Natural Selection: A Case Study

     Darwin’s Theory of Natural Selection, a scientific theory that supported the belief of evolution, was manipulated and applied to different areas of life, and thus it became the shaping force in European thought in the last half of the nineteenth century. Darwin, through observation of organisms, determined that a system

Many people are familiar with the words natural selection, an idea that was popularized by Darwin in the 19th century; to simply define it, natural selection is nature’s editing mechanism that results in the favoring of some individuals over others when exposed to certain environmental factors. Artificial selection parallels the process of natural selection but with an added twist: the involvement of human beings. Artificial selection is “a process in which humans consciously select for or against particular features in organisms” allowing “only organisms with the desired feature to reproduce or may provide more resources to the organisms with the desired feature” (Artificial Selection, n.d.).

Evolutionary biology has always interested me, specifically the mechanisms of natural selection and how species adapt to their environment. It started with my love for animals and nature when I was little. I spent my summers working with horses at a local corral, where I would ride around the surrounding wilderness areas. My favorite part about riding in the mountains was watching the change in plant and animal species as the elevation changed. It never ceased to amaze me how the alpine tree line was always so sudden. Humongous pine trees would give way to the short, shrubby plants of the alpine tundra so uniformly and noticeably. I have always wondered about the environmental conditions that cause species to distribute themselves in

Background Information Evolution is the process of biological change by which descendants come to differ from their ancestors. Natural Selection is when an individual with the best trait survive and breed in more population. Larger populations of organisms with the desired traits will then occur and organisms will evolve. The four principles of Natural Selection are variation, over production, adaptation, and descent with modification. Charles Darwin, an English naturalist and geologist saw two major trends within organisms which were variation and adaptation. Variations are differences in individuals’ physical traits compared to other individuals. In the Galapagos Islands Darwin noticed that finches had different beak sizes and shapes. Darwin then concluded that finches with thicker beaks lived in areas where nuts were the main food source and finches with smaller beaks tended to live in areas where insects were the main food source. Adaptation are features that allow an organism to better survive in their environment. There has been many adaptations in animals but one of the best has been living in groups because animals can then “help each other find food, defend against predators and care for their young” (animalpanet, n.d.). Overproduction is when organisms produce more offspring than the environment can support. Darwin stated that all animals over produce since offspring can reach reproduction age and have offspring of their own. For example, “even a slow breeder

“If no such variations exist, the population rapidly goes extinct because it cannot adapt to a changing environment” (O’Neil, 1998-2013). Scientists call this reproductive success. “Within a specific environment context, one genotype will be better than another genotype in survival or reproduction for certain reasons having to do with the way its particular features relate to the environment or relate to other organisms within the population” (Futuyma, 2000-2014). The theory of evolution is explicable through various kinds of scientific research.

In topic 1, the introduction to human uniqueness and social coercion theory, we are introduced to some of the common misinterpretation behind Charles’ Darwin’s theory of evolution, specifically in regards to natural selection and survival of the fittest. One of the biggest contributors to this issue is the lack of exposure to the general public on the overall theory behind these two processes. Instead of a full detailed explanation about natural selection and survival of the fittest, we are just told that it is slow and that to be fit means a level of superiority among competition, respectively. Topic 1 revealed that this is not true, as well as stating that natural selection is about individual risk, benefit and cost is of the utmost importance(Bingham). Based on this newly found insight from the course, how does individual risk, benefit, and cost play such an important role in natural selection even though selection is seen in a population and not a

Selection is the functional relationship between phenotypes and fitness. Natural selection is the production of organisms according to their physical attributes whereby off springs of the younger generations takes the strong, desired and inheritable aspects of their parents. They become more adapted to the environment although some does well than others according to their individual traits which are attributed to their phenotypes (Sinervo, 1997). According to Charles Darwin, fitness can be described in three different forms of selection which interferes with the mean of phenotypic traits in a population. They include: directional selection; stabilizing selection; and destructive selection.

Natural selection is considered to be the primary mechanism by which Evolution happens. Darwin posited that because any species can exceed the resources necessary to sustain life, a struggle for existence develops. In this struggle, “individuals with heritable traits that increase survival and reproductive success will pass on those traits to their offspring while those that do not will tend to be eliminated.” It is interesting to note that Darwin’s thoughts on natural selection were heavily influenced by Edward Blyth. Blyth, however, viewed natural selection as a conservative process whose goal was to keep organisms essentially unchanged.

BIOL375L 12/12/2014 Hiroki Takamiyagi Natural selection • Introduction Charles Darwin originally argued that all existing organism are the modified descendants of one or a few simple ancestors that arose on Earth in the distant past (Smith, 1989). Darwin also argued that the main driving force of evolution is what he defined as natural selection. Natural selection is the process that reproductively successful or environmentally well-adapted traits of individuals, is often as a result of mutation, inherited and become a part of a population’s traits through generations (Bell, 2008). In simple words, natural selection is a change in an allele frequency in a population over time. In order to prove this idea, Darwin carried out artificial genetic

Before I describe my interpretation of “natural selection,” it is necessary to define “knowledge,” which, in terms of this essay, is an idea or technology developed to improve the lives, and has been shown to do so. I interpreted the scientific term “natural selection,” to better

Evolution by artificial selection and natural selection have in common that they both favor certain traits over others. Moreover, they select on traits that are heritable, but they differ in the way traits are selected. Natural selection favors multiple ways to improve an individual’s fitness while in artificial selection, humans decide which traits they want to have in the next generation, which actually reduce the individual’s fitness.

In the origin of the species Darwin argues that every species adapt in order to survive. Natural selection is the form where parents transfer what is necessary to live in a certain environment and with time the descendants start changing accordingly to the necessities to stay alive. Darwin mentions that those species that change will survive and prosper, but on the other hand, the species incapable of changing will die and become

Natural selection is one of the most significant methods in which evolution can occur in a population that was proposed by Charles Darwin, among other scientists, in the 1800s. The term summarizes the concept that heritable traits that are able to survive, due to fitness for their environment, and successfully reproduce will likely become more common among a population. On the other hand, natural selection also includes the idea that heritable traits that either cannot survive, or have unsuccessful reproduction will become less common in a population. Other aspects of natural selection as a whole include evidence from various scientific fields, the key points of the process, its causes, and its effects.

Modern scientists believe that new species emerge when small populations become isolated from the parent group and encounter new selective pressures that may favor different characteristics. Natural selection is currently viewed as one of four major forces in the evolution of species. Natural selection enabled Darwin to explain the mechanisms of biological evolution, and it remains a powerful explanation for the development of living species of plants and animals.

Charles Darwin broached the theory of natural selection in his book the Origin of Species, which has been considered the basis of evolutionary biology to this day. Natural selection is when populations of a species evolve over the course of many generations. Darwin believed that species were not created separately,