15 Of The Best Documentaries On Free Evolution

What is Free Evolution?

Free evolution is the idea that natural processes can cause organisms to develop over time. This includes the appearance and growth of new species.

A variety of examples have been provided of this, including different kinds of stickleback fish that can live in salt or fresh water, and walking stick insect varieties that prefer particular host plants. These mostly reversible traits permutations do not explain the fundamental changes in the basic body plan.

Evolution through Natural Selection

The evolution of the myriad living organisms on Earth is a mystery that has intrigued scientists for many centuries. The best-established explanation is Darwin's natural selection process, a process that occurs when individuals that are better adapted survive and reproduce more effectively than those less well-adapted. Over time, a population of well-adapted individuals expands and eventually forms a whole new species.

Natural selection is a process that is cyclical and involves the interaction of three factors: variation, reproduction and inheritance. Mutation and sexual reproduction increase the genetic diversity of a species. Inheritance is the transfer of a person's genetic traits to his or her offspring, which includes both dominant and recessive alleles. Reproduction is the process of creating fertile, viable offspring. This can be achieved via sexual or asexual methods.

All of these elements have to be in equilibrium for natural selection to occur. For example the case where an allele that is dominant at the gene can cause an organism to live and reproduce more frequently than the recessive allele, the dominant allele will become more prominent within the population. If the allele confers a negative advantage to survival or reduces the fertility of the population, it will be eliminated. This process is self-reinforcing which means that an organism with a beneficial characteristic is more likely to survive and reproduce than an individual with a maladaptive trait. The more offspring an organism produces the better its fitness, which is measured by its capacity to reproduce itself and survive. People with desirable traits, 에볼루션 게이밍 like a long neck in giraffes, or bright white color patterns on male peacocks are more likely than others to live and reproduce, which will eventually lead to them becoming the majority.

Natural selection is only a force for populations, not on individuals. This is a major 에볼루션 무료 바카라 룰렛 - https://www.hulkshare.com/bellcard10/, distinction from the Lamarckian theory of evolution, which argues that animals acquire characteristics through use or neglect. If a giraffe extends its neck in order to catch prey and the neck grows larger, then its children will inherit this characteristic. The differences in neck size between generations will increase until the giraffe becomes unable to breed with other giraffes.

Evolution through Genetic Drift

In genetic drift, alleles at a gene may reach different frequencies in a population due to random events. At some point, one will reach fixation (become so common that it can no longer be eliminated through natural selection) and other alleles will fall to lower frequencies. This can lead to dominance in the extreme. Other alleles have been virtually eliminated and heterozygosity diminished to a minimum. In a small number of people, this could lead to the total elimination of the recessive allele. This is called a bottleneck effect, and it is typical of the kind of evolutionary process that takes place when a large amount of individuals migrate to form a new group.

A phenotypic bottleneck can also happen when the survivors of a disaster such as an epidemic or mass hunting event, are concentrated in a limited area. The survivors will share an allele that is dominant and will share the same phenotype. This could be caused by a war, an earthquake, or even a plague. The genetically distinct population, if it is left vulnerable to genetic drift.

Walsh, Lewens, and Ariew employ Lewens, Walsh, and Ariew use a "purely outcome-oriented" definition of drift as any deviation from expected values for different fitness levels. They cite the famous example of twins who are both genetically identical and share the same phenotype. However one is struck by lightning and 에볼루션 무료체험; Clinfowiki.Win, dies, while the other is able to reproduce.

This kind of drift could be crucial in the evolution of an entire species. However, it's not the only method to progress. The most common alternative is a process called natural selection, in which the phenotypic variation of a population is maintained by mutation and migration.

Stephens asserts that there is a significant difference between treating drift as a force or a cause and treating other causes of evolution such as mutation, selection and migration as forces or causes. He argues that a causal process account of drift allows us to distinguish it from other forces, and this distinction is vital. He further argues that drift is both direction, i.e., it tends to eliminate heterozygosity. It also has a size which is determined by population size.

Evolution by Lamarckism

In high school, students study biology they are often introduced to the work of Jean-Baptiste Lamarck (1744 - 1829). His theory of evolution, commonly called "Lamarckism is based on the idea that simple organisms transform into more complex organisms through taking on traits that result from an organism's use and disuse. Lamarckism can be illustrated by the giraffe's neck being extended to reach higher leaves in the trees. This could result in giraffes passing on their longer necks to their offspring, who would then grow even taller.

Lamarck was a French zoologist and, in his inaugural lecture for his course on invertebrate zoology at the Museum of Natural History in Paris on 17 May 1802, he introduced an original idea that fundamentally challenged previous thinking about organic transformation. According to him living things had evolved from inanimate matter via a series of gradual steps. Lamarck was not the first to suggest that this could be the case but he is widely seen as giving the subject its first broad and comprehensive treatment.

The prevailing story is that Lamarckism was a rival to Charles Darwin's theory of evolution through natural selection and that the two theories battled each other in the 19th century. Darwinism eventually won and led to the development of what biologists today refer to as the Modern Synthesis. The Modern Synthesis theory denies the possibility that acquired traits can be inherited, and instead, it argues that organisms develop through the selective action of environmental factors, including natural selection.

While Lamarck supported the notion of inheritance through acquired characters, and his contemporaries also paid lip-service to this notion but it was not a central element in any of their theories about evolution. This is due to the fact that it was never scientifically tested.

It's been over 200 years since the birth of Lamarck and in the field of genomics, there is a growing body of evidence that supports the heritability-acquired characteristics. This is often called "neo-Lamarckism" or, more frequently epigenetic inheritance. It is a variant of evolution that is as valid as the more well-known Neo-Darwinian theory.

Evolution by the process of adaptation

One of the most commonly-held misconceptions about evolution is its being driven by a struggle to survive. This view misrepresents natural selection and ignores the other forces that drive evolution. The struggle for survival is more accurately described as a struggle to survive within a particular environment, which can involve not only other organisms but also the physical environment.

To understand how evolution operates it is beneficial to understand what is adaptation. The term "adaptation" refers to any characteristic that allows living organisms to survive in its environment and reproduce. It could be a physiological structure such as fur or feathers or a behavior like moving into shade in hot weather or coming out at night to avoid cold.

The survival of an organism is dependent on its ability to extract energy from the environment and to interact with other living organisms and their physical surroundings. The organism must possess the right genes to produce offspring, and be able to find enough food and resources. The organism must also be able to reproduce itself at the rate that is suitable for its niche.

These factors, together with mutations and gene flow can cause changes in the proportion of different alleles within the gene pool of a population. Over time, this change in allele frequencies could lead to the emergence of new traits, and eventually new species.

Many of the features we find appealing in plants and animals are adaptations. For example, lungs or gills that draw oxygen from air feathers and fur as insulation, long legs to run away from predators and camouflage to conceal. However, a thorough understanding of adaptation requires paying attention to the distinction between the physiological and behavioral traits.

Physiological traits like the thick fur and gills are physical characteristics. Behavior adaptations aren't, such as the tendency of animals to seek out companionship or retreat into shade during hot weather. It is important to note that lack of planning does not make an adaptation. Failure to consider the consequences of a decision, even if it appears to be rational, may make it unadaptive.