Download File - Eric Simmons

Eric Simmons
Ryan Barney
Biology 1090
Darwinism/Evolution
When people hear the word “Darwinism” they think of things like the Darwin Awards or
Evolution. What most people don’t understand is that there is a lot more behind the idea of Darwinism
than just a website dedicated to giving awards to people who die in interesting ways or the idea of
humans coming from a fish and later changing into humans. Normally some would find this either boring
or not practical due to religious beliefs or just being plain lazy, but the point that I want to make is that
there is more to Darwinism than meets the eye. The following will be discussed throughout the paper to
have a clear understanding of what Darwinism really is and to show that with an open mind you can
genuinely find an interesting stand view or point of the topic. The selection that will be covered first is
who Charles Darwin was and how is idea of Evolution came to be, than Speciation what it is and how it
works and finally Natural Selection and how it came to be. Hopefully this can help anyone who is trying
to get a better understanding of Darwinism/Evolution can be educated and look at it in a different way
as I have come to find it.
Charles Darwin was a well-known scientist to the world, becoming infamous the discovery of
evolution by natural selection and how it revolutionized biology. He was born in February 1809 in
Shrewsbury Britain, you could say that Darwin was destined to be a doctor, or that is what is father
wanted him to be because during those times Science was a silly subject to even really consider and the
real fame and money was in Medicine. After dropping some school and other things he went on to sail
around parts of the world to observe animal life on what was a planned 2 year voyage ended up being a
5 year trip, which changed him and the world.
Charles Darwin was not the first person in the world to toy around with the idea of Evolution,
that was Jean Lamarck, but instead of the concept of a ladder idea where one species becomes another,
Darwin explained it like a tree with branch’s giving many different species. In our current Human Biology
text we are using in class there is an excerpt that explained it perfectly, after returning from the
Galapagos Islands, “Darwin reflected on his observations and concluded that the populations of
tortoises on the different islands must have descended from a single ancestral tortoise population.
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There was even a similar pattern of divergence between other groups of species on the islands and the
closest mainland.” After making these observations he came up with the theory of evolution which can
be defined as: all species on Earth are descendants of a single common ancestor, and all species
represent the product of millions of years of accumulated micro evolutionary changes.
Speciation is defined as, “The evolution of 1 or more species from an ancestral form.” For
example, If we were to take a lizard from somewhere like Western Europe, where the climate fluctuates
but it’s not just one extreme environment, we take 2 lizards and put one in a Desert and another in a
tropic rain forest they will eventually with time adapt to that environment and end up changing color to
either absorb the heat or even to blend in with the environment for defense. Even though they are in
different parts of the world they still come from the same ancestry and have become a new type of
species over time.
Darwin discovered as he went from a different part of the world to another he observed that
the species that were in those different environments had similar attributes and later came up with
reproductive isolation, which is just a type of speciation, reproductive isolation is weak in the early
stages of speciation, but changes to strong or complete in later stages of speciation.
Finally natural selection, natural selection is the bread and butter to Darwin’s idea of Evolution. I
saved this one for last because Darwin actually viewed evolution as natural selection. Darwin explained
Natural Selection as, “species can form by the evolution of one species splitting into two, or via a
population diverging from its extant ancestor to the point it was a new species.” Or also known today as
survival of the fittest. Species would continue to live on in their natural habitat unless something caused
them to move or become extinct or in other words it was either adapt or die. Most species would adapt
and eventually with time become a whole new species but coming from the same ancestry. Sound
familiar? It’s all a giant circle, evolution is defined as a change in species, what causes these species to
change? A change in environment aka speciation, and if they evolve splitting into two species than they
have beaten natural selection or the idea of “survival of the fittest.”
Today, because of Darwin, natural selection is considered one of the most important causes of
evolution. There are many other topics such as genetic drift and sexual selection also cause populations
to change over time. It took many years for scientists to accept the concept of natural selection but
today it has been accepted apart of biological science worldwide.
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From what we discussed about Evolution, or Darwinism, speciation and natural selection go
hand in hand to make the theory of Darwinism complete. Without the observations of the voyage of the
Beagle that Darwin took there would be no theory of evolution which would mean he would not have
found the reason why speciation occurs and how natural selection has a key role for species to even
exist or not. Over all I was not a big fan of Darwinism due to religious beliefs but I do believe there is a
type of evolution that occurs that allows us to adapt and survive in the society we do now. Because I
have taken the time to understand how Darwinism functions I have been able to accept and understand
parts of it and apply it to everyday life.
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BIBILIOGRAPHY
Safran, Rebecca J. "Speciation: The Origin of New Species." Nature.com. Nature Publishing Group, n.d.
Web. 17 Apr. 2013. <http://www.nature.com/scitable/knowledge/library/speciation-the-origin-of-newspecies-26230527>.
Lennox, James. "Darwinism." (Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy). Stanford University, 13 Aug. 2003.
Web. 17 Apr. 2013. <http://plato.stanford.edu/entries/darwinism/>.
Belk, Colleen M., and Virginia Borden. Maier. Human Biology. SLCC ed. San Francisco: Benjamin
Cummings, 2009. Print.
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