Exa, 1: Ch2 Flashcards
building on the ideas first propsed by James Hutton, Charles Lyell aimed to explain Earth’s geological features using an approach known as uniformitarianism, which hypothesized that _____
the same geological processes currently observable operate over very long periods in a slow & gradual manner
as opposed to uniformitarianism, the approach known as catastrophism explains that the Earth’s geological features are a result of
sudden , cataclysmic & large scale geological events
Charles darwin’s grandfather Erasmus darwin, an English physician and philosopher, was one of the first to propose the idea of evolutionary change. what did he propose?
proposed all life developed from what he called a single living filament (living things changed overtime)
jean-baptiste lamarck hypothesized that changes acquired during the lifetime of an individual organism, as a result of adapting to its environment, are passed on to progeny, why was this incorrect but still important?
acquired traits are not heritable, but Lamarck’s idea was important because he was the 1st to propose s process for evolutionary change
what were Charles Darwin’s two fundamental insights abt the process of evolution?
the environment selects on variation in the traits of individual organisms & all species have descended from one or a few common ancestors
which scientist of those listed below was a contemporary of Charles Darwin and also developed a complere theory of evolution by natural selection
alfred russel wallace
The primary differences between the processes of natural selection and artificial selection is/are
the selective agent and the period over time over which change occurs
to explain how varieties were on the path to becoming new species, Charles Darwin introduced the concept of
descent with modification
Thomas Malthus, a political economist showed that the human population would outstrip availble resources unless kept in check by other factors such as famine, war and disease. How did Charles DArwin apply this principle to his theory of evolution by natural selection
realized this also applied to plant and animal pop. and this struggle for existence was the opportunity for natural selection to act on differences within population
critics of darwin’s proposals argued that natural selection coulf not result in the evolution of complex trait primarily because
they had no value until fully formed
which. of the following is an example of a vestigal trait
human tail bone, wisdom teeth, appendix, tonsil, cocyx
vestigal traits: features of an organism that are considered to have last much or all of their original function thru evolution
