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Asked by anon-217175 to Savannah, Philippe, Lucy, Joanna, Harrison, Edoardo on 12 Jun 2019.
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Harrison Prosper answered on 12 Jun 2019: last edited 12 Jun 2019 7:21 pm
I make a distinction between the fact of evolution and the theory of evolution. The evidence for evolution is overwhelming. Every year new versions of the flu vaccine must be developed because of the evolution of the flu virus. Many of our antibiotics are becoming ineffective because of the evolving pathogens they are designed to kill. Peppered moths in Northern England evolved to black moths, which provided better camouflage against soot covered industrial northern cities. I believe in the fact of evolution. I accept the theory of evolution as the best explanation to date to explain the fact of evolution. The key, stunningly simple, idea of the theory of evolution is Darwin’s idea of natural selection. A minute, random, change to an organism will be propagated to the next generation if it can be inherited and if the change increases the chance that the organism will live long enough to reproduce. The bumper sticker version is “survival of the fittest”, a phrase that has been horribly misused over the past century. By “fittest” Darwin meant something like “best suited to its current environment”; nothing more and nothing less. It does not mean “strong”, “powerful”, “intelligent”, “blue-eyed”. Personally, I think evolution is a breathtakingly beautiful thing. It implies that I am related to the grass I mowed today and, more closely, to you. This is nothing short of transcendent and reminds me why I love science so much.
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Savannah Clawson answered on 13 Jun 2019:
I believe that the theory of evolution matches experimental evidence very well and therefore, it is a good theory. A scientist’s job is to always be sceptical of everything you hear until you get evidence to suggest it is true. When Charles Darwin first proposed the idea of evolution, he got a lot of ridicule because it sounded so crazy to people, and why should they believe him when they had no evidence to do so!? Darwin lived in a time when people didn’t know about genetics and DNA. We now know that changes in DNA called mutations can sometime cause characteristics to appear in an animal that makes them more likely to survive. For example, a giraffe with a slightly longer neck could reach more leaves and therefore had more food. The animals with these helpful mutations are more likely to survive and therefore are more likely to pass on their genetics to their offspring. A combination of these helpful mutations and probability of survival results in what we call natural selection.
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Eventually, more and more evidence suggested that Darwin had actually been right all along and evolution slowly became accepted in the scientific world – today I don’t think you will find many scientists who don’t agree with it. There is loads of evidence for evolution, like the fossil of the “Ambulocetus natans”, an animal whose name literally means “swimming-walking whale”, which was found by scientists in 1994. Its forelimbs had fingers and small hooves but its hind feet were enormous given its size. It was clearly adapted for swimming, but it was also capable of moving clumsily on land, like a seal.
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There is still a lot of controversy over evolution today, especially from people who say it contradicts the creation story. A lot of people also don’t like the idea that humans have evolved from apes and other animals – they think we hold some special rank in the world and cannot be related to other animals. This thinking also usually comes from a religious point of view. However, a lot of religious people fully accept the theory of evolution – even the Pope has said it does not contradict the Bible! -
Philippe Gambron answered on 14 Jun 2019:
It’s true. There is a lot of evidence for it. Basically, we are copies of our parents but, when that copy is made, some small errors can take place and we can have different characteristics. If this feature gives us an edge, for example, if it helps us outrunning lions, little by little, more and more people will share that characteristic. This could still happen nowadays. For example, if a new disease appears and it turns out that, after such a random change, some people are immune to it, in the end, the population will be immune to it. They understood that mechanism by looking and the differences and similarities between species but, now, it is possible to confirm that further by looking and the similarities between the DNA sequences of different organisms.
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