Weblog 4
The first thing that enters my mind when I think of Charles Darwin’s theory of evolution is survival of the fittest. In order to survive a species must evolve in certain ways to survive in the environment it is in. If it does not evolve when the environment or habitat it lives in changes it will die. The species that have not evolved die more often than the ones that have. Making the majority of the species evolved. The evolved species then passes evolved genes to its offspring. This makes the number of species that have not evolved less and less until there is no more in existence. Charles Darwin found his theory when he went to the Galapagos Islands. He found species there that were similar to the ones he had studied; only they were slightly different. They were the same species but were different because the environments where they lived were different. This means that each one had to evolve differently to stay alive. This is how and why we came to categorize all of the different species in a certain order, genus, class, phylum, and kingdom. I believe every species have gone through some kind of evolution to get to how they are today. Our environment has been changing since the beginning of time, and it won’t stop changing. Each species will have to evolve to keep up with the changes in their habitat. One specific example of this is obviously the homosapien. It is commonly thought that humans evolved from apes. There are many fossils to prove his theory. Most species that have evolved came from much larger species. The dinosaur is one example of that. Lizards are thought to be descendants of dinosaurs. The reason many species are smaller now is because today’s environment cannot sustain large appetites. Some species could not evolve so they became extinct. They did not have enough food or the climates changed and were not able to live in a new environment. The process of evolution is extremely slow and an internal change. The smallest change in DNA will evolve you in a great way.
After reading Charles Darwin’s Understanding of Natural Selection I realize that the main reason his work became so successful, in part, was ‘because of his clear and elegant literary style’. He used popular literature to explain his scientific concepts. He gave to much detailed information in all of his research. I did not realize before exactly why he was so much more popular than all of the other scientists.
I also did not realize how painstaking the evolution process is and how the body preserves everything good and gets rid of everything bad until the evolution is done. Also I realize now that the evolution process can only act as a good towards the species than bad. I also did not know about the sexual selection. Natural selection can modify and change the relationship of one sex to another in a species. The two sexes can have completely different habitats in life.
From the reading I realize that I had a pretty good understanding of Charles Darwin, but there is always more to learn. His theory is extremely simple yet profound.
Darwin’s essay was like a science report to me. He backed up his observations, but seemed to be unscientific because some of his conclusions stemmed from “imaginary” situations, based on real observations. I gained a greater understanding of where he was diriving his theories from. I was curoius about who he was refering to when he said that nature pointed to a “higher workmanship”. He never elaborated on who the higher workman was,perhaps he does in other essays.
I really liked how you brought about the idea of evolution enhancing a species. I never thought about that directly! It’s interesting to think that evolution would never stop until there was absolutely no more room for improvement.
It sounds like you gained a lot of knowledge from this assignment. The information contained in your essay about Darwin’s research was very interesting. It’s amazing how the process of evolution works, it makes the old saying true, only the strong survive.
You mentioned Darwin’s successfulness was because of his talent for literature. It might be one of advantageous reasons, but I believe the major reasons are his strenuous examination, recording, and comparing, not literary skills. Without definite evidences, no scientist supports the view. Darwin’s theory is still an essential learning in biology which means, I believe, many evidences show the reliability.