A S L 3 Lecture Notes - Lecture 49: Selective Breeding, Natural Theology, Uniformitarianism
Document Summary
Task 4 darwin"s evolution theory: darwin"s inspirations. Lyell thought that the world should not be understood as a result of few catastrophic events (catastrophism) Uniformitarianism --> gradual change due to geological processes that are uniformly working over time: gradualism and time --> changed darwin"s thinking about the origin of life. Lamarck developed a comprehensive theory of evolution before darwin. New variations come into existence because organisms are actively striving and purposefully striving to better themselves . Two important principles: principle of use and disuse (use of useful and disuse of useless characteristics, principle of inheritance of acquired characteristics (passing on characteristics to offspring) Organisms are striving to be better: darwin just said that organisms are trying to adapt to the environment (not necessarily better) Wrote on how population grow: population grow exponentially while food supplies grow linearly --> at some point, food supplies would not be enough malthusian catastrophe (riots, etc. )
