Evolution

• Based on Darwin's Voyage of Discovery, Observation 1 was that more offspring are produced than can survive. organisms are capable of producing more offspring than their environment can support.
• Based on Darwin's Voyage of Discovery, Observation 2 was that environmental resources are limited. This leads to competition among species for resources in each generation.
• Based on Darwin's Voyage of Discovery, Observation 3 was that offpsring vary in their traits. The offspring in any generation will be slightly different from one another in their traits (colour, size, shape, etc).
• Based on Darwin's Voyage of Discovery, Observation 4 was that traits are often heritable. In living organisms, any characteristics are inherited (ie. passed from parent to offspring).
• Based on Darwin's Voyage of Discovery, Inference 1 was that in a population, some individuals will have inherited traits that help them survive and reproduce (based on the conditions of the environment, such as the predators and food sources present). Individuals will helful (ie. environmentally favorable traits) will leave more offspring in the next generation than their peers (because the traits make them more effective at surviving and reproducing).
• Based on Darwin's Voyage of Discovery, Inference 2 was that because helpful traits are heritable, and because organisms with these traits leave more offspring, helpful traits tend to become more common (ie. present in a larger fraction of the population) in the next generation.
• Based on Darwin's Voyage of Discovery, Inference 3 was that over generations, the population will become adapted to its environment (as individuals with traits helpful in that environment have consistently greater reproductive success than their peers).
• Paleontology: The study of the past and ancient life, especially the distant past, through the examination of fossils. Founder was Georges-Louis-Leclerc.
• Catastrophism: The idea that the Earth is constantly changing and that the present is the result of a series of cataclysmic events. Catastrophes such as floods, diseases and droughts periodically destroyed species living in a particular region, allowing species from neighboring regions to repopulation the area. Founder is Georges-Louis-Leclerc.
• Uniformitarianism: The belief that geological processes occurring today were also responsible for shaping the earth millions of years ago. This theory was developed by James Hutton and further improved by Charles Lyell who stated that geological processes operated at the same rates in the past as they do today.
• Inheritance of acquired characteristics: the idea that characteristics acquired during and organism's lifetime can be passed on to its offspring. This is false and is known as the Lamarckian theory. Founder is Jean-Baptiste Lamark.
• Natural selection: A process whereby favorable variations or mutations accumulate within populations due to differential reproduction. It is the mechanism by which evolution occurs. Founders are Charles Darwin and Alfred Russel Wallace.
• Theory of natural selection: The concept that all living things share a common ancestry; related organisms differ from one another in small ways that accumulate over time; and new species arise when existing ones change sufficiently so that they no longer interbreed. Founders are Charles Darwin and Alfred Russel Wallace.
• Darwin’s finches: Birds with different beak shapes found on the Galapagos Islands. They have evolved differently because their food sources vary between islands.
• Biogeography refers to the distribution of plants and animals across the globe. Similarities between species found in distant areas suggest that these species may have evolved from a common ancestor.
• Homologous structures refer to similar body parts shared by unrelated species. For example, wings in birds and bats are analogous.
• Peppered moths: In England, peppered moths changed coloration depending on whether they lived near trees covered in pollution (dark) or not (light).
• Embryonic development involves studying how embryos develop into adults. This can reveal similarities among seemingly dissimilar species.
• Artificial selection is selective breeding done by humans to produce desired traits in domesticated animals and crops.
• Embryonic development refers to how embryos develop into adults. If embryos look alike at certain stages, it suggests that those species might have had a common ancestor.
• Use and disuse: body parts not used will eventually disappear. Founder is Jean-Baptise Lamark and is false.
• Evolution: Proposed by Darwin, the process of genetic change in a population over time.
• Survival of the fittest: the idea that organisms that are the most fit leave the most offspring so those organisms win the struggle for survival; phrase coined by John Spencer. Founder of this is Charles Darwin.
• Speciation: The evolutionary process by which new species arise from existing ones through natural selection acting on random mutations.
• Descent with modification: Darwin's theory that natural selection does not demonstrate progress, but merely results from a species' ability to survive local conditions at a specific time.
• Charles and Wallace are the founders of the theory of evolution by natural selection.
• fossil records: remains and traces of past life that are found in sedimentary rock. Reveals the history of life on heart and the kinds of organisms that were alive in the past.
• Fossils found in young layers of rock are much more similar to species alive today than fossils found in older, deeper layers of rock.
• Fossils apper in chronological order in the rock layers.
• Organisms do not all appear in the fossil record at the same time.
• transitional fossils: show "intermediary links" between groups of organisms.
• vestigial structures: features inherited from an ancestor but is now less elaborate and less functional than in ancestor.
• biogeography: study of the past and present geographical distribution of organisms
• geographically close environments are more likely o be populated by related species than locations that are geogrpahically separate but environmentally similar
• animals found on islands often closely resemble animals found on the closest continent
• fossils of the same species can be found on the coastline of neighboring continents
• closely related species are almost never found in the exactly the same location or habitat
• homologous structures: similar structural elements and origin but may have different function
• analogous structures: similar functions but different ancestor
• embryology: the study of early pre-birth stages of an organisms' development