Moody Studio team member Zann Gill speculates about what the mythical artist-inventor Daedalus above, in flight from the labyrinth he designed, and in which he was later imprisoned, might have said to scientist Charles Darwin. Their conversation, imagined as a dialog, could have shed light on how the rise of Darwinism as an interpretation of Charles Darwin has undermined collaborative models of evolution. Theory underpinning collaborative intelligence cites  views that revise traditional Darwinism, questioning its “survival of the fittest” competitive emphasis as a misinterpretation of what Darwin intended.

Darwin, concerned that fundamentalist religion might undermine his theory of evolution, may have strategically positioned Origin of Species to overcome this possible opposition, anchoring his theory to the bedrock of capitalism, already well-accepted and on the rise. Darwin’s strategic order of publishing started with his geological work, which was safer. He resisted being associated with Marxism, and instead aligned Origin of Species with the rising power of capitalism in the wake of Adam Smith’s acclaimed book, Wealth of Nations, with its well-timed 1776 date of publication.

Zann Gill’s book, What Daedalus told Darwin, examines evidence that Darwin, by aligning his theory of evolution with capitalism, was successful in achieving his original objective to overcome potential opposition from fundamentalist religion. However, his strategy backfired in another way. Darwin titled the third chapter of Origin “The Struggle for Existence” and promised in that chapter to elaborate more on this topic later.

If Darwin had fulfilled that promise, and if Spencer had not so effectively aligned Darwinism with the capitalist dictum of Andrew Carnegie and John D. Rockefeller that “competition rewards the fittest and most deserving,” we might earlier have recognized the need to complementcompetition for survival of the fittest with a collaborative, ecosystemic model of evolution. We could then better have anticipated the implications of what Garrett Hardin in 1968 called “the Tragedy of the Commons.” Whether we examine human ingenuity, or the ingenuity of nature, invention of tools for the task is everywhere, as Darwin’s famous finches attest.

The Darwin Awards, effectively make light of our plight, but tongue in cheek, have a message: Humans could do a lot for our planet by reducing their numbers. The Darwin Awards are a tongue-in-cheek honor, originating in Usenet newsgroup discussions around 1985. They recognize individuals who have supposedly contributed to human evolution by selecting themselves out of the gene pool via death or sterilization by their own actions, “In the spirit of Charles Darwin, the Darwin Awards commemorate individuals who protect our gene pool by making the ultimate sacrifice of their own lives. Darwin Award winners eliminate themselves in an extraordinarily idiotic manner, thereby improving our species’ chances of long-term survival.” By 2002, the Darwin Award website, founded and developed by UC Berkeley and Stanford trained biologist Wendy Northcutt, received 7 million page hits per month.

The Darwin Awards:
in search of smart.

Daily News. December 13, 2015 – The Evolution Revolution.