Thoeries Of Evolution

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processes was proposed by
Charles Darwin. His most famous book, On the Origin of Species by Means of
Natural Selection (1859), is a landmark in human understanding of nature.
Pointing to variability within species, Darwin observed that while offspring
inherit a resemblance to their parents, they are not identical to them. He
further noted that some of the differences between offspring and parents were
not due soley to the environment but were themselves often inheritable. Animal
breeders were often able to change the characteristics of domestic animals by
selecting for reproduction those individuals with the most desirable qualities.
Darwin reasoned that, in nature, individuals with qualities that made them
better adjusted to their environments or gave them higher reproductive
capacities would tend to leave more offspring; such individuals were said to
have higher fitness. Because more individuals are born than survive to breed,
constant winnowing of the less fit-a natural ...

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accumulationof favorable mutation changes. Natural selection was
reduced to a minor role by mutationist such as Vries. Morgan, and Bates.
While mutation was replacing Darwinism, the leading evolutionary theory,
the science of population genetics was being founded by Sewall Wright, J.B.S.
Haldine, and several other geneticists, all working independantly. They
developed arguments to show that even when a mutation that is immediately
favored appears, its subsequent spread within a population depends on such
variables as the following:

the size of the population
the length of generations
the degree to which the mutation is favorable
...

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