Page 256 - The Social Weapon: Darwinism

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As the various mental faculties gradually developed themselves the
brain would almost certainly become larger. ... the large proportion
which the size of man's brain bears to his body, compared to the same
proportion in the gorilla or orang, is closely connected with his higher
mental powers ... that there exists in man some close relation between
the size of the brain and the development of the intellectual faculties is
supported by the comparison of the skulls of savage and civilised races,
of ancient and modern people, and by the analogy of the whole verte-
brate series. 149

According to the claim put forward by Darwin, studies on skull
measurements and brain volumes (under the primitive scientific con-
ditions of his time) would furnish data supporting the theory of evo-
lution. Yet actually, the scientific results ran totally contrary to this
claim. Different skull measurements or brain volumes provided no in-
formation to support the theory of evolution. Indeed, it is now con-
clusively accepted that such measurements do not constitute any
valid comparison.
One scientist who imagined that he could allege that women
were inferior by using craniology (the science of skull measurement)
was Paul Broca. Regarded as one of the founders of physical anthro-
pology, he was one of those who employed and supported such prim-
itive methods as measuring the skulls of human groups and attaching

values to them. 150 In the light of these supposedly scientific measure-
ments, Broca went on to display the following distorted logic:
In general, the brain is larger in mature adults than in the elderly, in
men than in women, in eminent men than in men of mediocre talent, in
superior races than in inferior races ... Other things equal, there is a re-
markable relationship between the development of intelligence and the
volume of the brain. 151
Broca was particularly interested in the skull differences be-
tween men and women. In a prejudiced manner, he analyzed the skull

measurements he collected and came up with the assumption that

The Social Weapon: Darwinism