Hostory Of The Evolutionary Theory

Question 1

What is evolution?

Answer 1

Systematic change through time (biological and cultural)

Question 2

Describe Darwinian thinking

Answer 2

• population not individual is the unit of evolution
• variation is the norm
• four evolutionary forces

Question 3

Describe pre Darwinian thinking

Answer 3

• world was static and unchanging
• world was the product of grand design
• typological thinking was the norm

Question 4

What were the beliefs pre Darwin of the natural world

Answer 4

• essentialism
• great chain of being
• Catastrophism and unfenitarianism
• transformational evolution

Question 5

What is essentialism

Answer 5

• traced to Plato
• fixed forms exist perfect and unchanging in eternity
• differences perceived as accidents
• was elaborated on be Aristotle using the differences to arrange into single line

Question 6

What is the genetic chain of being?

Answer 6

• all organisms in one long chain (no gaps, extinctions etc)

- arranged from worst to best (including different humans)

Question 7

Describe Carolus Linnaeus

Answer 7

• created modern biological taxonomy (classification)
• essentialist (fixed number of species)
• didn’t suggest evolution but recognized similarities (humans, apes)
• believed humans a part of nature

Question 8

Who is Georges Cuvier?

Answer 8

-pioneer in palaeontology
-first important excavations of fossils in sene river basin
-“catostophism”
~fossil species wiped out a replaced
~never though species came from on another
~ problem was made creation look disorderly

Question 9

Who was Charles Lyle

Answer 9

-stimulated interest in informitarianism
~ natural forces constantly shaping and reshaping earth
~Change in organisms
~late 19th century replaces catastrophism

Question 10

Who was jean baptistery de Lamarck

Answer 10

• did not believe that organisms existed fixed and unchanging
• explored mechanisms to explain how biological change could occur
• once a species existed it could Change over time to become more perfectly suited to its environment
• developed idea of transformational evolution
• noted fossil species resembled living species, suggest were ancestors
• fossils looked different because influenced by different climate/ geography

Question 11

What were the two transformations Lamarck believed in

Answer 11

• law of use and disuse: Features of an organism strengthened by use/ weaken disappear without use
• law of inheritance of acquired characteristics: changes occurring in an organisms lifetime could be passed to offspring

Question 12

What did Lamarck believe about fossils?

Answer 12

• resembled living species, could be ancestors
• looked different because of different climate and geography
• demonstrated species could vary over time

Question 13

Describe Darwin’s background

Answer 13

• Lyell - principles of geology 1831: geology and uniformitarianism
• observed change - artificial selection, breeders and gardeners (Darwin pidgins)
• competition for scarce Resources

Question 14

Who was Thomas Malthus and what did he contribute?

Answer 14

• English clergyman and political economist
• concern was decline of living conditions in the 18th century England
• nature reproduces itself geometrically
• resources increase arithmetically
• conflict
• famine and poverty

Question 15

What were Darwin’s contributions to the theory of natural selection?

Answer 15

Variational evolution.

• biological variation is present in any given population
• variants best suited /adapted to current environment have greater chance of surviving/ reproducing

Question 16

Who was Gregor Mendel and how did he contribute to the theory of natural selection

Answer 16

• genetics
• Austrian monk/amateur botanist (pea plants)
• contributed to the concept of transmission of traits in families

Question 17

What are the Mendelian models for heredity?

Answer 17

• characteristics that we observe = phenotype
• inferred that is influenced by genetic make up (genotype)
• genetics emerged through the study of phenotypes (not chromosomes/genes)

Question 18

What did we learn after Mendel?

Answer 18

• genes = segments of DNA serving as the building blocks of proteins
• Alleles = alternative forms of a gene at same locus on homologous chromosomes (23 pairs)

Question 19

What are the factors that produce and redistribute variation?

Answer 19

• mutation
• gene flow
• random genetic drift
• founder effect
• bottle neck

Question 20

What is mutation?

Answer 20

• change in genetic material
• basic creative force in evolution - only way to produce truly new variation
• rare and have little effect unless paired with natural selection

Question 21

What is gene flow?

Answer 21

• Movement of genes/ alleles from one populations to another
• migration and interbreeding
• geographic (is land) and cultural factors can play a role
• tends to decrease genetic differences between populations

Question 22

What is random genetic drift

Answer 22

• has potential to increase differences between populations

- genes/ alleles become more/less common due to small population size and sampling

Question 23

What is founder effect

Answer 23

• migration- founding group and descendants carry a small fraction of Alleles
• restricts gene pool for next generation

Question 24

What is a bottleneck

Answer 24

Small population and there genes survive high mortality period in population (war, plague, natural disaster etc)

Question 25

What is natural selection?

Answer 25

• slow gradual process: reshapes population allele (gene frequencies
• 2 principles: survival, and reproduction

Question 26

Who is Karl landstamer and what did he discover

Answer 26

• was Austrian physician
• reported on ABO blood group system
• uses mode of Mendelian inheritance

Question 27

How many Alleles are in the ABO blood type and which ones are dominant?

Answer 27

3

A/B are co-dominant

Question 28

What do global patterns indicate?

Answer 28

• clinical distributions (small variations across regions)

- distinct pockets (very high/low)

Question 29

How do we interpret the global distribution of ABO blood type

Answer 29

• mutation
• gene flow (movement and interbreeding of people)
• random genetic drift
• natural selection (small pox)

Question 30

What is small pox?

Answer 30

• variola virus
• moves easily from person to person via droplet transmission
• mortality up to 30%
• surface antigens look like antigens on blood type A red blood cells

Question 31

What is evolution

Answer 31

A process - dynamic series of events the ultimately change the biological constitution of a population

Question 32

What is micro evolution? Macroevolution?

Answer 32

• Micro- small scale changes (gene/allele frequencies) usually over generations
• macro- large scale change (fossils) typically associated with speciation