SURVIVAL OF THE FITTES

AIM OF THE PROJECT

OBJECTIVE:

 TO STUDY THE THEORY OF SURVIVAL OF THE FITTEST

 To study theory of Charles Darwin’s theory on “survival of the fittest”.

 To examine the relation between the theory of evolution and survival of the fittest.

 Investigate Adaptations in Natural Populations

 Evaluate Environmental Influences on Fitness

 Examine Human Evolution in the Context of Survival

 Compare Theoretical Frameworks on Evolutionary Fitness

These objectives collectively aim to provide a comprehensive exploration of the "Survival of the
Fittest" concept, encompassing its theoretical foundations, practical applications in natural
populations, and its relevance to both non-human and human evolution
 INTRODUCTION :

"Survival of the Fittest" stands as a cornerstone in Darwinian evolutionary theory, encapsulating the
essence of natural selection—a mechanism crucial to understanding the adaptation of species over
time. Defined biologically as reproductive success, the phrase elucidates the concept that the forms
best designed to leave the most copies of themselves in successive generations are the ones that
endure.

The term itself was first introduced by Herbert Spencer, who, after delving into Charles Darwin's
groundbreaking work in On the Origin of Species, integrated the phrase into his Principles of Biology
in 1864. In a fascinating convergence of disciplines, Spencer drew parallels between his economic
theories and Darwin's biological insights, expressing the idea in mechanical terms. This "survival of
the fittest," synonymous with Darwin's "natural selection" or the preservation of favored races,
highlighted the competitive struggle for existence. Darwin, responsive to Alfred Russel Wallace's
suggestion, embraced Spencer's phrase, incorporating it into The Variation of Animals and Plants
Under Domestication in 1868 and further refining its meaning in the fifth edition of On the Origin of
Species in 1869. In Darwinian terminology, the phrase signifies being "better designed for an
immediate, local environment," emphasizing the adaptive advantage that ensures the persistence of
specific traits through generations.

Herbert Spencer
While the phrase "survival of the fittest" is often used to
mean "natural selection", it is avoided by modern
biologists, because the phrase can be misleading. For
example, survival is only one aspect of selection, and not
always the most important. Another problem is that the
word "fit" is frequently confused with a state of physical
fitness. In the evolutionary meaning "fitness" is the rate of
reproductive output among a class of genetic variants.
 THEORY :

The phrase can also be interpreted to express a theory or

hypothesis: that "fit" as opposed to "unfit" individuals or
species, in some sense of "fit", will survive some test.
Nevertheless, when extended to individuals it is a
conceptual mistake, the phrase is a reference to the
transgenerational survival of the heritable attributes;
particular individuals are quite irrelevant. This becomes
more clear when referring to Viral quasi species, in
survival of the flattest, which makes it clear to survive makes
no reference to the question of even being alive itself;
rather the functional capacity of proteins to carry out work.

Interpretations of the phrase as expressing a theory are in

danger of being tautological, meaning roughly "those with a
propensity to survive have a propensity to survive"; to have
content the theory must use a concept of fitness that is
independent of that of survival.

Interpreted as a theory of species survival, the theory that

the fittest species survive is undermined by evidence that
while direct competition is observed between individuals,
populations and species, there is little evidence that
competition has been the driving force in the evolution of
large groups such as, for example, amphibians, reptiles, and
mammals. Instead, these groups have evolved by
expanding into empty ecological niches. In the
punctuated equilibrium model of environmental and
biological change, the factor determining survival is often
not superiority over another in competition but ability to
survive dramatic changes in environmental
conditions, such as after a meteor impact energetic
enough to greatly change the environment globally. The
main land dwelling animals to survive the K-Pg impact 66
million years ago had the ability to live in tunnels, for
example.

In 2010 Sahney et al. argued that there is little evidence

that intrinsic, biological factors such as competition have
been the driving force in the evolution of large groups.
Instead, they cited extrinsic, abiotic factors such as
expansion as the driving factor on a large evolutionary
scale. The rise of dominant groups such as amphibians,
reptiles, mammals and birds occurred by opportunistic
expansion into empty ecological niches and the extinction
of groups happened due to large shifts in the abiotic
environment.
INTERPRETED AS EXPRESSING A MORAL THEORY :

The fitness, according to Darwin, refers ultimately and only

to reproductive fitness. Hence, those who are better fit in an
environment, leave more progeny than others. These, therefore,
will survive more and hence are selected by nature. He called it
natural selection and implied it as a mechanism of evolution.
But this theory is also interpreted as many other moral theories
, so I have added a short note on those topics .

SOCIAL DARWINISTS :
It has been claimed that "the survival of the fittest" theory
in biology was interpreted by late 19th century capitalists
as "an ethical precept that sanctioned cut-throat economic
competition" and led to the advent of the theory of "social
Darwinism" which was used to justify laissez-faire
economics, war and racism. However, these ideas pre-date
and commonly contradict Darwin's ideas, and indeed their
proponents rarely invoked Darwin in support. The term
"social Darwinism" referring to capitalist ideologies was
 introduced as a term of abuse by Richard Hofstadter's Social
Darwinism in American Thought published in 1944.

ANARCHISTS:
Russian anarchist Peter Kropotkin viewed the concept of
"survival of the fittest" as supporting co-operation rather
than competition. In his book Mutual Aid: A Factor of
Evolution he set out his analysis leading to the conclusion
that the fittest was not necessarily the best at competing
individually, but often the community made up of those
best at working together.

TAUTOLOGY :
"Survival of the fittest" is sometimes claimed to be a
tautology. The reasoning is that if one takes the term "fit" to mean
"endowed with phenotypic characteristics which improve chances
of survival and reproduction" (which is roughly how Spencer
understood it), then "survival of the fittest" can simply be rewritten
as "survival of those who are better equipped for surviving".
Furthermore, the expression does become a tautology if one uses
the most widely accepted definition of "fitness" in modern biology,
namely reproductive success itself (rather than any set of
characters conducive to this reproductive success). This reasoning
is sometimes used to claim that Darwin's entire theory of evolution
by natural selection is fundamentally tautological, and therefore
devoid of any explanatory power.

EVOLUTION

Evolution is the study of the different forms of life, its

characteristics and the changes over several generations.
It is the scientific theory used by biologists to study the
genetic variation in a population.

Evidence that evolution of life forms has indeed taken

place on earth has come from many quarters. Fossils are
remains of hard parts of life-forms found in rocks. Rocks
form sediments and a cross-section of earth's crust
indicates the arrangement of sediments one over the other
during the long history of earth. Different-aged rock
sediments contain fossils of different life- forms who
probably died during the formation of the particular
sediment.

There are many theories about how life originated on the

planet earth. The theory of evolution is based on the idea
that all species are correlated and progressively varies
with time.

DARWIN’S THEORY OF EVOLUTION:

Charles Robert Darwin, an English naturalist, geologist,

and biologist, is well known for his theory of evolution and
the process of natural selection. He gave the theory of
evolution, which is known as ‘Darwin’s theory of natural
selection’ and also published a book, on “Origin of Species
by Natural Selection”.

According to Darwin’s Theory, the main features of this

theory are as follows,

 All organisms reproduce and multiply enormously.

 No two individuals are alike. They are different from
each other either in their size, shape, behavior, etc.

 Some traits are consistently passed on from their

 parent to the offspring.

 The rate of reproduction varies in all living species.

Some reproduce more and some minimum.

A BRIEF ACCOUNT OF EVOLUTION :

According to the several theories of Evolution:

 The first cellular forms of life appeared on earth was

about 2000 million years ago .Later single-cell
organisms, multicellular forms, and invertebrates
were formed and became active
 .
  Jawless fish evolved and different organisms started to
invade from water to land. Later, amphibians, reptiles some
of them to viviparous mammals came into existence.
 About 23.03 to
5.333 million
years ago, evolved
primates that
resembled to
toady’s gorillas
and chimpanzees.
During ice age
between 75,000-
10,000 years ago,
modern Homo
sapiens arose.

EXPERIMENTS:

MILLER’S EXPERIMENT:

provided experimental evidence for chemical evolution.

(i) The experiment was carried out by SL Miller and HC Urey in
1953.
(ii) He took a closed flask containing CH4,H2,NH3 and water vapour
at 800°C and created electric discharge. These conditions were
similar to those in primitive atmosphere.
(iii) After a week, formation of amino acids were observed.
Complex molecules like sugars, nitrogen bases, pigments and fats
were seen in the flask by other scientist.
(iv) Analysis of the meteorite also revealed the presence of
similar compounds.
(v) Chemical evolution of life was more or less accepted.

ORIGIN OF FIRST CELL:

(i) First non-cellular life forms originated three million years
ago.
(ii) These molecules were like RNA, protein and polysaccharides.
(iii) Cellular life form first evolved about 2000 million years ago.
(iv) These were single-celled formed in aquatic environment.
(v) This form of abiogenesis, i.e. the first form of life arose slowly
through evolutionary
forces from non-living molecules It is accepted by many scientists.

EVIDENCES OF EVOLUTION:

THE EVIDENCES COMES FROM:

(i) Palaeontology (ii) Comparative anatomy and morphology
(iii)Biochemical/Physiology (iv) Biogeography
(v) Embryology
(i) Palaeontology is the study of fossils. The fossils are the remains
of past organisms
preserved in sedimentary rocks
(a) Rocks form sediments and a cross-section of earth’s crust
indicates the arrangement of sediments one over the other during
the long history of earth.
(b) Different aged rock sediments contain fossils of different life
forms, who died during the formation of the particular sediment,
(c) Some organisms appear similar to modern organisms. They
represent extinct organisms like dinosaurs.
(d) A study of fossils in different sedimentary layers indicates the
geological period in which they existed.
(e) The study showed that life forms varied over time and certain
life forms are restricted to certain geological time-scale Hence,
new forms of life have evolved at different times in the history of
earth,
(ii) Comparative anatomy and morphological evidences show the
similarities and
differences among the organisms of today and those that existed
years ago.
The evidences come from comparative study of external and
internal structure.

I. (a) The organs with same structural design and origin but
different functions are called homologous organs. Examples are
forelimbs of some animals like whales, bats and cheetah have
similar anatomical structure, such as humerus, radius, ulna,
carpals, metacarpals and phalanges.
(b) Homology in organ indicates common ancestry.
(c) Other examples of homology are vertebrate hearts or brains.
In plants also, thorns and tendrils of Bougainvillea and Cucurbita
represent homology.
(d) Homology is based on divergent evolution. The same structure
developed along different directions due to adaptations to
different needs. The condition is called divergent evolution.
II. (a) Organs which are anatomically different but functionally
similar are called analogous organs. For example, wings of
butterfly and birds.
(b) Analogy refers to a situation exactly opposite to homology.
(c) Analogous organs are a result of convergent evolution. It is the
evolution in which different structures evolve for same function
and hence, have similarity.
(d) Other examples of analogy are eyes of Octopus and mammals;
flippers of penguins and dolphins. In plants, sweet potato (root
modification) and potato (stem modification).

III. Vestigial organs like homologous organs provide evidences

for organic evolution.
These are degenerate, non-functional and rudimentary organs to
the possessor, while correspond to fully developed and functional
organs of related organisms.
(a) There are about 90 vestigial organs in the human body. Same
of them are tail bone (coccyx), wisdom teeth, nictitating
membrane, vermiform appendix, etc.
(b) Some examples from other animals are hip girdles and bones
of the hind limbs in some whales and certain snakes and wings of
flightless birds.
Biochemical Evidences
(a) The metabolic processes in organisms are similar with same
new materials and end products. For example, energy released by
oxidation is stored in ATP which then powers the energy
requiring process.
(b) Molecular homology is the similarity among animals at the
molecular level.
For example, human DNA differs in only 1.8% of its base pairs
from chimpanzee DNA and there is no difference between the two
in the amino acid sequence for the protein
cytochrome-c.
(iv) Biogeographical evidences The species restricted to a region
develop unique features. Also, species present in far separated
regions show similarity of ancestry...

EVOLUTIONARY PROCESSES:

I. Adaptive radiation is an evolutionary process in which

an ancestral stock gives rise to new species adapted to
new habitats and new ways of life. Examples are (0
Darwin’s finches These were small black birds, which
Darwin observed in Galapagos island.
(a) He observed many varieties of finches in the same
island.
(b) All varieties of finches had evolved from original seed-
eating finches.
(c) There was alternation in beaks enabling some to
become insectivorous and some vegetarian.

(ii) Marsupials of Australia A number of marsupials, different

from each other evolved from an ancestral stock, all within the
Australian island continent.

II. Parallel evolution refers to independent development of

similar characters in two animal groups of common ancestry
living in similar habitats of different continents. Examples are
Marsupial mammals in Australia show parallel evolution as they
have evolved from placental mammals. All these closely resemble
and look similar to a corresponding marsupial.
Few examples are mentioned in the table.
III. Convergent evolution is development of similar adaptive
functional structures in unrelated groups of organisms. Examples
are:
(i) Wings of insect, bird and bat.
(ii) Spiny anteater and scaly anteater belong to different orders of
class-Mammalia. They have acquired similar adaptations for food,
e.g. leg ants, termites and insects.
(v) Embryological evidences Study of comparative embryology
shows common patterns of development.
(a) The principles of embryonic development were given by Von
Baer.
(b) Ernst Haeckel propounded The theory of recapitulation or
Biogenetic law which states that an individual organism in its
development (ontogeny) tends to repeat the stages passed
through by its ancestors (phylogeny), i.e. ontogeny recapitulates
phylogeny.
(c) This means that the life history of an animal reflects its
evolutionary history.
For example, during the life history, frog’s tadpole larva
resembles fishes, the ancestors of
amphibia. The presence of gill clefts in all
vertebrate embryos including human provides a strong evidence
in support of organic evolution.
(vi) Anthropogenic evidences Excess use of herbicides,
pesticides, etc has resulted in selection of resistant varieties in a
lesser time scale. This is also true for microbes against which
antibiotics or drugs have been used. All these evidences tell us
that ‘Elvolution is a stochastic process based on chance events in
nature and chance mutation in the organisms’.

CONCLUSION :
The origin of life on earth can be understood only against the
background of origin of universe especially earth. Most scientists
believe chemical evolution, i.e., formation of biomolecules
preceded the appearance of the first cellular forms of life. The
subsequent events as to what happened to the first form of life is a
conjectured story based on Darwinian ideas of organic evolution
by natural selection. Diversity of life forms on earth has been
changing over millions of years. It is generally believed that
variations in a population result in variable fitness. Other
phenomena like habitat fragmentation and genetic drift may
accentuate these variations leading to appearance of new species
and hence evolution. Homology is accounted for by the idea of
branching descent. Study of comparative anatomy, fossils and
comparative biochemistry provides evidence for evolution.
Among the stories of evolution of individual species, the story of
evolution of modern man is most interesting and appears to
parallel evolution of human brain and language.
THE END