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American scientist, 1998-05, Vol.86 (3), p.226-229
Erscheinungsjahr
1998
Link zum Volltext
Quelle
Sociological Abstracts
Beschreibungen/Notizen
Considers the influence of Thomas Malthus's (1798) ideas about the relation of population & poverty on the theory of evolution developed by Charles Darwin (1859) 60+ years later. According to Malthus, increased population growth necessarily leads to increased poverty because of the inherent scarcity of important resources. According to Darwin, in 1838, Malthus's ideas triggered Darwin's notion of a causal mechanism of natural selection. While this statement may have been overly dramatic &, in factual content, erroneous, it is suggested that Malthus's influence on Darwin's theory is indisputable. However, Darwin did not simply accept Malthus's notion; he rejected Malthus's dismissal of artificial selection as a model for change in nature. Darwin employed Malthus's ideas as a springboard from which to elaborate a theory of natural evolution. Unfortunately, he never explicitly applied his theory to the question of why some societies flourish, while others continue to exist in a subsistence state. However, this should not obscure his profound debt to Malthus's theory of the relation between population & poverty. D. M. Ryfe