Evolution Flashcards
What happened to the English Peppered Moths?
- During the industrial revolution, the populations of black and flecked moths fluctuated
- Pollution favoured the black peppered moth and so it’s population increased as it was able to camouflage better with it’s surroundings
- Clear skies (which happened when they introduced the clean-air act) favoured flecked moths and so their population increased
Adaptations vs. Variations
Adaptations: Structural, behavioural, physiological processes that help an organism survive
Variations: Structural, functional, physiological differences caused by small mutations in DNA that are inherited
What is Normal Distribution?
polygenic inheritance where a specific trait depends on many external/internal factors
Who was James Hutton?
Geologist who therorized actualism, geographical forces shaped the Earth
Who was Charles Lyell?
Geologist who proposed uniformitarianism, geological processes happen at the same rates, change is long and slow, and Earth is shaped by constant geographical forces
Who was Georges Cuvier?
Paleontologist who proposed catastrophism, catastrophes (flood, volcanoes) killed all the species in one area to allow nearby species to come in and repopulate it
Who was Jean Baptiste Lamarck?
Naturalist who found the line of descent, thought we could ´evolve our own bodies and proposed the inheritance of acquired characteristics, traits that were acquired in an organism’s life could be passed on to the offspring
Who was Thomas Malthus
Economist that developed malthus theory, populations produce offspring faster than their environment can support them, and so the least fit ones would die
Who was Charles Darwin?
proposed the theory of evolution by natural selection but called it descent with modification, change doesn’t mean progress (ie. the species doesn’t get any closer to perfection) change has no demonstration of perfection and no direction
Who was Alfred Wallace?
reached very similar conclusions as Charles Darwin but was lesser-off and less known.
Natural vs. Artificial Selection
in natural selection the environment places pressure, in artificial selection humans place pressure
Selective Pressure
pressure from the environment to allow only a specific trait to be more desirable than the others at a specific time
Who were the contributors to evolution?
HLCLMDW
What are the 5 evidences for evolution?
Palaeontology, BioGeography, Anatomy, Embryology, DNA
What are the 6 causes of microevolution?
Genetic Drift, Non-Random Mating, Natural Selection, Gene Flow, Sexual Selection, Mutations.
