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S. D. Tucker
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Hitler's and Stalin's Misuse of Science: When Science Fiction was Turned into Science Fact by the Nazis and the Soviets Hardcover – December 20, 2023

by S D Tucker (Author)

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S.D. Tucker delves into the Nazi and Soviet historical hijacking of science by extreme ideologies, revealing the dangerous consequences of pseudoscientific narratives in today's world.

In today’s world, science itself, which we are constantly being told is a neutral vehicle for wholly objective ideas and theories, is increasingly being hijacked and abused by the toxic modern cult of identity politics, of both left and right. But should we be too surprised by any of this? No, because this exact same sorry process has happened time and again before, under the rule of totalitarian political cults like the Nazis and the Soviets, both of which vigorously promoted various pseudoscientific theories of ‘Aryan Science’ and ‘Marxist Science’ on the sole grounds that they were ideologically correct as opposed to being factually so.

Nazi racial pseudoscience and belief in nonsense like the ‘World Ice Theory’, which claimed that stars did not really exist and were actually just reflections of the sun off giant floating space-icebergs, were widely encouraged in the Third Reich, and used for long-term military weather-forecasting purposes. Likewise, the ideas of the renegade biologist Trofim Lysenko, who developed a deluded ‘anti-capitalist’ theory of genetics opposed to Darwin’s, were responsible for widespread famine in the USSR when Stalin allowed him to apply them practically towards the nation’s crop-harvests. Those academics and functionaries who disputed these clearly false pseudoscientific notions often found themselves in deep trouble – or, ultimately, dead.

In this incisive and challenging study, author S.D. Tucker explores the often weird and fanciful theories that were proposed and took hold under these extreme regimes – and in doing so sends a word of warning to the modern world of the internet and social media where similar bizarre ideas are expounded and consumed with frightening gullibility.

Everywhere from Western universities, schools and hospitals to Vladimir Putin’s Russia, absurd stories of sexist glaciers, racist gravity, socialist trees and NATO-backed mutant extra-terrestrial potatoes are being promoted as items of politically mandated scientific fact by compliant collaborators and credulous social media followers. Pseudoscientific narratives are even now used to justify the 2022 invasion of Ukraine, much as they were once used to justify the Nazi conquest of Europe or the spread of Communist revolution across the globe.
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  1. Print length
    256 pages
  2. Language
    English
  3. Publisher
    Frontline Books
  4. Publication date
    December 20, 2023
  5. Dimensions
    6.25 x 1.25 x 9.25 inches
  6. ISBN-10
    139907315X
  7. ISBN-13
    978-1399073158
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About the Author

S.D. TUCKER is a much-published British author who has written numerous well-received books and magazine articles for publication in the UK, US and Ireland, with a long-standing focus on the more unusual areas of history. Writing about topics as varied as weird science, aberrant economics, historical eccentrics, medical quackery and strange ideas about outer space, he has a particular interest in folklore, myth, legend and the paranormal. An experienced and knowledgeable writer on esoteric topics like UFOs, poltergeists and occult Nazi beliefs, which he approaches from a variety of perspectives, he writes the regular ‘Strange Statesmen’ column in Fortean Times magazine.

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S. D. Tucker

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  • StupidBoy
    5.0 out of 5 stars Ideology and Science
    Reviewed in the United Kingdom on January 15, 2025
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    This is a well-written and entertaining overview of how science can go badly wrong when it is driven by political ideology rather than objective investigation.
    Tucker describes how the National Socilaist regime in Germany attempted to divide science upon racial lines so that there was a correct ‘Aryan Science’ and de facto false ‘Jewish Science’ . For instance, Einstein being Jewish meant that his Relativity Theory could not be taught at German universtites. Similiary in the Soviet Union the crank evolutionary theories of Trofim Lysenko became official Party ideology (and to the rejection of modern genetics) . His ideas led to real world problems in Soviet agricutural policies and in Maoist China contributed to wide-spread famine which killed millions. Finally Tucker examines how the current culture wars and its idea of ‘ social costructivism’ are infecting biloigy and even mathmatics. A must read if you still care about truth and objective reality.
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