Thursday, October 30, 2014
Thursday, October 23, 2014
Thomas Malthus and his Influence on Darwin
Thomas Malthus' theories
on population growth were an influential factor in Darwin's theory of Natural
Selection. Malthus studied and understood factors that limited human population
growth. Thomas Malthus wrote about how more humans are born than can survive
due to certain limitations of food and space. His theory on the relationship of
population growth and the availability of food supply led Darwin to expand upon
this idea of population growth and relate it to all species as a whole. Darwin
expanded upon Thomas Malthus' theory and came to the conclusion that better
adapted species would survive and weaker species would give way to the better
adapted species. Darwin later theorized that the adapted species would pass on the
survivable traits to their off springs.
Darwin's theory of
Natural Selection could have been developed without the assistance from other
scientists. He could have come up with his theory without help from anyone,
just by his detailed work as a naturalist and his observations of other species
and unusual adaptations to their environment. For example his friend and
contemporary Alfred Russel Wallace came up with the same evolutionary theory
that Darwin had, although Wallace called it "struggle for existence"
and Darwin called it "Natural Selection," so in retrospect, Darwin
need not have read the theory of Thomas Malthus, Alfred Russel Wallace or his
other contemporaries. The threat of
ridicule by the church was a big impediment to Darwin as the church held
sway during his time and so he published his book on The Origin of the Species only when he had carefully studied and fully researched his theory and could not come to any other conclusions.
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