PSYC 385 Chapter Notes - Chapter 1: Gregor Mendel, Mendelian Inheritance, Hierarchical Organization
27 Mar 2015
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Most important idea in all of science: evolution by natural selection. Because it is the central explanatory theory of biology explains why living things are as they are. Difficulties in understanding evolution: timescale is different which we normally deal with, we tend to think about each species of animal or plant as having a unique and distinct. Essence": useful for us to generalize, finish page 3. 1. 1what problems does the theory of evolution solve. Solves 2 main problems in understanding living things: problem of history, problem of design. There are commonalities and divergences between living organisms: Commonalities include the limbs of different vertebrates contain a pattern of five bones that are similar even though they have differing serving functions. Hierarchical organization: 2 species that are similar in the details of system a tend to also be similar in the details of system b. We can group different species together on the basis of the amount of structure that they share.
