Showing posts with label Marx. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Marx. Show all posts

Sunday, February 18, 2007

Partnerships

It's weird how we often remember only one person out of a partnership. Why is it that one person can get everlasting fame/notoriety and the other just sinks into oblivion?

Case in point:
Marx and Engels. We don't call it Engelism, do we?
Darwin and Wallace. Again... it's Darwinism.

Well, Marxism and Darwinism sound a lot better, there's not doubt about that. But still, don't you feel bad for those partners who will never go down in history, who will only be studied by scholars/students of the field but will never be truly recognized by the general public? I mean, I could ask my mom, who knows almost nothing about politics/philosophy about communism and she would say "Marx" off the top of her head. And I could ask an art major about evolution and he would say "Darwin." It's just a little unfair, n'est-ce que pas?

Edit: one partnership which I think has gotten equal recognition is Watson and Crick (DNA double-helix, won the Noble Prize, etc.). But do people really know who they are? (beyond Bio majors and scientists and all that). I mean... I don't know. But at least they're equally semi-famous.