EVOLUTION

A. Theories on the origin of life

1. Creationism belief that a Supreme Being created the world and everything in it
2. Spontaneous Generation idea that living organisms arose from inanimate object by
Anaximander and supported by Aristotle
Francesco Redi Italian physician who performed an experiment (using several jars
containing piece of raw meat ; maggots and flies were present
Lazzaro Spallanzani Italian Naturalist who demonstrated that microorganism could not
grow in sterile medium; boiling chicken broth; life is pre-existing
Louis Pasteur French chemist and microbiologist who disproved the said theory by
demonstrating swan-neck flasks to involve air and have a sterile medium
3. Evolution idea that existing species have developed from pre-existing forms; living organisms
undergo changes over time
Empedocles pre-existing form/ living organisms undergo changes over time
Aristotle supported Empedocles concept
Pierre Louis Moreau de Maupertius human embryo goes through several phases of
differentiation ; development of stages of vertebrates
Karl von Linne close morphological and anatomical similarities of certain species
Georges-Louis Buffon change must have taken place during the history of life on earth
Erasmus Darwin idea of some sort of blood relationship
Jean Baptiste Lamarck species could change gradually over time; Theory of Inheritance
of Acquired Characteristics or the Theory of Use and Disuse; individual acquires trait
throughout its life time and characteristics can be passed to the next generation
Reverend Thomas Robert Malthus An Essay on the Principle of Population; proposed
that external factors determine the growth of human population
Charles Darwin On the Origin of the Species By Means of Natural Selection; living
forms change gradually over time
4. Oparin-Haldane (Chemical Evolution) postulated by Alexander Ivanovich Oparin; life arosefrom
inorganic matter under the environment that existed during primitive earth;
supported by John Burdon Sanderson Haldane
5. Cosmozoic or Panspermia suggested by
* Svante August Arrhenius Life reached Earth by means of spores from outer space.;
based his theory on meteorites that contain a variety of organic compounds
MICROEVOLUTION
Evolution is the process by which all existing species have developed from primitive organism
(ancestral species)
Microevolution refers to evolution occurring at or below the species level