Birth Control - Halliday G. Sutherland (summer reading list .TXT) 📗

IS THERE A NATURAL LAW REGULATING THE PROPORTION OF BIRTHS AND DEATHS?

Section 1. THE THEORY OF THOMAS DOUBLEDAY REVIVED

In 1837 Thomas Doubleday [51] maintained that the rising birthrate of his own time was closely connected with the fall in the standard of living, and his argument implied that, in order to check the excessive birthrate, it was necessary to improve the condition of the mass of the people. Four years later he published The True Law of Population, wherein he stated that when the existence of a species is endangered—

“A corresponding effort is invariably made by Nature for its

preservation and continuance by an increase of fertility, and that this

especially takes place whenever such danger arises from a diminution of

proper nourishment or food, so that consequently the state of depletion

or the deplethoric state is favourable to fertility, and that, on the

other hand, the plethoric state, or state of repletion, is unfavourable

to fertility in the ratio of the intensity of each state.”

By a series of experiments on plants Doubleday discovered that “whatever might be the principle of manure, an overdose of it invariably induced sterility in the plant.” Although his formula is deficient in that food is selected as the one factor in environment which influences fertility, and although it may be an overstatement to claim that fertility varies in exact proportion to abundance or to scarcity, nevertheless his formula contains an important truth which literally knocks the bottom out of the whole Malthusian case.

It is a sad reflection that, while the falsehoods of Malthus have been blindly accepted for the greater part of a century, the work of Doubleday was almost lost in oblivion. His shade has now been recalled to the full centre of the stage, and for this the credit is due to Mr. C.E. Pell. His recent book [52] is a stimulating essay on the declining birthrate, and contains much evidence that supports the main contention of Doubleday. Although it is impossible to agree with all the deductions made by Mr. Pell, he has nevertheless done a public service by restating the problem of the birthrate in a new way, by effectively bursting the Malthusian bubble, and by tabulating fresh evidence against the birth-controllers.

Section 2. MR. PELL’S GENERALISATIONS CRITICISED

Mr. Pell defines the law of births and deaths in two generalisations. The first is: “We have seen that it is a necessary condition of the success of the evolutionary scheme that the variation of the inherited potential degree of fertility between species and species must bear an inverse proportion to their capacity for survival.” [53] At first glance this statement appears hard to be understood; but it is obviously true—because it means that a species that is well adapted to its environment can survive with a low degree of fertility, whereas a species that is not well adapted to its environment requires a high degree of fertility in order to survive. Mr. Pell considers that a “capacity for survival” is synonymous with “nervous energy”; but, as our total knowledge of nervous energy is limited to the fact that it is neither matter nor any known force, the change in words does not mark a real advance in knowledge.

The second generalisation is that “the variation of the degree of animal fertility in response to the direct action of the environment shall bear an inverse proportion to the variation of the survival capacity under that environment.” [54] Here Mr. Pell and I part company. I have already (Chapter III) disputed the causal connection between birthrate and death-rate which Mr. Pell here asserts. His generalisation is made by assuming that birthrates and death-rates rise and fall together: that conditions which produce a high death-rate will also produce a high birthrate and that conditions which cause a low death-rate will also cause a low birthrate; that the increase or decline of a population is due to the direct action of the environment; and finally that “the actual degree of fertility is decided by the direct action of the environment.” [55] On that last rock Mr. Pell’s barque sinks. The mistake here is analogous to the old Darwinian fallacy, abandoned by Huxley and by Romanes, that natural selection is a creative cause of new species. Even if the hypothesis of evolution—and it is merely a hypothesis—be accepted, the only view warranted by reason is that variation of species and their actual degree of fertility may be produced, not by the direct action of environment, but by the reaction of species to their environment—a very different story.

There is no statistical evidence to prove a uniform correspondence between birthrates and death-rates, and it is improbable that there should be a physical law of nature whose operations cannot be demonstrated by mathematical proof. Moreover, we know that the same conditions which cause a high birthrate may cause a low death-rate. In the case of the first settlers in a new country the death-rate is low because the diseases of civilisation are absent and the settlers are usually young, whereas the birthrate is high. If fifty young married couples settle on the virgin soil of a new country it is probable that for many years an enormous birthrate, of over 100, will coexist with a low death-rate.

In reality a high birthrate may coexist with a low death-rate, or with a high death-rate. For example, there is a difference between natural and artificial poverty, the first being brought about by God, or, if any reader prefers to have it so, by Nature, and the second being made by man. Under conditions of natural poverty small groups of people in an open country are surrounded by land not yet cultivated: whereas artificial poverty means a population overcrowded and underfed, living in dark tenements or in back-to-back houses, breathing foul air in ill-ventilated rooms seldom lit by the sun, working long hours in gas-lit workshops for a sweated wage, buying the cheapest food in the dearest market, and drugged by bad liquor. In either case their existence is threatened, although for very different reasons, and the birthrate rises; but under conditions of natural poverty the death-rate is low, whereas in slums the death-rate is high.

Section 3. THE LAW OF DECLINE

It would appear, then, that under conditions of hardship the birthrate tends to rise, and that in circumstances of ease the birthrate tends to fall. If the existence of the inhabitants in a closed country is threatened by scarcity, the birthrate tends to rise. For example, “In some of the remote parts of the country, Orkney and Shetland, the population remained practically stationary between the years 1801 and 1811, and in the next ten years, still years of great scarcity, it increased 15 per cent.” [56]

The governing principle may be expressed in the following generalisation. When the existence of a community is threatened by adversity the birthrate tends to rise; but when the existence of a community is threatened by prosperity the birthrate tends to fall. By adversity I mean war, famine, scarcity, poverty, oppression, an untilled soil, and disease: and by prosperity I mean wealth, luxury, idleness, a diet too rich—especially in flesh meat—and over-civilisation, whereby the physical laws of nature are defied. Now the danger of national decline owing to prosperity can be avoided by a nation that observes the moral law, and this is the most probable explanation of the fact that in