this post was submitted on 30 Jun 2025
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Three prominent researchers warn about the current existential threat in the United States

Helmut Schwarz has been reading about what happened to science during the rise of Adolf Hitler, almost a century ago.

The German chemist just received the Frontiers of Knowledge Award from the BBVA Foundation in Spain, due to his contributions to the field of catalysis. For him, there are parallels between the situation in Nazi Germany and Trump’s United States.

“From 1900 to 1932, a third of all Nobel Prizes went to Germany, more than to the U.S. and the U.K. combined,” he tells EL PAÍS. He and two other scientists sat down with EL PAÍS in Bilbao, where they received their awards.

“When Hitler came to power,” he continues, “German science — which led the world — completely disintegrated. But Hitler thought that wouldn’t be a problem,” he continues. Now, Donald Trump’s administration views universities — supposed hotbeds of progressive ideology — as the enemy. He wants to bring them under his control. “In my opinion, the threat isn’t immediate, but it’s very important in the long term,” Schwarz adds.

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[–] acosmichippo@lemmy.world 2 points 10 hours ago* (last edited 10 hours ago) (1 children)

But then again, I don’t even know if the ones doing the same now do either.

RFK Jr defintiely does.

yeah i don't have any official recommendations on Lysenkosim reading, but wikipedia's article seems to do a good job. He just had terribly wrong ideas about gene transfer, grafting, etc. all based on Lamarckism, which he believed to be more compatible with communist ideology.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lysenkoism#Lysenko's_claims

[–] sanity_is_maddening@piefed.social 2 points 5 hours ago (1 children)

Yeah, RFK does sound like he believes the craziness he's spewing. He's gonna get a lot of people killed, that's for sure. He already has. But the people who believe that he's only gonna get the dumb side of Americans who believe him killed are so wrong. That's not how this works. I get a lot of Americans on vacation where I live in Portugal. And it's also true all over Europe and the rest of the world. And it is terrifying to think of the very probable outbreaks and who knows what else to come.

And thanks, I'll use Wikipedia to read more about Lysenkoism over the weekend.

Thank you for the reply.

[–] acosmichippo@lemmy.world 2 points 2 hours ago

Portugal looks like a beautiful country and I'd love to visit sometime.