Charles Darwin

Essay by TeoMorabitoJunior High, 9th grade May 2009

download word file, 3 pages 3.0

As a scientist, Charles Darwin accepted a job on the HMS beagle and travel to the Galapagos Island where he studied 13 different varieties of Finches (Williams, 298). During this study, he discovered that all of these different Finches had different beak depending of there Island geographical situation, some large, tiny or medium size one. Then, he suggested that all these beak differences may came from the food. He thought that the Finches might have evolved by natural selection (Williams, 299). When Charles’ famous book “The Origin of Species” had been published in 1859 (Williams, 298), he explained how the species such as the Finches might have evolved. He called this theory, the “Theory of natural selection”.

Camouflage of moths can support the theory of natural selection because as Charles Darwin proved it, the animals’ characteristics evolved depending of their environment. As this environment may change, the animal need to continue to adapt threw the natural selection.

A good example of a now days evolution is the camouflage of the Moths in England, These Moths most evolved with a pale wings colors because this color makes them hard to see on a lichen-covered bark from a predator like a bird whereas the dark one is much more easy to see. So, the population of pale moths increases and the dark decrease. But as the humans pollute the air, the lichen disappeared so that the Pale moths which where naturally protected attempt to disappear because of us. The dark moths will be now increasing and all the natural selection process is now changing for the England’s moths.

Pesticide resistance is also due to the natural selection, the insects that were living in fields are now confronted with pesticides, so they have been forced to evolve and just the strongest specimens survive. These survivals may have a resistance to pesticide. That’s why, the human pesticides’ researchers need to invent a large range of different pesticides. As insects are able to evolve being resistant to some pesticides, some bacteria can too. The creation of super bugs is also the result of the Charles Darwin’s theory of natural selection. In this case, some bacteria develop resistance to antibiotics because they have evolved a tolerance to the antibiotic. This bacteria will not be killed by the antibiotic and because of the ability of the bacteria to reproduce very quickly, a lot of new bacteria will be resistance to that antibiotic (Williams, 300) and so, a new epidemic may appear. To stop these super bacteria, the researchers, like for the insects need to invent a new antibiotic that can kill the new bacteria. However, because bacteria will become resistant to the new antibiotics through evolution, the researchers will always need to invent new type of medicines.

Species may evolve but they can also disappear. Even if animals have already been extinct in the past, humans’ activity makes it extinction faster. The dodo, a large bird that could not fly or run fast, has been extinct on the 1690s (Williams, 305) due to the fact that humans hunted it for its meat and that the animals that the human imported to they natural living places ate its eggs and young (Williams, 305). Such as the dodo, some species of whale have been hunted to extinction for there foods…Since the man invented weapons, traps and other techniques to capture animals, which allows its survival, it was only the normal mechanisms of the “natural selection”. With the constant increase in the quantity of human’s population, slowly changed the balance of that “natural selection”. Finally, with the arrival of new and powerful technology, balance is completely reverse for many species of animals, when the man starts to move from one continent to another, and to carry species of animals, plants, bacteria… which were new to their arrival environment, new disease appear and because, the other species does not get time to evolved. The new species gets the same problem, so that all the species became sick and many of them died.

Bibliography:Williams, 298: Gareth Williams, Biology for you. Page 298: Charles Darwin, “The theory of natural selection”.

Williams, 299: Gareth Williams, Biology for you. Page 299: The Galapagos finchesWilliams, 300: Gareth Williams, Biology for you. Page 300: Selection in action, Super rats, resistant bacteria.

Williams, 305: Gareth Williams, Biology for you. Page 305: Extinction, the dodo.