Note 17 — Chapter II

In his work, “Die Darwinsche Theorie und der Sozialismus” Dr. L. Woltmann has brought out clearly the difference between the combat in nature and that which takes place in society. He says: “The history of the civilization of the human race also proceeds upon the basis of the great biological principles of adaptation, transmission, and perfection in the struggle for existence. But between the application of these principles among the lower animals and in the world of man there are the following essential differences. In the first place in the animal world the struggle for existence takes place through the adaptation of organic means to organic ends, while with men technical tools and economical means of production enter in, things which are not within the power of separate individuals, but are made possible by association. In the second place hereditary transmission in the case of animals is organic, while in the case of human beings there is added an external and legally determined hereditary transmission of technical tools and of capital. In the animal kingdom, in the third place, the struggle for existence is a rivalry of organic production and reproduction, while among men, especially under the capitalistic order, there takes place a competition in commodities and places, a contest for profit, which has hardly anything in common with natural selection.”17