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Y6 EVOLUTION AND
INHERITANCE
LESSON 4:
‘On the Origin of
Species by
Natural Selection’
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TODAY YOU WILL LEARN
• About the publication of Darwin’s book ‘On
the Origin of Species by Natural Selection’
• Why Charles Darwin’s Finches were such an
important part of his Theory Of Evolution
• How Evolution by Natural Selection really
works
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DARWIN FINALLY
PUBLISHES HIS IDEAS
After he came back from the
voyage of the Beagle, Darwin
started to put his ideas together
ready for publication. It took him
over 20 years to do this!
WHY DID IT TAKE HIM
SO LONG?
It was such a complicated theory
that he needed a long time to
work it out. He also wanted to
make sure that he would be able
to defend it if people tried to say
it was wrong.
WHY WOULD PEOPLE SAY
IT WAS WRONG?
At that time in history, there was a lot
of belief in a religious view of the
world from Christianity and other
religions, which used the bible to
date the point at which life on Earth
began to between 5,000 and 7,000
years old.
WHY WOULD PEOPLE SAY
IT WAS WRONG?
Even now, many people still
believe in this ‘Creationism’ point
of view, even though there is an
overwhelming amount of evidence
to prove Darwin’s Theory of
Evolution.
ALFRED RUSSELL
WALLACE
In fact, Darwin would have
taken even longer to publish
his book if it hadn’t been for a
man called Alfred Russell
Wallace, who wrote to Darwin
to say that he had the same
idea!
1859: DARWIN
PUBLISHES
Darwin quickly realised that
he needed to publish his idea
in something called a
‘scientific paper’. He also
made sure that Wallace’s
paper was published at the
same time.
1859: DARWIN
PUBLISHES
Soon afterwards, one of the
most famous books in the
history of science was
published, with the full title
‘On the Origin of Species by
Natural Selection’.
BUT WHAT
DID IT ALL
MEAN?
LET’S LOOK IN MORE
DETAIL AT TWO THINGS
ABOUT THE THEORY OF
EVOLUTION THAT WE
LEARNED IN THE LAST
LESSON ..
WHAT DARWIN LEARNED – HIS
‘THEORY OF EVOLUTION’
• That differences in the offspring of living things (called
VARIATION) create different characteristics that give them a
better or worse chance of survival in different conditions, called
NATURAL SELECTION.
• This slow process over millions of years results in living things
changing to adapt to their environments, leading to completely
new species, which he called the THEORY OF EVOLUTION.
Or in other words, if
you fit the place you
are born in better than
the other creatures
around you, you will live
longer!
DARWIN’S FINCHES
• One of Darwin’s main discoveries were the
different types of finches in the Galapagos
islands, which all had different beaks to match
different food even though they had all
descended from the same basic type of bird!
DARWIN’S FINCHES:
DIFFERENT BEAKS FOR
DIFFERENT JOBS!
NATURAL SELECTION
Why have these animal attributes
been ‘selected’ by nature to give
the animal a better chance of
survival?
NATURAL SELECTION
NATURAL SELECTION
NATURAL SELECTION
NATURAL SELECTION
LEARNING CHECK:
Tell the person next to you ..
• What the Theory of Evolution
by Natural Selection is
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