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What is Free Evolution?
Free evolution is the idea that the natural processes of organisms can cause them to develop over time. This includes the creation of new species and alteration of the appearance of existing ones.
This has been demonstrated by many examples such as the stickleback fish species that can be found in saltwater or fresh water and walking stick insect species that are apprehensive about particular host plants. These reversible traits however, are not able to explain fundamental changes in basic body plans.
Evolution by Natural Selection
The development of the myriad living creatures on Earth is a mystery that has intrigued scientists for many centuries. The best-established explanation is Darwin's natural selection process, which occurs when better-adapted individuals survive and reproduce more effectively than those who are less well-adapted. As time passes, the number of well-adapted individuals becomes larger and eventually develops into an entirely new species.
Natural selection is a cyclical process that involves the interaction of three factors including inheritance, variation, and reproduction. Mutation and sexual reproduction increase genetic diversity in an animal species. Inheritance refers to the passing of a person's genetic traits to their offspring that includes dominant and recessive alleles. Reproduction is the generation of fertile, viable offspring which includes both asexual and sexual methods.
All of these factors must be in harmony for natural selection to occur. For example when an allele that is dominant at the gene causes an organism to survive and reproduce more frequently than the recessive one, the dominant allele will become more prevalent in the population. If the allele confers a negative survival advantage or lowers the fertility of the population, it will be eliminated. The process is self-reinforcing meaning that the organism with an adaptive characteristic will live and reproduce much more than those with a maladaptive trait. The more fit an organism is as measured by its capacity to reproduce and survive, is the greater number of offspring it can produce. Individuals with favorable traits, like a longer neck in giraffes, or bright white colors in male peacocks are more likely survive and produce offspring, and thus will become the majority of the population in the future.
Natural selection is only a force for populations, not on individual organisms. This is a major distinction from the Lamarckian evolution theory that states that animals acquire traits either through the use or absence of use. For instance, if the Giraffe's neck grows longer due to reaching out to catch prey and its offspring will inherit a more long neck. The length difference between generations will persist until the giraffe's neck becomes too long that it can not breed with other giraffes.
Evolution through Genetic Drift
In the process of genetic drift, alleles of a gene could be at different frequencies in a group due to random events. At some point, only one of them will be fixed (become common enough to no more be eliminated through natural selection), and the other alleles decrease in frequency. This can lead to an allele that is dominant in extreme. The other alleles are essentially eliminated, and heterozygosity is reduced to zero. In a small number of people this could result in the complete elimination of the recessive allele. This scenario is known as a bottleneck effect and it is typical of evolutionary process that occurs when a lot of individuals move to form a new group.
A phenotypic bottleneck may also occur when survivors of a disaster like an outbreak or mass hunt event are confined to an area of a limited size. The remaining individuals will be largely homozygous for the dominant allele, which means they will all share the same phenotype and will consequently have the same fitness traits. This situation might be caused by a war, earthquake or even a cholera outbreak. Regardless of the cause the genetically distinct group that remains is susceptible to genetic drift.
Walsh Lewens, Walsh and Ariew define drift as a departure from expected values due to differences in fitness. They provide the famous case of twins who are genetically identical and share the same phenotype, but one is struck by lightning and dies, but the other continues to reproduce.
This kind of drift could be crucial in the evolution of a species. But, it's not the only way to develop. Natural selection is the most common alternative, in which mutations and migrations maintain phenotypic diversity within a population.
Stephens asserts that there is a huge difference between treating the phenomenon of drift as an actual cause or force, and considering other causes, such as migration and selection mutation as causes and forces. He argues that a causal process account of drift allows us to distinguish it from other forces, and this distinction is crucial. He also argues that drift has a direction, that is, it tends to eliminate heterozygosity. He also claims that it also has a size, which is determined by the size of the population.
Evolution through Lamarckism
When high school students study biology they are often introduced to the work of Jean-Baptiste Lamarck (1744 - 1829). His theory of evolution, often referred to as “Lamarckism”, states that simple organisms develop into more complex organisms by inheriting characteristics that result from an organism's use and disuse. Lamarckism can be illustrated by an giraffe's neck stretching to reach higher leaves in the trees. This process would cause giraffes to pass on their longer necks to their offspring, who would then get taller.
Lamarck was a French Zoologist. In his lecture to begin his course on invertebrate Zoology at the Museum of Natural History in Paris on the 17th of May in 1802, he introduced an innovative concept that completely challenged previous thinking about organic transformation. In his view, living things had evolved from inanimate matter via the gradual progression of events. Lamarck wasn't the first to suggest this but he was thought of as the first to provide the subject a thorough and general treatment.
The prevailing story is that Lamarckism became a rival to Charles Darwin's theory of evolution by natural selection, and that the two theories battled out in the 19th century. Darwinism eventually triumphed, leading to the development of what biologists today refer to as the Modern Synthesis. The theory denies that acquired characteristics can be passed down and instead argues organisms evolve by the influence of environment factors, including Natural Selection.
Lamarck and his contemporaries endorsed the idea that acquired characters could be passed down to the next generation. However, this notion was never a key element of any of their theories on evolution. 에볼루션 게이밍 is partly due to the fact that it was never tested scientifically.
It's been more than 200 years since the birth of Lamarck and in the field of genomics there is a growing evidence-based body of evidence to support the heritability of acquired traits. It is sometimes referred to as "neo-Lamarckism" or, more frequently epigenetic inheritance. It is a form of evolution that is just as valid as the more popular Neo-Darwinian model.
Evolution by adaptation
One of the most widespread misconceptions about evolution is that it is driven by a type of struggle for survival. This is a false assumption and overlooks other forces that drive evolution. The fight for survival can be more effectively described as a struggle to survive within a particular environment, which could involve not only other organisms, but also the physical environment itself.
Understanding how adaptation works is essential to comprehend evolution. Adaptation is any feature that allows a living thing to survive in its environment and reproduce. It can be a physical feature, like fur or feathers. Or it can be a behavior trait that allows you to move to the shade during hot weather or moving out to avoid the cold at night.
An organism's survival depends on its ability to draw energy from the surrounding environment and interact with other living organisms and their physical surroundings. The organism must possess the right genes to create offspring and to be able to access sufficient food and resources. In addition, the organism should be capable of reproducing at an optimal rate within its niche.
These factors, in conjunction with gene flow and mutations can result in an alteration in the ratio of different alleles within the population's gene pool. As time passes, this shift in allele frequencies could lead to the emergence of new traits, and eventually new species.
Many of the characteristics we admire about animals and plants are adaptations, like the lungs or gills that extract oxygen from the air, fur or feathers to provide insulation long legs to run away from predators and camouflage for hiding. However, a complete understanding of adaptation requires a keen eye to the distinction between the physiological and behavioral traits.
Physiological adaptations, like the thick fur or gills are physical traits, whereas behavioral adaptations, like the tendency to seek out friends or to move to shade in hot weather, aren't. It is also important to remember that a the absence of planning doesn't make an adaptation. In fact, a failure to think about the consequences of a decision can render it unadaptable even though it appears to be sensible or even necessary.