Darwin
CHY4U
Brave New World
• http://www.cbc.ca/player/Shows/Shows/The+
Nature+of+Things/Darwin%27s+Brave+New+
World/ID/1316757054/
• CBC, The Nature of Things, Darwin’s Brave
New World (45.04) [intro is 2:40]
Finches on Galapagos Islands
Darwin:
“I never dreamed that islands, about fifty or
sixty miles apart, and most them in sight of each
other, formed of precisely the same rocks,
placed under a quite similar climate, rising to a
nearly equal height, would have been differently
tenanted; but we shall soon see that this is the
case.”
Jonathan Clements, Darwin’s Notebook: The Life, Times, and Discoveries of Charles Robert Darwin (London: Quid
Publishing, 2009), 50.
“The most curious fact is the perfect gradation in
the size of the beaks in the different species of
Geospiza, from one as large as that of a hawfinch to
that of a chaffinch… there are no less than six
species with insensibly graduated beaks… Seeing
this gradation and diversity of structure in one
small, intimately related group of birds, one might
really fancy that from an original paucity of birds in
this archipelago, one species had been taken and
modified for different ends.”
Jonathan Clements, Darwin’s Notebook: The Life, Times, and Discoveries of Charles Robert Darwin (London:
Quid Publishing, 2009), 65.
Galapagos Online: Darwin’s Finches. N.d.,
http://www.galapagosonline.com/Galapagos_Natural_History/Birds_and_Animals/Birds
/Darwins_Finches.html (Nov. 10, 2011)
PBS. Evolution Library. Adaptive Radiation – Darwin’s Finches. 2001.
http://www.pbs.org/wgbh/evolution/library/01/6/image_pop/l_016_02.html (Nov. 10, 2011)
Tree of Life
Ian Sample, Evolution: Charles Darwin Was Wrong About the Tree of Life, The Guardian, 2009, Jan. 21,
http://www.guardian.co.uk/science/2009/jan/21/charles-darwin-evolution-species-tree-life (Nov. 10, 2011).
Types of Change
University of California Berkeley, Museum of Paleontology, Understanding Evolution, N.d.
http://evolution.berkeley.edu/evolibrary/search/imagedetail.php?id=250&topic_id=&keywords= (April 17,
2013).
Biological Evolution
“Biological evolution, simply put, is descent with modification. This definition
encompasses small-scale evolution (changes in gene frequency in a population
from one generation to the next) and large-scale evolution (the descent of
different species from a common ancestor over many generations). Evolution
helps us to understand the history of life.”
“Biological evolution is not simply a matter of change over time. Lots of things
change over time: trees lose their leaves, mountain ranges rise and erode, but
they aren't examples of biological evolution because they don't involve descent
through genetic inheritance.”
“The central idea of biological evolution is that all life on Earth shares a common
ancestor, just as you and your cousins share a common grandmother.”
Through the process of descent with modification, the common ancestor of life on
Earth gave rise to the fantastic diversity that we see documented in the fossil
record and around us today. Evolution means that we're all distant cousins:
humans and oak trees, hummingbirds and whales.”
Finch Genes
University of California Berkeley, Museum of Paleontology, Understanding Evolution, N.d.
http://evolution.berkeley.edu/evolibrary/search/imagedetail.php?id=250&topic_id=&keywords= (April 17, 2013).
Social/Historical Relevance
• Darwin’s life and writings were primary
sources for the study of the 19th century.
• Science was very popular at this time in
western societies.
– More practical at that time than during Scientific
Revolution because of the influence of the
Industrial Revolution.
19th Century Scientific Advances
•
•
•
•
•
•
Electron
Compound microscope
Pasteurization
Thermodynamics
Periodic table
[Zipper patent, paper clip]
Challenge To Traditional Thinking
Age of earth
Scientific thinking
View of change, progress
Age of earth
Religious dogma
View of change,
progress
Giraffe
• http://phenomena.nationalgeographic.com/2
013/01/15/giraffe-necks-not-for-sex/