Therefore, the European rooted cultures were superior based on race (p. 52).

What’s more, though Morgan disregarded the theory of degenerationismas implausible, he continued to belief in psychic unity of human kind(in a way it still asserted that there was some form degeneration). He implied that Western-American culture retained its moral superiority because of their relationship with God, when he says, “that all primitive religions are grotesque and to some extent unintelligible.”

Essentially, Morgan’s moral authority of idealism reflected the values of the time and was, to a certain extent, led to the expansionists, colonialism, and empiric ideas of the age. These ideas turned ideals substantiated the Western-American culture need for dominance (or oppression depending on one’s view).

In contrast, Spencer’s observation of society as a social organism is correct in a principle metaphor sense, in that, it is super organic. This is what I mean: His ethnocentric view, like that of Morgan’s, in comparison was matter of relativity. The status of Western-American culture centric saw itself as high, because of technology and the modernity of rational thought.

In the super organic, rationality and empiricism imported perspectives that there was only one way to be modern, civilized, and/or civilized, when in the guise of the Victorian and American cultures. Therefore, the similarities between Morgan’s and Spencer’s assertions were that they viewed the world from the top down. European, Victorian, and American cultures represented the highest forms.

Thus, Morgan saw aboriginal cultures as archaic, dead in a sense, while Spencer saw them as living organisms [9]. Both saw that culture was evolutionary. Morgan spin saw humanity as savages, barbarians, with “germs” of civilization planted within, which only needed to be cultivated. Otherwise, it lay dormant until culture had reached a definable transition. In other words, the transition followed a sequence—if x then y, if y then z., each transition had particular moments, which would eventually lead to equality for the lower races (see page 52).[10]

On the other hand, Spencer may have been ethnocentric but he was not overtly racist despite what critics may have believed. More likely he was a classis and sexist. Moreover, though he and Morgan used the comparative method (Morgan) and analogy (Spencer) as techniques to illustrate their theories, it gave anthropology the foundations, the ability to examine the human perspective.

Furthermore, it was Spencer who truly sat on the fence of transition. He was not confused in an evolutionary sense, nor in the sense that, he had a quandary between scientific or spirit. No, he was certain that science was the correct task master to elucidate the world from the darkness of superstition. The quandary I speak of was the “Survival of Fittest” moniker he bestowed on Darwin’s and Wallace’s evolution.

However, Spencer believed in the application of the Lamarckian inheritance not that of natural selection. He believed that inheritanceforwarded the social mores of a society and then redefined it as a living organism. [11]In so being that, it was an allegory for the human advancement.

What was curious was his picking and choosing in what areas applied to entity known as the social organism. He believed in his model. He believed in the competition between the strong and the weak. He believed in the acquisition of inherited traits. He believed that public resources should not be used to educate the poor. He defended the perspective of the classes, and he defended government and what it ought and ought not to do.

Spencer was compelled to recapitulate the necessity of his parliament and show it off as the highest form of reasonableness. He advocated that the weak should be left to their own vices and the strong to theirs. He used analogies to demonstrate how the function of society (and differing societies) were comparable to the most simplistic to the most complicated and evolved. He ultimately saw Victorian society as parental to the lesser classes and to the lesser (primitive) societies.

In Lydia Alix Fillingham book, Foucault: For Beginners, Foucault points out that after the revolution (French that is), how the authority of the state became parental, especially for the mentally-ill, which in turn, was later applied within culture. The parental attitude was reflected throughout the Western-American culture. In so being that, science and social mores of the time led to the evolvement of care taker of the planet. In other words, it was a moral imperative to do so—a manifest destiny, if you. Spencer and Morgan for this era reflected the attitudes of the day, and in turn, brought eventual enlightenment to mankind.

[1] This essay will reference Warms and McGee 4^th edition, Anthropological Theory: An Introduction History.

[2] Throughout this essay Lewis Henry Morgan defines culture from the low to the high. The high, of course, is defined as Western-American culture, because of the modernity (technology) of the time. Henry sees cultures as progressive, lineal, ascends to a higher forms. Each civilization went through certain steps to reach civilization (see page 44, Warms and McGee 4^th, third essay titledEthnical Periods by Lewis Henry Morgan).

[3] Modern at this moment is being defined as culture being complex, with intricate social dynamics, Intensive Agriculture and Industrialized manufacturers, as well as complex and higher moral imperative that is a complex as a brain as compared to lesser form such as sponge or protozoan (Spencer, p. 25).

[4] In Friedrich Nietzsche The Anti-Christ, he says, “We should not deck out and embellish Christianity; it has waged a war to the death this higher type of man … by representing the highest intellectual values as sinful, as misleading, as full of temptation…”(See Sharp Press publication page 23 of The Anti-Christ). In essence, Nietzsche is saying that Christianity is anti-intellectual, anti-science, and has set the cultural mores of society against the progressive movement of man. In so being that, in consideration of truth, in consideration of reality and education, Christianity had the spirit (as Emile Durkheim) of the community of the uneducated man.

[5] Simply, degenerationism is the biblical accounting of primitive view of societies. After the fall of the Tower of Babel, people who once were one were no longer, in language, in race, and degenerated into the cultures around the world.

[6] See Warms’ and McGee’s footnote 3 on page 43.

[7] In a way, Morgan’s implication was that Christianity was superior because it was “comprehensible” to the civilized, despite his disdain for religion. I disagree with Warms’ and McGee’s perspective in footnote 8 on page 45. I think he was referring to those below Christianity. His placement of religion below House Life and Architecture, and Property seems to be arbitrary, in that, one’s subsistence is tied to shelter. Such concepts of such ideas may have been forwarded prior to religion or developed at the same time.

[8] In terms of the scientific method, thought was going through a restoration, of sorts, recognizing that the transitory nature of could be observed, tested, and verified. What’s more the examination surrounding Nature, began dissemble the status of the untenable.

[9] In essence, Morgan looked at cultures as static, in the sense that, they were frozen at particular stage until “germs” of civilization took hold.

[10]

According to Warms and McGee, Morgan persistence in referring to Aryans, Greeks, and Romans as a civilizing force demonstrated a particular bent toward race.

[11] Don’t misunderstand. When I state, Spencer used Lamarckian Inheritance to forward the social mores of a society and redefined it. I don’t mean he redefined Lamarckian Inheritance, I mean he used the elements of it as analogy to define how a culture can recapitulates, retransmits, key symbols and culture messages. If those message (or traits ) survive they are inherited (or retransmitted) to the next generation.