#IS NATURAL SELECTION 2 DEAD SERIES#

Maasai giraffe browses on leaves of a tall tree in the Maasai Mara National Reserve, Kenya. Difference between Darwinian and Lamarckian evolution Around the same time as Darwin, British biologist Alfred Russel Wallace independently came up with the theory of evolution by natural selection, while French biologist Jean-Baptiste Lamarck proposed that an organism could pass on traits to its offspring, though he was wrong about some of the details. The colorful plumage of peacocks and the antlers of male deer are both examples of traits that evolved under this type of selection.Д«ut Darwin wasn't the first or only scientist to develop a theory of evolution.

Their bodies became more streamlined, and they developed tail flukes to better propel themselves through water.Дarwin also described a form of natural selection that depends on an organism's success at attracting a mate - a process known as sexual selection. Other body parts of early whales also changed. In later generations, more genetic changes occurred, moving the nose farther back on the head. Such individuals were more successful and had more offspring. The whales with this adaptation would have been better suited to a marine lifestyle, since they would not have had to completely surface to breathe. The evolution of the blowhole, for example, might have started with random genetic changes that resulted in at least one whale having its nostrils farther back on its head.

#IS NATURAL SELECTION 2 DEAD SERIES#

Take the example of whales: By using evolution as a guide and understanding how natural selection works, biologists knew that the transition of early whales from land to water occurred in a series of predictable steps. When this process happens over a relatively short period of time and in a species or small group of organisms, scientists call it 'microevolution.'Д«ut when given enough time and accumulated changes, natural selection can create entirely new species, a process known as 'macroevolution.' This long-term process is what turned dinosaurs into birds, amphibious mammals (such as an animal called Indohyus) into whales and a common ancestor of apes and humans into the people, chimps and gorillas we know today. Natural selection can alter a species in small ways, causing a population to change color or size over the course of several generations. To understand the origin of whales, you need a basic understanding of how natural selection works. (Image credit: Leonello Calvetti/Getty Images) (See the open-access textbook Concepts of Biology for more information about these lines of evidence.)ДЄrchaeopteryx, shown here in this illustration, is considered the first bird-like dinosaur on record, dating to about 150 million years ago during the Jurassic period.

It is one of the best-substantiated theories in the history of science, supported by evidence from a wide variety of scientific disciplines, including not just genetics (which shows that different species have similarities in their DNA) but also paleontology and geology (through the fossil record, which shows how that species that existed in the past are different from those present today), and developmental biology (species that seem very different as adults pass through similar stages of embryological development, suggesting a shared evolutionary past). But future research by geneticists provided the mechanism and additional evidence for evolution by natural selection (see вЂњModern Understanding,вЂќ below). Here, 'fitness' refers not to an organism's strength or athleticism but rather its ability to survive and reproduce.Дarwin did not know the mechanism by which traits were passed on, according to National Geographic that is, he did not know about genetics, the mechanism by which genes encode for certain traits and those traits are passed from one generation to the next he also didnвЂ™t know about genetic mutation, which is the source of natural variation.

The theory is sometimes described as 'survival of the fittest,' but that characterization can be misleading, Pobiner said. Put simply, the theory can be described as 'descent with modification,' said Briana Pobiner, an anthropologist and educator at the Smithsonian National Museum of Natural History in Washington, D.C., who specializes in the study of human origins. In natural selection, it's the natural environment, rather than a human being, that does the selecting. Darwin chose the term 'natural selection' to be in contrast with 'artificial selection,' in which animal breeders select for particular traits that they deem desirable, according to National Geographic.

Is natural selection 2 dead