Title
Darwin, Malthus, Süssmilch, and Euler: The ultimate origin of the motivation for the theory of natural selection
Document Type
Article
Department or Administrative Unit
Mathematics
Publication Date
8-15-2013
Abstract
It is fairly well known that Darwin was inspired to formulate his theory of natural selection by reading Thomas Malthus’s Essay on the Principle of Population. In fact, by reading Darwin’s notebooks, we can even locate one particular sentence which started Darwin thinking about population and selection. What has not been done before is to explain exactly where this sentence – essentially Malthus’s ideas about geometric population growth – came from. In this essay we show that eighteenth century mathematician Leonhard Euler is responsible for this sentence, and in fact forms the beginning of the logical chain which leads to the creation of the theory of natural selection. We shall examine the fascinating path taken by a mathematical calculation, the many different lenses through which it was viewed, and the path through which it eventually influenced Darwin.
Recommended Citation
Klyve, D. (2013). Darwin, Malthus, Süssmilch, and Euler: The ultimate origin of the motivation for the theory of natural selection. Journal of the History of Biology 47(2), 1-24. DOI: 10.1007/s10739-013-9366-8
Journal
Journal of the History of Biology
Copyright
Copyright © 2013 Springer
Comments
This article was originally published in Journal of the History of Biology. The full-text article from the publisher can be found here.
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