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Asked by xopeanuutzox to Alice JB, Andy, Barbara, James, Jo on 14 Jun 2011. This question was also asked by larissa.
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Jo Hulsmans answered on 13 Jun 2011:
Yes! It is one of the most beautiful things in science, it is incredibly simple and it can explain almost everything in biology!
If you have a group of animals, there will be small changes between them. Some might be faster, or stronger, or smarter, or better at a specific task. The animals that are better adapted to their environment will survive longer and have more children, and they will pass on their traits to their offspring.
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James Jennings answered on 13 Jun 2011:
Well explained, not much that I can add to that answer. Other than the fact that it also quite nicely explains why humans and apes are very alike!
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Barbara Guinn answered on 13 Jun 2011:
I can but can I do it in a speech bubble? Very briefly, if you are best able to live in an environment you will out compete everyone else. So if you can swim faster and escape being eaten you’ll live to have babies which can also swim faster. If you have a longer neck and can eat the leaves at the top of the trees then when there isn’t much food you’ll survive. However when there is lots of food and no predators you don’t have to compete but then you have more babies and eat more and when there are too many of you, food becomes less available and then you start to compete and only the fittest can survive. That’s it, basically.
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Alice Jones Bartoli answered on 14 Jun 2011:
The other guys have answered this question beautifully, but I wanted to add something… for humans at least (i know about humans – so I’ll talk about them) there are some small genetic changes between us that are ‘adaptive’ (useful) in different circumstances.
Some of the work that I do is with people who are ‘psychopaths’, and people ask whether we could get rid of those genes that might make people ‘psychopathic’. It might be that those genes that contribute toward this sort of behaviour are useful in some environments (e.g. when times are very tough, and having low levels of anxiety are a good thing), but might not be useful in other environments (being brought up in a loving home, and where making friendships is a good idea). It’s not always straightforward to see what genes and characteristic will survive, and that’s probably why evolution happens so… very… slowly…
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