"LYSENKO, VIEWS OF NATURE AND SOCIETY -
REDUCTIONIST BIOLOGY AS A KHRUSCHEVITE REVISIONIST WEAPON"
First published in pamphlet format in Toronto; September 1993. (pp.170-212)
Continuing With:
PART TWO : LYSENKO

INTRODUCTION

In general Lysenko is roundly abused as a charlatan and a pseudo-scientist, who manufactured biological speculations based on a prior philosophical edifice of Dialectical materialism. This belief is coupled with charges that he curried political favour to promote his pseudo-science. It is true that the hostility towards Lysenko, was more than matched by Lysenko's contempt of orthodox genetics. But in Part One, the potted history we see that even in Western genetics, many scientists voiced dissatisfaction with orthodoxy. It is fair then to ask:

Accusation Number (i):
Charges that he was not primarily a scientist and that his theoretical framework was incorrect. Further, this accusation states that his biology owes more to a rigid abstract Marxist dialectics than to nature. Moreover that he imported into a pure science, a hitherto unknown political stance.

Accusation Number (ii):
Charges that he was responsible for the practical destruction of a large part of Russian agriculture by an incorrect practice drawn from an incorrect theory.

Accusation Number (iii):
charges that to promote his views Lysenko actively courted and obtained Stalin's assistance to suppress non -Lysenkoite genetics. Furthermore the active persecution by Terror was responsible for Lysenko's victory, and that this Terror was guided by Stalin's approval.

These accusations emanate from a wide variety of political outlooks, that form a United Front against both Lysenkoism and Stalin. This Front ranges from those with an openly bourgeois anti-Communist view, to the politically uninterested scientists who accept received wisdom, to the Trotskyite view that everything in Russia up to 1952 was a manifestation of Stalin's evil influence. In their analyses, these various authors usually do not critically examine Lysenko himself. At best, a few selective quotes are used to display a "familiarity" with Lysenkoism. The formula used is : Recitation of a few facts, distortion of more facts, coupled to an omission of other information and assumptions that nuclear DNA is at the root of all heredity.

Therefore to conduct a legitimate enquiry, we will analyse critically at least the major parts of Lysenko's theory.
To assess this theory, we apply the test of current genetic knowledge. This is a harsh test, as the state of knowledge in 1945-52 was even less complete than now. The theoretical framework of Lysenko is considered below, and this mainly considers the above numbered Charge (i).

This part then, is the "purely" biological analysis of the charges against Lysenko. Not to pre-empt this analysis, it concludes like many another before and after him, that Lysenko was sometimes right and sometimes wrong.
As for the role of philosophy, and dialectical materialism in his biology, Part 3, examines, albeit briefly, the value or otherwise of dialectics in the sciences.

Charges (ii) and (iii) are really the political core of the charges against Lysenko. These charges, we will assess in historical detail in Part Four.

LYSENKO AND THE CHROMOSOMES

One of Lysenko's most insistent arguments was that there is no special corpuscular bearer of the means of heredity. He thought of the entire body as being in some way, capable of participating in the formation of the progeny. This view was summarised in statements such as:

This view has been credited as containing the roots of Lysenkoite mysticism. But it is interesting that non-Lysenkoist, non-Communist Western geneticists, at odds with Orthodoxy in genetics have often expressed similar views, at similar historical time periods. Compare for instance, Lysenko's view with the views of Wettstein, whose work was discussed in Part One: Or compare Lysenko's expression with that of Wettstein's colleague Michaelis: For a final 20 th century viewpoint, Barbara McClintlock can be cited. But perhaps the final comparison should be with the view of the Founder of the Neo-Synthesis, Charles Darwin: Of necessity, Three Main Corollaries must follow this general view, of the intricate linkage between events in the cytoplasm and the nucleus.

Firstly, this view emphasises the genetics of the body as changing, as "responding", as "growing". On this question Lysenko was correct, and his assertions are at least in part, vindicated by current day research. This has been addressed in the latter part of Part 1.
To remind us of one thought that emphasises biological changeability and responsivity, McClintlock found herself in opposition to orthodoxy for precisely her insistence upon the organism's flexibility:

The Second Corollary is that Lysenko's position would support the position that the Inheritance of Acquired Characters is possible. This has in part already been addressed in Part 1, and the work of the Western scientists such as Sonneborn have been cited to support this view. Especially in the plant kingdom, we have shown enough data, that the absolute interdictions against Inheritance of Acquired Characteristics, violates the facts.

The Third corollary applies to Lysenko, but not to Wettstein, Michaleis and McClintlock.
It concerns the existence of chromosomes, and more importantly their role.
This has to be examined, since Lysenko offers them virtually no scope in heredity by the above definition.
In our view, there should be no doubt that Lysenko therefore radically overemphasised the view that there was no biochemical function in heredity for the chromosomes. In this he was mistaken we would contend.

But it is often asserted that the Lysenkoists rejected any role in the cell for the chromosomes.
This is NOT wholly correct; for at various times the significance of the chromosomes was explicitly recognised by Lysenko himself:

It is evident from these quotations, that in fact ONE thing that Lysenko attacked was the very same simple minded concepts, that were attacked by Western geneticists such as McClintlock, Goldschmidt, Sonneborn and others. But in so doing he did at times inveigh too heavily against the physical material
structures: But of course, Lysenko lost his crystal ball somewhere. Because of course, here Lysenko was incorrect. Years later, genes were visualised by X-Ray diffraction. Moreover, the cells in which various genes are acting can be visualised by locating the messenger RNA with its corresponding DNA.

And again, he dogmatically insisted in a radical over-emphasis that:

However, in arguing against any role of the chromosomes in heredity, the essential thrust of Lysenko was to retain the possibility of, and indeed necessity of change: Lysenko selects for attack notions of unchangeability: As discussed above, these anti-change notions of Koltsov are fundamental to the Weismannist statist view of nature.

But even given Lysenko's need to defend the idea and possibility of change as a force in nature, certainly some of his followers adopted an approach that ended up throwing out the baby with the bathwater. Thus S.S.Perov in upbraiding one Professor Alikhanian states categorically:

Others were far more literal than Lysenko in the rejection of the gene and the chromosome. Thus K.Y.Kostryukova asserted that: Even the demonstrations by the adherents of the plasma gene were not sufficient to convince or mollify Kostryukova: But. before we pass any judgement on Lysenko and his school, we should bear in mind the discomforts of the Western geneticists like McClintlock and Goldschmidt, with the Morgan-Weismann-Mendel views that became the "Central Dogma"; as cited earlier.
But in addition, we should re-examine the basis of Mendelian genetics.
These were the Laws of Segregation that Lysenko rather arrogantly and degradingly asserted were "The Pea Laws". These Laws of Segregation were key to the New Synthesis. But there was a lack of dovetailing of theory with many experimental observations, as was discussed in Part One.
We will briefly re-cap some of the key findings.

NON-MENDELIAN INHERITANCE

Perhaps one of the earliest observations, that served effectively to challenge Mendelian segregation, as a universal phenomenon  - was made by Correns :

Other instances arose where a convenient Mendelian inheritance pattern was simply not tenable. This includes the inheritance of variegation in Maize uncovered by Rhoades in 1943: Other examples of similar phenomena tending to an anti-Weismannist interpretation are cited by Briggs and Waters. They comment that: The implications of this are transparently abhorrent to strict Weismannists. However to those not so inflexible they carry some explanatory powers. As pointed out by Briggs and Walters: INTERIM CONCLUSION

Lysenko was undoubtedly correct in his assertion that the chromosome/gene was not inviolate from cytoplasmic and thus environmental influence.
This is particularly the case in plants.
However it is unlikely that this is restricted to plants alone.
As a result the phenotype is not solely dictated by the nuclear genome as the Morgan school contended. This was later shown by such work as that of McClintlock.
The complexity of the interaction between environment and the control of gene expression was beyond the understanding of either the classic geneticists or the Lysenkoist.
However, Lysenko's insisted first and foremost upon the notions of change.
In this question, he was a true follower of Heraclitus - the great apostle of "change" -here (see Appendix Two).

BUT:
There was on the other hand a tendency of the Lysenkoist school to underplay the relevance of the chromosomes. This led to a ignorance of the potential role for nuclear genes and their potential manipulation.
This of course underlies some of the dramatic advances by which medicine and technology are currently are being changed.
Here the Lysenkoists lapsed into a materialism that was anti-dialectical because it denied a reality.
They concentrated on their laudable aim of highlighting change.
In obeying Heraclitus, they threw the baby out with the bathwater.
They were one sided in a most serious breach of the 4 th law of dialectics.
They in effect were "Mechanical Materialists" (See Part III).

2. DIRECTED CHANGE

Lysenko believed that evolution changes heredity, almost only in a directed manner.
In contrast, the orthodox New Synthesis views that evolution only exerts its effects through chance, via Natural Selection.
Lysenko further believed that it is possible to intervene and actively change heredity in a number of ways. Evidence for this belief is examined below. It encompasses a number of differing botanical phenomena, and in the ensuing discussion some agricultural realities of the USSR will be explored also.

In passing we should say, that Lysenko contradicts himself on the role of Chance in nature. Thus we have discussed in detail in Section One, the issues around Chance, and their importance in the debates on Evolution.

In some places Lysenko agrees that:

However elsewhere the conventional geneticists were castigated for their adherence to Chance. Thus in his Address to the Lenin Academy in 1948, he said: His invocation in general was: In this regard we should examine how he thought this could be done.
(A) HYBRID VIGOUR.

Lysenko stressed in his work a phenomenon that had been well described by Darwin, and became termed Hybrid Vigour.

This was a phenomenon whereby established varieties, of plants, would undergo a deterioration in breeding proliferative potential:

His observation was one that he claimed: The problem that he described he felt was: It will be seen below that Lysenko was right in an empirical observation, that the phenomenon was due a "degeneration of the inherent genetic state".
However, he could provide no real mechanism for this degeneration.
And the mechanism is one that does in fact rest upon an acceptance that Mendelism must be sometimes correct !

But Non-Lysenkoist scientists apparently objected to Lysenko on the issue of Heterosis upon two principal grounds.
a) Does Heterosis Exist ?
Critics argued that the phenomenon, if it existed was not such an important phenomenon. They argued that self-pollinating plants do not deteriorate. The explanation for the observed habit if the peasants, who changed their crop variety every few years; was due to the better crop varieties that became available.

However the phenomenon had been long noted by plant breeders. It had drawn Darwin's attention. Indeed the phenomenon itself had been noted since early breeding experiments, by others as well:

In his great search for the possible evidences for evolution, Darwin had been led to try and understand the function of flowers. In particular the fascinating forms of the Orchid, then a fashionable craze in England, seemed to be dictated by some need.
Darwin rejected the prevalent notion of complexity arising by God's wondrous attention to beauty. Darwin wrote in puzzlement in 1876: But Darwin went on to test his hypothesis and was surprised to note, in 1866, with his beds of Linaria vulgaris that: FIGURE: p.123 Briggs and Walters.
Two Forms of a flower, Primula veris.
Heterostyly. ie two forms of style in the flower ensure cross pollination.

The contradiction between the presence of self fertilising mechanism in nature for plants and the better yields of agricultural heterotic plants may be only an apparent, and not a real stumbling block. The advantage of self-fertilisation would be a fail safe mechanism, whereby it woudl be ensured that a seed could be set - even if there was no outbreeding possible: But as Briggs and Walters point out: b) The Mechanism of Heterosis
Those Soviet scientists that accepted the phenomenon of Heterosis as being real; only did so on the grounds of Mendelian segregation. Lysenko argued that the geneticists were constantly redefining the rules, and adapting data to fit into their own structure: As discussed above, the phenomenon itself is a genuine phenomenon and is not any longer, usually contested. So Lysenko was correct in his general assertion here.

However, the explanation of hybrid vigour that is currently available to biologists may not be terribly pleasing to the die hard Lysenkoists. It appears that:

So though the phenomenon was real, because of his bias against Mendel and the notion of a gene, Lysenko was in no position to appreciate how the phenomenon may arise.

Lysenko's own crossings were probably based on the underlying principle of natural selection. ie. The best available specimens should be crossed, and the most vigourous progeny should be cultivated. This sound agronomical practice is not unreasonable. But Lysenko was in this matter unable to transcend it. However, it must now be asked, of what practical importance to the USSR was this debate?

(c) The practical import of heterosis in the USSR; -the story of hybrid corn.

Nikolai Vavilov wished to introduce hybrid corn to the USSR. It's use in the USA had by then increased yields by 20-30% on:

In the USA, agronomists had developed a hybrid corn practice, that was interestingly, based on very similar views to those of Lysenko on hybrid vigour.
It is perfectly true that hybrid corn had boosted yields of corn considerably in the USA; and this legitimately excited Vavilov.
The issue of monoculture became particulary controversial when Khrushchev pointed out the merits of the US Dept of Agriculture monoculture experiments with maize. In fact Edward Murray East and George Harrison Schull in the USA had obtained promising results with " controlled fertilisation ". These basically entailed detasseling of corn in order to control the pollination, a procedure in essence similar to the ones used by Lysenko in the USSR. East and Schull established special hybrids of corn by breeding selected corn, because: But the story does not end here. This original observation of hybrid vigour, or heterosis; was actually ignored by the USDA. They then had to deal with these so called hybrid corns. The difference from the Lysenkoite view was that they continued to use these hybrid corns exclusively; allowing the original "hybrid vigour" to decline.

As Briggs and Walters pointed out above this will lead to a narrow line of self contained gene pool, with some unhelpful consequences (See quote above). Ultimately this led to the problems faced by the corn industry in the USA, where widespread chaos and disruption to the corn future market was caused by Corn Leaf Blight in the 1970's:

One reason for the rapid spread of the Blight was found to be a cytoplasmic gene (of irony in this debate between the advocates of Weismannist central dogma and those in favour of a role for cytoplasmic based inheritance!) that had been first observed in the Philippines, but the reports were scouted by the US National Academy of Sciences (NAS). The USA NAS proceeded after the devastation to inaugurate a series of studies. These were published as: "The Genetic Vulnerability of Major Crops" in 1972. This assessed uniformity of crop to be a major factor in the Corn Blight. In 1976 the US NAS published a paper which acknowledged: Finally, it should be pointed out that a naive extrapolation from experience in the USA to that of the USSR is dangerous. The extraordinary geography of the USSR, and its climatic harshness puts the agricultural efforts of the Bolshevik years (under Lenin and Stalin and excluding the Khrushchev revisionist years) into a favourable perspective. It is important to understand this in connection with the debate about Heterosis and pure bred Maize lines, but it applies with strength to the other crops, such as cotton and sugar beets.

We should expand a little on the geography. The reader is referred to the Geographic map below for easier comprehension of the following rather lengthy section. Levins and Lewontin have shown the way, and point out that:

These authors make the pertinent conclusion that: MAP USSR SHOWING VEGETATION ZONES.
From Knystautas, Algridas : The Natural History of the USSR", Century Hutchinson, London, 1987; p.32.
The map shows well the vast range of the climactic zones that are necessary for the climate to vary from polar zone and tundra, to desert, to mountain.

In part 4, we explore in more detail the realities of crop production in the USSR, and the destruction of USSR agriculture under the Khruschevite revisionists.
Conclusion :

In summary, hybrid vigour is a real phenomenon that was correctly identified by Lysenko as a key factor in crop productivity. The resistance to recognition of its importance its' may have prevented a rise in corn production earlier in the USSR. The campaign by Vavilov and later Khrushchev, to rely on special hybrid corns was based on a mistaken belief that these selected corns were by themselves adequate to boost production. A parallel experiment in the USA contradicts this view. The exclusive reliance on hybrid corn in the USA led to a major crisis in the resistance of the US corn to infection, again highlighting the importance of the phenomenon of hybrid vigour.

(B) VEGETATIVE PROPAGATION AND GRAFTING

It is largely accepted that grafting is a crucial part of common agricultural practice.
However Lysenko's view was that using grafts one could permanently alter the genetic properties of the stock and scion.
It is interesting then that there is substantial evidence from non-Lysenkoist sources that this may be a method of transmitting characteristics:

An interesting case that interacts with the notion of the developmental timing of changes in phenotype (See below), is the special case of grafting of the tips of Hydera helix, the Common Ivy. We have already discussed this, See Prior Figure (p.107; in hard copy version): In the Soviet Union there was a scandal over the demonstration of a case of fraud. This entailed a hornbeam graft.
It was contended that the graft showed some fraud.
The case was initially denied by the Lysenkoists, but the agriculturist who made the graft publicly acknowledged that it had been a graft.

CONCLUSION

Lysenko was in general correct, when he was highlighting the practical importance of grafts.
 

C) PHYSICAL INTERVENTIONS AT CRITICAL JUNCTURES.

Lysenko strongly believed that interventions at particularly sensitive times of the embryo's development would alter the properties of the developing organism. This was the basis for his strong endorsement of the process of Vernalisation.
In this matter he has been criticised by many authors on two grounds.

Firstly, that he did not actually invent this process, that credit should go to a German by the name of G.Gassner. Loren Graham points out that Lysenko was aware of Gassner's work and fully credited him (Graham. p.202).

But more fundamentally he has been attacked on the grounds that the process of vernalisation itself did not work, and that it was a lot of scientific baloney. It seems somewhat two sided. You cannot say on the one hand that Lysenko stole the idea, and on the other say that in any case he was wrong.
Moreover, Sapp points out some interesting corollaries between Lysenko's work and the directions of other Western researchers:

In this matter then, later developments have forced a consideration of the role of the cytoplasmic hereditary determinants contained within the plastids of plants. This has been discussed above under "Non-Mendelian Inheritance".
Even the generally critical Loren Graham states that: Graham does charge however, that Lysenko was a sloppy experimenter with inadequate controls for his experiments: Also it shoudl be noted, that within this general area, ample data accumulated since Lysenko's time,  confirms the view that developmental signals or cues, are critical to a whole series of later developmental paths.
Briggs and Walters provide many examples whereby developmental variability is directly associated to later phenotypic variation. Thus they examine the phenomenon of Heteroblastic development. This was a term coined by Goebel (1897) to denote the change form a juvenile to an adult form phase accompanied by more or less abrupt changes in morphology:

Figure 11. Njoku's experiment with Ipomoea caerulea

From, Figure 6.11 From Briggs and Walters, Ibid, p. 108.

3. THEORY AND PRACTICE

Lysenko felt that both theory and practice were crucial to interpret the natural world correctly.
It is interesting to note that Darwin, maintained consistently how much he learnt from the practical breeders.
Similarly, it is also interesting that Barbara McClintlock was herself looked down upon by many scientists in the USA, on the grounds that she was only a breeder. In fact for further development of her work, McClintlock needed the aid of techniques developed by breeders. McClintlock wished to associate particular genes with particular chromosomes:

But, undoubtly, there was a tendency amongst the Lysenkoist to ignore the role of carefully controlled experimentation.

For example, Lysenko asked :

If adequate controls are not built into an experiment, it is likely that misinterpretation will occur.
It seems to be the case that the Lysenkoists were not able to carefully document their work with as many controls as science should expect.

4. THE MATERNAL ENVIRONMENT

Lysenko believed that the maternal environment was of utmost importance in the development of the progeny. It is of interest that in many animal species (from drosophila flies to Xenopus amphibians, to mammals) the early fate of the early embryo is linked to the maternal contributions to the zygote.

Early on, Boveri, a pioneer of developmental biology, whose other contributions included recognition of the importance of chromosomes, had realised that the maternally derived cytoplasm plays a general organising role for the developing zygote after fertilisation.
This seemed in any case logical, since the sperm arrived with very little cytoplasm, whereas the egg was often very large. Interestingly, his classic experiments on "merogonic hybridisation", were performed to prove conclusively that there was no role for the cytoplasm in inheritance:

Sapp comments that: Finally, as a result of his experiments, Boveri concluded: But it is true, that some cases of "maternal inheritance", proved to be not very convincing as refutations of the Mendelian-Morgan hypothesis of primacy and monopoly of the nucleus.
Thus the cases of Toyama's silkworms and Boycott's snails were seized by Sturveyant to attack so called maternal inheritance. Toyama had: Similarly for the previously described molluscs reverse forms, (ie Left handed spirals or right handed spirals) of shell coiling: But modern day genetics has accepted the notions of maternal inheritance as being an important developmental control. Anderson comments that: In the Xenopus laevis and other frog and amphibian, the knowledge of the different poles of the embryo has led to searches for the differences in composition. There seems to be a definite polarity in the presence of different maternally acquired cytoplasmic determinants. These include nucleic acids, and are distributed asymmetrically in the developing embryo, after fertilisation: Higher animals such as the mammals have similar special effects from the maternally derived egg molecules: Following from this general recognition of the importance of the maternal environment, it was natural that the concept of phasic development would follow. At certain critical stages in development, the "set conservative" path of the developing embryo could be changed to another path.
There are critical periods when it is best to perform these experimental manipulations:

There are parallels in Western biology. Thus many workers were interfering with normal development by environmental manipulations:

Experimental data amply confirms the notions in this theory. They address one of the concerns that Weissmann had articulated in his erection of the Central Dogma. This was that if the developing embryo was open to environmental challenge, that development would be possibly disrupted.

Lysenko pointed out that indeed there was a conservatism to respect of development, but that in careful manipulation, that the conservative patterning of the embryo could be broken.

It appears that in this matter, Lysenko was indeed correct.

5. SPECIATION.

According to Lysenko, the:

His views were most clearly opposed by Vavilov, whose alternative views are discussed below.
But it should be recognised that Lysenko's view is not dissimilar from many then contemporaries of Lysenko such as Goldschmidt; and moreover many present day Western geneticists.
Recently, as discussed above, the theory of Saltatory species formation of S.J.Gould and Niles Eldredge) change acknowledges rapidity in species formation.

Vavilov developed his Theory of "The Law of Homologous Series", and unveiled it in June, 1920 at the Conference of Breeders:

According to Gould: In his work he had collected specimens from all over the world, establishing a bank (the largest in the world ) of genetic variation. He observed: From changes in rye and wheat specimens from Europe, Asiatic Russia, Iran and Afghanistan, Vavilov concluded that: He indeed correctly predicted the existence of certain varieties: The normal explanation of these findings would invoke parallel evolution in response to a similar environment. However Vavilov proposed: Thus Vavilov argued that new species arose by developing genetic differences that precluded interbreeding. But most of the ancestor's genetic system was intact and the same, leaving not much difference between them: The theoretical consequences of this are pointed out by S.J. Gould : Thus in discussing lentils Vavilov says: Extrapolating his ideas lead Vavilov to predicting an ordering of biological "elements", that would enable precise construction of organisms. An explicit analogy with the Periodic Table in chemistry predicted that : In opposition Lysenko charged that Vavilov's Law : S.J. Gould acknowledges only that: This grudging admission is similar to remarks made upon the discovery that sometimes Lysenko may be right and his opponents wrong. However, S.J. Gould does go on to conclude that: This implicitly sees the Deification of Natural Selection created by the Western Darwinians.
It acknowledges the difficulties, that are created by a dogmatic insistence upon all change in evolution being purely random (ie by chance); until such time that it be fixed by Natural Selection.
Of course as discussed in Part 1, Gould was one of the dialectical biologists who have brought forward the Punctuated Equilibria story.

CONCLUSION

The substance of Lysenko's views on speciation regarding rapidity of formation, are still controversial. However a growing body of conventional main stream biologists and geneticists are in broad agreement with this view that species formation is a much more rapid event than given credit by the New Synthetists.

6. THE ORIGINS OF LIFE : OPARIN, A DIALECTICIAN REFUTES LEPESHINKAIA : A REDUCTIONIST MATERIALIST.

Lysenko's school initiated a whole series of attempts to explain biology by a prior philosophical commitment to dialectics.
The invocation to explain everything by Dialectics, was taken up by a number of individuals, some of whom were not adequately critical, or adequately scientifically trained. This had a tendency to lower the standard of science by posing questions in a very mechanical manner.

This general approach in starting from a prior commitment, and then proceeding to obtain data can be quite different to the approach of seeing events first, and then explaining them.
This process of explanation can either take into account an understanding of dialectics; or it can ignore dialectics.

The two approaches are conceptually quite different, and may lead to differing solutions. But it is true that there is both a postive and a negative in this Prior commitment. The negative lies in a prior Bias (expectation). The positive lies in an ability to ask the right questions.

But unless, the balance is kept, the result can be a half-baked Mechanical Materialism. This seemed to have happened in a number of instances. The half-baked solution was often superficial more attractive becasue it aspired to being Dialectical, and was often easily achieved. The more real dialectical solution was however more difficult to achieve.

A particular instance where the two approaches differed, was in the debate on the Origins of Life. here Oparin was a scientist who was early on credited with first realising a key issue. This was that the origins of life, must have been in a climate radically different from present physico-chemical conditions on Earth.

The differences in the two approaches can be exemplified by comparing Oparin with Olga Lepeshinskaia.
The latter was a scientist, who worked out of her kitchen, and pushed a claim that she had engendered Spontaneous generation. Naturally, this observation was exciting if it could be replicated. Unfortunately it could not. The two certainly at core disagreed:

The difficulties in Spontaneous Generation were first appreciated by Pasteur, whose travails were early noted by Engels. Oparin took the more subtle, but more productive approach to Engels' writings: By 1936 Oparin had digested and was citing Engels' Dialectics of Nature.
In the process he more or less anticipated, and openly repudiated the possibility of the future "findings" such as those of Lepeshinskaia : As he went on, Oparin had no hesitation about updating Engels. In this he soon had problems with the "Ultra orthodox dialectical materialists" who wished to stick to Engels' literal words, including the word "protein"! These were the "Ideologically Pure" who under this guise prevented grappling with the real dialectical issues: Oparin openly adopted Dialectical Materialism as an aid in understanding the processes. This was recognised even by the biologists of the West, who had appreciated his original and penetrating insights. In a book that was actually translated by the United States space agency, NASA, Oparin in 1966 wrote : Clearly since in this time both Lysenko and Oparin were receiving Support from the CPSU(B), even though this author believes that they were from different wings of the party, the two were bound to be connected in some way: In light of the administrative and other connections between Oparin and Lysenko, the initial support Oparin gave to Lepeshinskaia could be construed as opportunism. It is unclear however, whether he was ever genuinely convinced by her claims of what amounted to spontaneous generation. Graham claims that in later face-to-face interview with Oparin, Oparin opined that: "It was easy for Americans to criticise his support for Lysenko," but that in effect there was no choice if he wished to continue his scientific work and avoid censure and possibly more (See Graham 2, Bibliography).

Finally, Oparin did resist the crude reductionist materialist attempts. In fact Oparin was a firm adherent of dialectics. This continued through his controversies with Western scientists into the 1960's. His criticisms of crude reductionist materialism are also an sharp critique of Lepeshinskaia. That his struggle in theory, was conducted in such a veiled manner, is highly indicative of the "unhealthy" climate that Dogmatists had created in the name of Dialectical Materialism.

The political events behind this Facade of Dialectics is discussed below in Part Four.
However, Stalin tore away the facade, when he exposed how it was used to cover a crude "arrogance" and dictatorial style in the science of Linguistics. All in the name of "Dialectics".

This may make some quite unhappy about the possibilities inherent in Dialectics. However, that it is a TOOL that can be misused, like any other, should not discredit it. In Part Three we try and draw out some of the ways in which an application of Dialectics aids Biology.