Charles Darwin brought to the question of marriage the same patient exactitude with which he contemplated finches and earthworms, though he didn't quite maintain his dispassion.
"Not forced to visit relatives, and to bend in every trifle," wrote Darwin on the "Not Marry" side of the infamous two-column list he used to weigh the pros and cons of lifelong union to young Emma Wedgewood. "Anxiety and responsibility — less money for books etc. — if many children forced to gain one's bread."
But love's rewards and fears of solitude eventually swayed him. "Imagine living all one's day solitarily in smoky dirty London House," he wrote on the other side of the list. "Picture to yourself a nice soft wife on a sofa with good fire, & books & music perhaps."
Charles and Emma married in 1839 and were, by all accounts, a loving couple, raising seven children to adulthood and finding compromise between Charles' theory of evolution and Emma's Christian beliefs.
"Better than a dog anyhow," he wrote.
To see the list, visit The Complete Work of Charles Darwin Online. For more on brains, decision-making and marriage — neuroscience journalist Jonah Lehrer calls Darwin's list-making approach "completely useless" — read "The Science of When to Get Married."
See Also:
Brandon Keim's Twitter stream and Del.icio.us feed; Wired Science on Facebook.
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