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The Influence of Evolution The many factors motivating Verner to bring Ota to the United States were complex, but he evidently was “much influenced by the theories of Charles Darwin” a theory of evolution which, as it developed historically, increasingly divided humankind into arbitrarily contrived races (Rymer 1992, 3). Verner also believed that the Africans were an “inferior race” (Verner 1908a; 10, 717). Hallet shows that Darwin also felt Pygmies were inferior humans:
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