Professor Ken Gemes
The Biology of Evil: A Modern Blood Libel, Part 1
Summary
In this session, Professor Ken Gemes delves into the historical shift in how evil is perceived, moving from a view of evil as a misapplication of reason during the Enlightenment to a 19th-century shift where it’s seen as a bodily infection that needs isolation and eradication. This change has particularly concerning implications when applied to groups like the Jews, who were viewed as a threat to the populace. Gemes examines how ideas of infection, both biological and intellectual, converged in the 20th century, leading to disastrous outcomes. Part 1 of 2.
Professor Ken Gemes
Ken Gemes received his PhD from the University of Pittsburgh in 1990. He came to Birkbeck in 2000 having taught for ten years at Yale University. Ken’s interests range from technical issues concerning logical content and confirmation to Nietzsche’s account of how philosophy is merely the last manifestation of the ascetic ideal.
It’s too big a question, but obviously, the idea that we descended from apes can’t be reconciled with the religious story about the creation of Adam and Eve, so it’s going to be a problem.
I’m just trying to give you the history of the ideas that started in the 19th century, and they created what I’ve called conditions of possibility. A lot of these ideas are all pseudoscience, but they were incredibly influential. But a lot of this theory is driven by hatred and some of it is driven to ideology and not always so open to empirical evidence.
Marx represents a kind of transition point. He thinks Jews actually partake of what he calls Jewishness, but the real problem is not Jews for him. Jewishness is really a marker for him for crass materialism. It’s a fatal connection. But he thinks he, as a Jew, can get beyond it. Any individual can get beyond it with the right ideology.