Originally published in May 1917
“Mr. Chalmers Mitchell’s new book, ‘Darwinism and War’ is a reply to the argument in favor of war, so often put forth in the last three years by a certain German school, that a state of constant struggle or warfare is a dominant factor in evolution. These writers declare that war is both necessary and admirable, and is in fact a biological law which man cannot resist, and that it is, moreover, beneficial in the long run, favoring the survival of the strongest and ablest races. Mr. Mitchell finds, however, in his own words: ‘Natural selection results from the conservation of favored races rather than from the extermination of one race by another.’ He finds nothing in common between the grouping of individuals which forms a modern nation and that which constitutes a race or species of animals. In short he believes it is entirely inadmissible to attempt to justify human conduct by laws supposed to be dominant in the animal kingdom.”
—Scientific American, May 1917
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