Evolution and Liberty; R. Cooney

But could he have known the ef fect his theories were to have on fields as distant from biologic sci ence as .political philosophy and economics? Could he have known Mr. Cooney is a freelance writer recently graduated from the University of Nevada. 290 the uses - or misuses - to which his theories would be put in those fields? In truth, Darwin's discoveries were very influential in both of these areas. For proof of that, one need look no further than the school of social and political think ers known to us as the Social Dar winists. To these men, the Dar winian hypothesis was a galvaniz ing axiom. Darwin had found in the struggle for existence a bio logical foundation for competition among and between men, and in the survival of the fittest a justi fication for laissez-faire. Here, felt the libertarian spirits of the Social Darwinists, was the definitive an swer to all socialistic and reform ist agitators. Lockean liberalism was thereby wedded - as we shall see, not entirely compatibly - to the findings of modern science.