Kropotkin - o explorador: o apoio mútuo como fator de evolução

Abstract

In the bicentenary year of Darwin's birth, thinking of the work O Mutual Support (1902), the observations and thinking of Peter Kropotkin, one of the many marginalized authors in the social and human sciences, becomes important due to his numerous theoretical contributions as a scientist and as an anarchist, who thinks of a complex methodology to overcome capitalism. When Thomas Henry Huxley claims that conflict is not only desirable as one of the conditions of progress, and thus inevitable, Kropotkin proposed to discuss the matter, giving his own interpretation of Darwin's evolutionary theory. His series of essays then made in a famous newspaper, culminated in his work O Apoio Mútuo (1902), where he opposes social Darwinism, stating that mutual support between species is the most important element in its evolution.

In fact, mutual aid seems to be the rule among the most successful species. Society life allows the most fragile of animals, the smallest birds and the weakest mammals to resist and protect themselves from the most terrible birds and beasts of prey. (WOODCOCK, in G., 2002).

While admitting that the strength, speed, cunning, protective colors and the ability to withstand the cold and hunger mentioned by Darwin admitted under any circumstances, that sociability is the greatest advantage in the struggle for life. Kropotkin suggests that intellectual capacity is eminently social, as it is stimulated by language, imitation and accumulated experience. In addition, the very fact of living in society tends to develop as rudimentary as this form of development may be - that sense of collective justice that ends up becoming a habit, which is the very essence of social life. This work, by the anarchist thinker and man of science, encompasses almost all branches of human knowledge, put at the service of a scientific-philosophical thesis, which constitutes a particular interpretation of Darwinian evolutionism.