Ancient Origins of Intelligent Design

[gluadys]

Actually, a university professor who specialises in science history once told me that Darwin was referring to human ethnicities in the subtitle, and she's a far more qualified source than TalkOrigins or any other biased propaganda website that claims otherwise. Still, the title of the book doesn't invalidate the content.

Since Darwin doesn't speak of human evolution at all in Origin of Species, the word "races" in the subtitle of that book probably refers to varieties and sub-species of plant and animal populations. I don't know why your science historian would say otherwise, given the content of the book.

In Descent of Man, where he does discuss human evolution, he does use "race" to refer to ethnicities including Maori, Tasmanian, Scots, French and Irish as well as several others.

Interestingly, Darwin did not consider skin colour to be a significant indicator of race and almost always refers to ethnicities geographically rather than in terms of colour. Probably the terms he uses that moderns would find most objectionable are "civilized races" (note the plural) and "savage races". It is pretty clear he thinks the European races "civilized" and all others "savage" or at best partially "civilized". Even so, he still draws distinctions among the various European races, clearly considering the Irish a good deal less civilized than the Scots.

 

[Assyrian]

But he was English.

Worth pointing out Darwin did not think European civilisation was all that civilised given the way they were wiping out and enslaving the rest of the world.

 

[marlowe007]

Interestingly, Darwin did not consider skin colour to be a significant indicator of race and almost always refers to ethnicities geographically rather than in terms of colour. Probably the terms he uses that moderns would find most objectionable are "civilized races" (note the plural) and "savage races". It is pretty clear he thinks the European races "civilized" and all others "savage" or at best partially "civilized". Even so, he still draws distinctions among the various European races, clearly considering the Irish a good deal less civilized than the Scots.

Darwin was a meliorist. He believed that primitive people could be civilised and turn from their savage ways (cultural determinism). He did believe in racial differences but did not insist that they guaranteed social inequality among races nor did he advocate social policies that would maintain structured inequality.

 

[Mallon]

Darwin was a meliorist. He believed that primitive people could be civilised and turn from their savage ways (cultural determinism).

Sounds like a lot of Christians I know!

 

[Mallon]

Actually, a university professor who specialises in science history once told me that Darwin was referring to human ethnicities in the subtitle, and she's a far more qualified source than TalkOrigins or any other biased propaganda website that claims otherwise.

I'm with gluadys. Darwin didn't even discuss human evolution in OOS, so how could he have been referring to human races?

 

[gluadys]

Darwin was a meliorist. He believed that primitive people could be civilised and turn from their savage ways (cultural determinism). He did believe in racial differences but did not insist that they guaranteed social inequality among races nor did he advocate social policies that would maintain structured inequality.

Yes, he believed in racial differences. For his time it was a major victory to show all "races" were one human species with one origin. Polygenism was a fairly popular idea at the time, and espoused by, among others, Louis Agassiz. But he seems not to have identified races primarily by skin colour referring to it as merely conspicuous.

I agree with what you say, though what he would favour in the way of social policies aimed at civilizing savage races would be termed cultural genocide today. After all, in his mind, "civilizing" meant "teaching them to be more like us".

 

[mark kennedy]

It sounds a whole lot different to hear Darwin explain it:

This is how he seen the races competing for the nebulous 'favored race' status:

At some future period, not very distant as measured by centuries, the civilized races of man will almost certainly exterminate, and replace the savage races throughout the world. At the same time the anthropomorphous apes … will no doubt be exterminated. The break between man and his nearest allies will then be wider, for it will intervene between man in a more civilized state, as we may hope, even than the Caucasian, and some ape as low as a baboon, instead of as now between the negro or Australian and the gorilla. (The Descent of Man)​

This one seems very simular to the attitude of the evolutionist toward the creationist. No rational person believes cognizant of the facts...

No rational man, cognizant of the facts, believes that the average Negro is the equal, still less the superior, of the white man. And if this be true, it is simply incredible that, when all his disabilities are removed, and our prognathus relative has a fair field and no favour, as well as no oppressor, he will be able to compete successfully with his bigger-brained and smaller jawed rival, in a contest which is to be carried out on by thoughts and not by bites (Descent of Man)​

Obviously he felt himself quite superior in his mental characteristics:

Their mental characteristics are likewise very distinct; chiefly as it would appear in their emotional, but partly in their intellectual faculties. Everyone who has had the opportunity of comparison must have been struck with the contrast between the taciturn, even morose, aborigines of S. America and the light-hearted, talkative negroes. (Descent of Man)​

Darwin prefered 'natural law' to 'miraculous interpolation', here is one of these supposed laws as he describes it:

"Finally, it may not be a logical deduction, but to my imagination it is far more satisfactory to look at such instincts as the young cuckoo ejecting its foster-brothers, ants making slaves, the larvae of ichneumonidae feeding within the live bodies of caterpillars, not as specially endowed or created instincts, but as small consequences of one general law leading to the advancement of all organic beings--namely, multiply, vary, let the strongest live and the weakest die." (On the Origin of Species)​

He definitely believed in sub-races and different species of humans:

It might also naturally be enquired whether man, like so many other animals, has given rise to varieties and sub-races, differing but slightly from each other, or to races differing so much that they must be classed as doubtful species? (On the Origin of Species)​

 

[gluadys]

It sounds a whole lot different to hear Darwin explain it:

Only if you choose to ignore the context in which he is writing.

This is how he seen the races competing for the nebulous 'favored race' status:

At some future period, not very distant as measured by centuries, the civilized races of man will almost certainly exterminate, and replace the savage races throughout the world. At the same time the anthropomorphous apes … will no doubt be exterminated. The break between man and his nearest allies will then be wider, for it will intervene between man in a more civilized state, as we may hope, even than the Caucasian, and some ape as low as a baboon, instead of as now between the negro or Australian and the gorilla. (The Descent of Man)​

Throughout Descent of Man, Darwin tries to assume the role of an objective observer (we might envision an intelligent space alien) for whom humanity is just another species to be studied like any other. This paragraph does not come from his chapter on races, but from a chapter in which he is trying to explain how divergence is highlighted by extinction. In his time Europeans were swiftly wiping out many indigenous peoples. Darwin uses this fact to indicate how gaps between species occur. He invites the reader to imagine the consequences of the extinction of savage races and the anthropoid apes--the species most like humanity. What would remain as the nearest relatives to civilized Europeans? Baboons, perhaps. The gap between surviving civilized humans and surviving lower apes would be much greater and seem much more difficult to bridge than that between savage peoples and chimpanzees. (Darwin may have mistakenly thought African Negros more closely related to anthropoid apes than Europeans.)

This one seems very simular to the attitude of the evolutionist toward the creationist. No rational person believes cognizant of the facts...

No rational man, cognizant of the facts, believes that the average Negro is the equal, still less the superior, of the white man. And if this be true, it is simply incredible that, when all his disabilities are removed, and our prognathus relative has a fair field and no favour, as well as no oppressor, he will be able to compete successfully with his bigger-brained and smaller jawed rival, in a contest which is to be carried out on by thoughts and not by bites (Descent of Man)​

I was unable to find this paragraph in Descent of Man. Are you sure you have attributed it correctly?

Obviously he felt himself quite superior in his mental characteristics:

Their mental characteristics are likewise very distinct; chiefly as it would appear in their emotional, but partly in their intellectual faculties. Everyone who has had the opportunity of comparison must have been struck with the contrast between the taciturn, even morose, aborigines of S. America and the light-hearted, talkative negroes. (Descent of Man)​

Not so obvious when you look at the context, for it doesn't mention Europeans at all.

But it would
be an endless task to specify the numerous points of difference. The
races differ also in constitution, in acclimatisation and in liability
to certain diseases. Their mental characteristies are likewise very
distinct; chiefly as it would appear in their emotional, but partly in
their intellectual faculties. Every one who has had the opportunity of
comparison, must have been struck with the contrast between the
taciturn, even morose, aborigines of S. America and the
lighthearted, talkative negroes. There is a nearly similar contrast
between the Malays and the Papuans,*(3) who live under the same
physical conditions, and are separated from each other only by a
narrow space of sea.​

On the other hand, when making a comparison of intellect which does include Europeans, he emphasizes the similarity of all races:

The same remark holds good
with equal or greater force with respect to the numerous points of
mental similarity between the most distinct races of man. The American
aborigines, Negroes and Europeans are as different from each other
in mind as any three races that can be named; yet I was incessantly
struck, whilst living with the Feugians on board the Beagle, with
the many little traits of character, shewing how similar their minds
were to ours; and so it was with a full-blooded negro with whom I
happened once to be intimate.​

Darwin prefered 'natural law' to 'miraculous interpolation', here is one of these supposed laws as he describes it:

"Finally, it may not be a logical deduction, but to my imagination it is far more satisfactory to look at such instincts as the young cuckoo ejecting its foster-brothers, ants making slaves, the larvae of ichneumonidae feeding within the live bodies of caterpillars, not as specially endowed or created instincts, but as small consequences of one general law leading to the advancement of all organic beings--namely, multiply, vary, let the strongest live and the weakest die." (On the Origin of Species)​

Indeed he did prefer an explanation of natural law to one of miraculous intervention, and so did many Christian theologians. Consider the theological ramifications of saying God deliberately and miraculously created ichneumonidae larvae, slave-making ants or the instinct of the young cuckoo to eject its foster siblings from the nest. It is much the same as saying that God deliberately and miraculously caused the recent earthquake in Haiti and is personally responsible for the loss of life there.

He definitely believed in sub-races and different species of humans:

It might also naturally be enquired whether man, like so many other animals, has given rise to varieties and sub-races, differing but slightly from each other, or to races differing so much that they must be classed as doubtful species? (On the Origin of Species)​

Of course, he accepted that there were differing human races, just as there are of many other species; in fact almost half of his chapter on human races bears on the question of whether or not they are actually different species--a question still unsettled in his day. Darwin concludes that the varieties of humans are not different species, but all variations of a single species. He comments on the term "sub-species", a recent neologism in his day, but dismisses it as merely synonymous with race or variety.

Again, your attribution is incorrect. This paragraph comes from Descent of Man, not Origin of Species.

 

[marlowe007]

Polygenism was a fairly popular idea at the time, and espoused by, among others, Louis Agassiz.

According to Desmond & Moore, it was Agassiz's polygenism which not only disgusted Darwin but "put a political intensity behind his evolutionary crusade."

This one seems very simular to the attitude of the evolutionist toward the creationist. No rational person believes cognizant of the facts...

No rational man, cognizant of the facts, believes that the average Negro is the equal, still less the superior, of the white man. And if this be true, it is simply incredible that, when all his disabilities are removed, and our prognathus relative has a fair field and no favour, as well as no oppressor, he will be able to compete successfully with his bigger-brained and smaller jawed rival, in a contest which is to be carried out on by thoughts and not by bites (Descent of Man)​

Nope, that's not Darwin speaking. It's taken from T.H. Huxley's essay Emancipation: Black and White.

BTW - Egalitarianism was very rare in the time that Darwin lived. It comes as no surprise that Darwin and most Western intellectuals of the 19th century had racist and sexist views because racism and sexism were ingrained into their culture. Darwin was rather progressive by 19th century standards. He, like Abraham Lincoln and Thomas Jefferson, was a man of his time. I don't think it would be intellectually honest to hold these men to modern social standards and write them off as racist bigots. They were far more complex than that.

 

[Papias]

Mark wrote:

Nonsense! This is what the verses actually say:
And he said, Cursed be Canaan; a servant of servants shall he be unto his brethren. (Gen 9:25)

The sons of Ham: Cush, Mizraim, Put and Canaan Genesis (Gen 10:6)

OK, you agree that Noah curses Ham’s descendants to be slaves, right?
The heir of Ham is listed as Cush, which in Hebrew means “black”.
Anyone not already familiar with the fact that Ham’s heir is named “black”, and that Ham’s descendants are sentenced to slavery, isn’t terribly familiar with Genesis. More importantly, anyone concerned with racism and slavery has to know that this very understanding has been used (openly and with wide acceptance) by Christians (both Catholic and Protestant) as a Biblical support of slavery for centuries before the late 1800s, by which time slavery most abolition movement had been successful.

It means Canaan was cursed and the second quote is simply the names of the sons of Ham. Darwin used a racist phrase as the subtitle of his book.

As others have pointed out, the subtitle refers to species of animals, and the Origin of Species isn’t even about human evolution or races. It sounds like someone has been watching Expelled too much.


Jefferson Davis, the president of the Confederacy said:
"[Slavery] was established by decree of Almighty God...it is sanctioned in the Bible, in both Testaments, from Genesis to Revelation
.

Slavery was common in the ancient world, usually resulting from war or debt. Jefferson Davis didn't bother to mention that perpetual slavery in Leveticus was voluntary and there was the Year of Jubilee. I don't expect you, nor would I expect Jefferson Davis, to understand sound Biblical exegesis.

Um, you are familiar that there were two separate and unequal sets of rules for Hebrew vs non-hebrew slaves in ancient Israel, right? Slavery for the Hebrew slave under the Hebrews was not nearly as terrible as the out and out slavery of others. Hebrew slaves were set free in Jubilee years, had to be treated well, and so on. Unlike Hebrews, non-Hebrews could legally be involuntarily, permanently enslaved through war (Dt 20), or through the slave trade (Lev 25:44). Long-lived slaves could also be bequeathed to the master’s heirs like other property (Lev 25:46). Non-Hebrew slaves could be beaten, as long as they weren’t killed, and didn’t lose an eye or tooth.

Ex 21:21 states: "If a man beats his male or female slave with a rod and the slave dies as a direct result, he must be punished, but he is not to be punished if the slave gets up after a day or two, since the slave is his property.” How severely must a man or woman be beaten to be unable to get up for many hours? Have you ever seen a woman or a man beaten like that?

Let me ask you a serious question, who does this proverb speak of?

20 Wisdom calls aloud in the street,
she raises her voice in the public squares;
21 at the head of the noisy streets she cries out,
in the gateways of the city she makes her speech:

22 "How long will you simple ones love your simple ways?
How long will mockers delight in mockery
and fools hate knowledge?

23 If you had responded to my rebuke,
I would have poured out my heart to you
and made my thoughts known to you.
(Proverbs 1:20-23)

According to the verse, this proverb speaks of Wisdom. We should all heed wisdom.

All Christians should remember that God has spoken through many avenues, including his creation and our God-given reason. To take only one of the Bibles, and to pretend that your interpretation of some of the verses is more important than all other sources of God’s wisdom is to engage in idolatry of that one chosen Bible.


This practice of Bibolatry deafens one to most of God’s voices, and leads many a Christian to strongly hold a position at odds to the facts, which hurts both that Christian and Christianity as a whole. Part of the reason people worldwide are leaving Christianity in droves is because the Bibolatry of some Christians leads them to claim things that have long been abandoned by any learned person, such as a global flood or a flat earth. The Bible is good and holy, but interpretations of the verses are just that, interpretations to be seen in accordance with all of God’s truth.

Papias

 

[Assyrian]

Nope, that's not Darwin speaking. It's taken from T.H. Huxley's essay Emancipation: Black and White.

Interesting title. When I googled the quote it kept coming up in Creationist websites, but they attributed it to Huxley's
Lay Sermons, Addresses and Reviews
or
Lectures and Lay Sermons
No reference to the actual title of Huxley's essay, which would give the game away.

 

[mark kennedy]

Mark wrote:



OK, you agree that Noah curses Ham’s descendants to be slaves, right?
The heir of Ham is listed as Cush, which in Hebrew means “black”.
Anyone not already familiar with the fact that Ham’s heir is named “black”, and that Ham’s descendants are sentenced to slavery, isn’t terribly familiar with Genesis. More importantly, anyone concerned with racism and slavery has to know that this very understanding has been used (openly and with wide acceptance) by Christians (both Catholic and Protestant) as a Biblical support of slavery for centuries before the late 1800s, by which time slavery most abolition movement had been successful.

A text without a context is a pretext. Did it escape your attention that for the children of Israel to escape slavery it took a miraculous Exodus?

As others have pointed out, the subtitle refers to species of animals, and the Origin of Species isn’t even about human evolution or races. It sounds like someone has been watching Expelled too much.

Darwin clearly believed that certain humans were not Homo sapiens and that there existed sub-species.

Jefferson Davis, the president of the Confederacy said:
"[Slavery] was established by decree of Almighty God...it is sanctioned in the Bible, in both Testaments, from Genesis to Revelation
.

Um, you are familiar that there were two separate and unequal sets of rules for Hebrew vs non-hebrew slaves in ancient Israel, right? Slavery for the Hebrew slave under the Hebrews was not nearly as terrible as the out and out slavery of others. Hebrew slaves were set free in Jubilee years, had to be treated well, and so on. Unlike Hebrews, non-Hebrews could legally be involuntarily, permanently enslaved through war (Dt 20), or through the slave trade (Lev 25:44). Long-lived slaves could also be bequeathed to the master’s heirs like other property (Lev 25:46). Non-Hebrew slaves could be beaten, as long as they weren’t killed, and didn’t lose an eye or tooth.

Ex 21:21 states: "If a man beats his male or female slave with a rod and the slave dies as a direct result, he must be punished, but he is not to be punished if the slave gets up after a day or two, since the slave is his property.” How severely must a man or woman be beaten to be unable to get up for many hours? Have you ever seen a woman or a man beaten like that?



According to the verse, this proverb speaks of Wisdom. We should all heed wisdom.

All Christians should remember that God has spoken through many avenues, including his creation and our God-given reason. To take only one of the Bibles, and to pretend that your interpretation of some of the verses is more important than all other sources of God’s wisdom is to engage in idolatry of that one chosen Bible.


This practice of Bibolatry deafens one to most of God’s voices, and leads many a Christian to strongly hold a position at odds to the facts, which hurts both that Christian and Christianity as a whole. Part of the reason people worldwide are leaving Christianity in droves is because the Bibolatry of some Christians leads them to claim things that have long been abandoned by any learned person, such as a global flood or a flat earth. The Bible is good and holy, but interpretations of the verses are just that, interpretations to be seen in accordance with all of God’s truth.

Papias

Right! Anyone who takes the Bible literally must be an idolater. Anyone who does not make the Darwinian a priori assumption of universal common descent must be incredulous. Christians must conform their belief system to accomodate secular clerics who prefer the mythology of descent with modification and any inferance of a Creator is openly ridiculed.

Christian scholars including Paul speaks of Adam as the first man in no uncertain terms (see Rom 5). Peter describes the global flood as an act of divine judgement in no uncertain terms. Luke traces the lineage of Christ back to Adam who he calls 'son of God' indicating special creation.

I am well aware both of the wittness of Scripture and the scientific evidence for chimpanzee/human common ancestry. I remain a young earth creationist by default for the simple reason that both the scientific evidence and the Scriptures are twisted to fit into a worldy philosophy. I personally don't care if you honestly and diligently come to a conclusion, based on evidence and sound Biblical exegesis, of universal common descent. It's when I'm accused of being an idolater for taking the wittness of the Scriptures over the scorn of unbelievers that I get indignant.

Darwin was a mythographer who attributed to some nebulous naturalistic assumptions what is rightfully attributed to God alone. Darwin was an unbeliever who explored alternatives to special creation, I have no problem with that. It's when people pretend that the Scriptures support this worldview that I suspect compromise with the spirit of the age.

Have a nice day
Mark

 

[Papias]

Mark wrote:

A text without a context is a pretext. Did it escape your attention that for the children of Israel to escape slavery it took a miraculous Exodus?

The exodus is completely consistent with the separate and unequal slavery laws of the Pentateuch. Harsh enslavement of Hebrews is not OK (hence the Exodus), harsh enslavement of others is OK. Do you agree that beating someone within an inch of their life is harsh?

Do you agree with me that "Cush" means "black", and that both Protestants and Catholics used this to justify slavery for centuries?

Darwin clearly believed that certain humans were not Homo sapiens and that there existed sub-species.

OK, then provide a reason for us to believe this. In this thread we've seen ambigous quotes and falsely attributed quotes. Maybe that was a mistake, but nonetheless, it means that when one assert something like this, it makes me ask for a source.

Have a nice day

You too!

Papias

 

[The Lady Kate]

Darwin clearly believed that certain humans were not Homo sapiens and that there existed sub-species.

Source?... or are you blowing smoke?

 

[shernren]

The exodus is completely consistent with the separate and unequal slavery laws of the Pentateuch. Harsh enslavement of Hebrews is not OK (hence the Exodus), harsh enslavement of others is OK. Do you agree that beating someone within an inch of their life is harsh?

Do you agree with me that "Cush" means "black", and that both Protestants and Catholics used this to justify slavery for centuries?

Oh, they did much better: The New Orleans medical and surgical ... - Google Books

 

[AintNoMonkey]

A sphere has edges.

A square is round.

See? I can do it too.

 

[mark kennedy]

Source?... or are you blowing smoke?

Do your own reading on the subject, it won't be hard to find. Darwin's Descent of Man might be a source:

"It is not my intention here to describe the several so-called races of men; but I am about to enquire what is the value of the differences between them under a classificatory point of view, and how they have originated."

"Some naturalists have lately employed the term "sub-species" to designate forms which possess many of the characteristics of true species, but which hardly deserve so high a rank. Now if we reflect on the weighty arguments above given, for raising the races of man to the dignity of species, and the insuperable difficulties on the other side in defining them, it seems that the term "sub-species" might here be used with propriety. But from long habit the term "race" will perhaps always be employed. The choice of terms is only so far important in that it is desirable to use, as far as possible, the same terms for the same degrees of difference."

"In a series of forms graduating insensibly from some ape-like creature to man as he now exists, it would be impossible to fix on any definite point when the term "man" ought to be used. But this is a matter of very little importance. So again, it is almost a matter of indifference whether the so-called races of man are thus designated, or are ranked as species or sub-species; but the latter term appears the more appropriate."

"A most important obstacle in civilised countries to an increase in the number of men of a superior class has been strongly insisted on by Mr. Greg and Mr. Galton, namely, the fact that the very poor and reckless, who are often degraded by vice, almost invariably marry early, whilst the careful and frugal, who are generally otherwise virtuous, marry late in life, so that they may be able to support themselves and their children in comfort. . .Those who marry early produce within a given period not only a greater number of generations, but, as shewn by Dr. Duncan they produce many more children. Thus the reckless, degraded, and often vicious members of society, tend to increase at a quicker rate than the provident and generally virtuous members. Or as Mr. Greg puts the case: 'The careless, squalid, unaspiring Irishman multiplies like rabbits..."​

(Charles Darwin: Descent of Man, see Chapter VII - On the Races of Man)

Can't wait to see how many of the anticreationists run to defend Darwin.

Have a nice day
Mark

 

[mark kennedy]

A square is round.

See? I can do it too.

That reminds me of a joke:

A Farmer saves enough money to send his son to college, after his first year he returns to his family for the summer. They go into town and at the country store he is telling everyone how his son now has all kinds of book knowledge. He says to his son, 'tell them some of the smart book knowlege you have been learning'. His son says, 'pie are squared'

His Dad takes off his hat and bops the boy with it saying, 'you big dummie, pie are round, cornbread are square'.

Now back to your regularly scheduled discussion.

 

[gluadys]

Darwin clearly believed that certain humans were not Homo sapiens and that there existed sub-species.

Incorrect. Darwin does not make the mistake you are apparently making of equating "sub-species" with "sub-human". A sub-species is a group within a species and is not in any way less than the species itself. One would not say that because there are gray wolves and red wolves and timber wolves, etc. that any of them is not Canis lupus. Ditto for humans.

No one today holds that any group of humans is a sub-species, but even if there were, members of that group would still be Homo sapiens and just as fully human as any other human being. Darwin understood that.

Do your own reading on the subject, it won't be hard to find. Darwin's Descent of Man might be a source:

"A most important obstacle in civilised countries to an increase in the number of men of a superior class has been strongly insisted on by Mr. Greg and Mr. Galton, namely, the fact that the very poor and reckless, who are often degraded by vice, almost invariably marry early, whilst the careful and frugal, who are generally otherwise virtuous, marry late in life, so that they may be able to support themselves and their children in comfort. . .Those who marry early produce within a given period not only a greater number of generations, but, as shewn by Dr. Duncan they produce many more children. Thus the reckless, degraded, and often vicious members of society, tend to increase at a quicker rate than the provident and generally virtuous members. Or as Mr. Greg puts the case: 'The careless, squalid, unaspiring Irishman multiplies like rabbits..."​

(Charles Darwin: Descent of Man, see Chapter VII - On the Races of Man)

Too bad you did not continue this section to see how Darwin responds to Mr. Greg and Mr. Galton.

"There are, however, some checks to this downward tendency. We have
seen that the intemperate suffer from a high rate of mortality, and
the extremely profligate leave few offspring. The poorest classes
crowd into towns, and it has been proved by Dr. Stark from the
statistics of ten years in Scotland,* that at all ages the
death-rate is higher in towns than in rural districts, "and during the
first five years of life the town death-rate is almost exactly
double that of the rural districts." As these returns include both the
rich and the poor, no doubt more than twice the number of births would
be requisite to keep up the number of the very poor inhabitants in the
towns, relatively to those in the country. With women, marriage at too
early an age is highly injurious; for it has been found in France
that, "Twice as many wives under twenty die in the year, as died out
of the same number of the unmarried." The mortality, also, of husbands
under twenty is "excessively high,"*(2) but what the cause of this may
be, seems doubtful. Lastly, if the men who prudently delay marrying
until they can bring up their families in comfort, were to select,
as they often do, women in the prime of life, the rate of increase
in the better class would be only slightly lessened."
​

What Greg and Galton overlooked is that it is not the number of children born that is significant, but the number that survive to adulthood and go on to produce the next generation. On that basis the prudent, who delay marrying and have few but healthy children who survive, may have the advantage over those who marry young and have many children only to see most of them die before their 5th birthday.

This, by the way, is well born out by the experience of the last half-century in international development. It is well-established by now that the most effective means of reducing birth rates is to reduce/eliminate poverty. Those who have confidence their children will grow to maturity tend to have smaller families. The very poor have many children both because they have little access to birth control and because they need to produce 6-10 children to assure that 1 or 2 will survive.

 

[The Lady Kate]

Do your own reading on the subject, it won't be hard to find.

As I thought... blowing smoke.

Darwin's Descent of Man might be a source:

"It is not my intention here to describe the several so-called races of men; but I am about to enquire what is the value of the differences between them under a classificatory point of view, and how they have originated."

"Some naturalists have lately employed the term "sub-species" to designate forms which possess many of the characteristics of true species, but which hardly deserve so high a rank. Now if we reflect on the weighty arguments above given, for raising the races of man to the dignity of species, and the insuperable difficulties on the other side in defining them, it seems that the term "sub-species" might here be used with propriety. But from long habit the term "race" will perhaps always be employed. The choice of terms is only so far important in that it is desirable to use, as far as possible, the same terms for the same degrees of difference."

"In a series of forms graduating insensibly from some ape-like creature to man as he now exists, it would be impossible to fix on any definite point when the term "man" ought to be used. But this is a matter of very little importance. So again, it is almost a matter of indifference whether the so-called races of man are thus designated, or are ranked as species or sub-species; but the latter term appears the more appropriate."

"A most important obstacle in civilised countries to an increase in the number of men of a superior class has been strongly insisted on by Mr. Greg and Mr. Galton, namely, the fact that the very poor and reckless, who are often degraded by vice, almost invariably marry early, whilst the careful and frugal, who are generally otherwise virtuous, marry late in life, so that they may be able to support themselves and their children in comfort. . .Those who marry early produce within a given period not only a greater number of generations, but, as shewn by Dr. Duncan they produce many more children. Thus the reckless, degraded, and often vicious members of society, tend to increase at a quicker rate than the provident and generally virtuous members. Or as Mr. Greg puts the case: 'The careless, squalid, unaspiring Irishman multiplies like rabbits..."
​

(Charles Darwin: Descent of Man, see Chapter VII - On the Races of Man)

Can't wait to see how many of the anticreationists run to defend Darwin.

Have a nice day
Mark

Nothing to defend... if you read it in context.

I do appreciate the smokescreen, though... goes nicely with the blizzard we've been having.