Robert writes:

>Darwin didn't help things in the title of his most famous book:
>"The Origin of  Species
>By means of Natural Selection or the Preservation of Favoured Races in the
>Struggle for Life"
>
>I don't think he was  referring to races of humans.

That's correct. "Race" is a biological term, albeit one now not
commonly used,
but a term that is essentially synomymous with "variety" and
"subspecies." See
for example the statement, "The organization of this checklist is by class. The
orders, families, genera, and species are organized alphabetically within each
class heading. No distinction is made between subspecies, race, or variety so
all infraspecific epithets have been treated as subspecies", which occurs at:

http://hbs.bishopmuseum.org/abtarthrocklist.html

To read the title of Darwin's book more accurately, using modern verbiage,
substitute the word "variety" for "race," as "The
Origin of  Species by Means
of Natural Selection or the Preservation of Favoured Varieties in the Struggle
for Life."

Wirt Atmar
---
þ RIMEGate(tm)/RGXPost V1.14 at BBSWORLD * Info{at}bbsworld.com

---
 * RIMEGate(tm)V10.2áÿ* RelayNet(tm) NNTP Gateway * MoonDog BBS
 * RgateImp.MoonDog.BBS at 1/7/03 9:06:28 PM