![]() The evolutionary puzzle can be solved by observing that providing equal access to land enables humans to limit their own fertility. Recognizing this simple relationship would have helped Darwin resolve a dilemma at the heart of his theory: his expectation that the most successful members of our species would have the most children, an idea contradicted by his observation of large, poor families among the Irish. Humans sometimes adapt to environmental stress by having more children, not fewer, which means that poverty can cause population growth, not the reverse. However, among humans, the true basis of reproductive success is grounded in control of the resources necessary for survival. Recent evolutionary biologists have focused on gene frequency as a way to compare the reproductive success of one individual against another within the same species. Darwin and Wallace cemented that idea into evolutionary theory. Malthus argued, without evidence, that human population growth will continue unchecked until regulated by external factors such as hunger and disease. It was compounded by Charles Darwin and Alfred Russel Wallace, both of whom made the Malthusian "struggle for existence" the basis of natural selection in the evolutionary process. ![]() Knopf, New York.Confusion about overpopulation stems from the writings of Thomas Malthus in 1798. The Invention of Nature: Alexander von Humboldt’s New World. My life: a record of events and opinions. ![]() The Malay Archipelago: the land of the orang-utan, and the bird of paradise. Annals and Magazine of Natural History 16: 184–196. On the Law Which Has Regulated the Introduction of New Species. A Narrative of Travels on the Amazon and Rio Negro. Proceedings of the Zoological Society of London 20: 107–110. The British Journal for the History of Science 3: 39–55. Victorian sensation: the extraordinary publication, reception, and secret authorship of Vestiges of the natural history of Creation. The University of Chicago Press, Chicago. Science and Philosophy in the Age of Goethe. Harvard University Press, Cambridge (MA). The Growth of Biological Thought: Diversity, Evolution, and Inheritance. Letters of Alexander von Humboldt to Varnhagen von Ense from 1827 to 1858. Cosmos: A Sketch of the Physical Description of the Universe, translated from German by E. Aspects of Nature, in Different Lands and Different Climates With Scientific Elucidation. ![]() Longman, Hurst, Rees, Orme, and Brown, London (1814-1829). English translation: Personal Narrative of Travels to the Equinoctial Regions of the New Continent, during the years 799-1804 by Alexander von Humboldt and Aimé Bonpland, written in French by Alexander von Humboldt translated and edited by Helen Maria Williams, 7 vols. ![]() Voyage aux régions équinoxiales du Nouveau Continent: fait en 1799, 1800, 1801, 1803 et 1804 par Al. ed., Cambridge University Press, Cambridge. ed., Basic Books, New York.ĭarwin C., 1988. Edited and with appendix and notes by his grand-daughter Nora Barlow. The autobiography of Charles Darwin 1809-1882. Zoological Journal of the Linnean Society 3: 46–62.ĭarwin C., 1958. On the Tendency of Species to form Varieties and on the Perpetuation of Varieties and Species by Natural Means of Selection. Charles Scribner’s Sons, New York.ĭarwin C. The Astonishing Hypothesis: The Scientific Search for the Soul. ![]()
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