Chapter 20

Development of
Evolutionary Thought

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BIO 121 INTRODUCTION TO BIOLOGY II
Ch. 3 – Development of Evolutionary Thinking

Malachy Ifeanyi Okeke, PhD

Section of Biomedical Sciences
School of Arts and Science
American University of Nigeria
Office: Rm. AS318
Email: malachy.okeke@aun.edu.ng
H.M.S. Beagle

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Why It Matters…
• In 1858 Charles Darwin and Alfred Russel Wallace
each presented papers to the Linnaean Society of
London describing a mechanism for biological
evolution
• In 1859 Darwin published his book, On the Origin
of Species by Means of Natural Selection, which
proposed that natural mechanisms produced the
diversity of life on Earth
• Darwin’s concept of evolution forms the unifying
paradigm within which all biological research is
undertaken

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Darwin and Wallace

Charles Darwin Alfred Russel Wallace

Historic England/Bridgeman Images

Historic England/Bridgeman Images

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Biological Evolution
• Biological evolution occurs in populations when
specific processes cause the genomes of
organisms to differ from those of their ancestors
• These genetic changes, and the phenotypic
modifications they cause, are the products of
evolution
• By studying the products of evolution, biologists
learn about the processes that cause evolutionary
change

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Link:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ntZATsnVZw4
20.1 Recognition of Evolutionary Change
• Natural history
• Branch of biology that examines the form and
variety of organisms in their natural environments
• Aristotle (384–322 B.C.) created a ladder-like
classification of nature (Scala Naturae)
• Natural theology
• By the fourteenth century, Europeans had merged
Aristotle’s classification system with biblical
creation

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Integration of Ideas
• Beginning in the 14th century, scientists proposed
mechanistic theories to explain physical events:
Nicolaus Copernicus (1473–1543); Galileo Galilei
(1564–1642), René Descartes (1596–1650), Isaac
Newton (1643–1727)
• Sir Francis Bacon (1561–1626) established the
importance of observation, experimentation, and
inductive reasoning
• Carolus Linnaeus (1707–1778) developed the
branch of biology that classifies organisms
(taxonomy)

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Questions About Biogeography
• Three new disciplines promoted a growing
awareness of change: biogeography, comparative
morphology, and geology
• Biogeography
• Studies of the world distribution of plants and
animals
• Global explorations provided naturalists with
thousands of unknown plants and animals
• Some species found in similar habitats in different
areas resembled each other

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Similar Species, Different Regions

African ostrich South American rhea Australian emu

(Struthio camelus) (Rhea americana) (Dromaius novaehollandiae)

scooperdigital/iStockphoto.com
© vblinov/Shutterstock.com

© PRILL/Shutterstock.com

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Questions About Comparative Morphology
• When biologists began to compare the
morphology (anatomical structure) of organisms,
they discovered interesting similarities and
differences
• Example: front legs of pigs, flippers of dolphins,
and wings of bats have similar locations; all are
constructed of similar tissues; and all develop
similarly in embryos
• Buffon proposed vestigial structures – the
useless parts we observe today – must have
functioned in ancestral organisms

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Homologous Structures

Humerus

Ulna

Radius

Carpals

5
1 1
4
Digits
5
2 5 2
3
4
2
3 4
3
Foreleg of pig Flipper of dolphin Wing of bat

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Questions About Fossils
• By the mid-18th century, geologists observed
different fossils in younger and older layers of
sedimentary rocks
• Georges Cuvier (1769–1832), a founder of
paleobiology, realized that layers of fossils
represented organisms that had lived at
successive times in the past
• Developed the theory of catastrophism – that
each layer of fossils had died in a local catastrophe

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Lamarck and Biological Evolution
• Jean Baptiste de Lamarck (1744–1829) proposed
a theory of biological evolution based on specific
mechanisms (principle of use and disuse and
inheritance of acquired characteristics)
• Lamarck had four important ideas that were used
by Darwin:
• All species change through time
• New characteristics are passed from one
generation to the next
• Organisms change in response to their
environments
• Specific mechanisms caused evolutionary change
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Lamarck’s Theories
• According to Lamarck,
short-legged ancestors
of herons stretched
their legs to stay dry
while feeding in
shallow water

McPhoto/Blickwinkel/AGE Fotostock
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Recognition That Earth Had Changed over Time
• Gradualism
• James Hutton (1726–1797) proposed that slow,
continuous physical processes, acting over long
periods of time, produced Earth’s geological
features
• Uniformitarianism
• Charles Lyell (1797–1875) proposed that the
geological processes that sculpted Earth’s surface
over long periods of time (e.g. volcanic eruptions,
earthquakes, erosion) are exactly the same as the
processes observed today

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STUDY BREAK 20.1
1. Why did the existence of vestigial structures
make Buffon question the idea that living systems
never changed?
2. What were Lamarck’s contributions to an
evolutionary worldview?
3. How do the concepts of gradualism and
uniformitarianism in geology undermine the belief
that Earth is only about 6,000 years old?

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© 2017 Cengage Learning. All Rights Reserved.
20.2 Darwin’s Journeys
• In 1831 Charles Darwin embarked on a voyage
around the world on the naval surveying ship
H.M.S. Beagle
• Darwin’s major observations:
• Fossilized glyptodonts in Argentina had features
similar to those of living armadillos
• Animals in different South American habitats
resembled each other but differed from species
that occupied similar habitats in Europe (e.g. nutria
and beavers)
• Galápagos Islands’ species varied slightly from
island to island, but all resembled South American
species
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Voyage of H.M.S. Beagle

Equator

Galápagos
Islands

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 Ancestors and Descendants

Charles R. Knight painting (negative CK21T), Field

Museum of Natural History, Chicago
Steve Bower/Shutterstock.com
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South American Nutria

South American nutria (Myocastor coypus) European beaver (Castor fiber)

© Eugene Gordin/Shutterstock.com

Krys Bailey/Alamy
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Galápagos Islands
A. The Galápagos B. Galápagos tortoise (Geochelone elephantopus) C. Marine iguana (Amblyrhynchus cristatus)

Darwin

© rebvt/Shutterstock.com

Onfoku/iStockphoto.com
Wolf

Pinta

Marchena Genovesa

Santiago Equator
Bartolomé
Seymour
Rábida Baltra
Fernandina Pinzón
Santa Cruz

Santa Fe
Tortuga San Cristóbal
Isabela
Española
Floreana

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Darwin’s Reflections
• Darwin noticed great variability in bill shapes
among 13 species of finches from the Galápagos
Islands
• Focused on two questions:
• Why were the finches on a particular island
slightly different from those on nearby islands?
• How did these different species arise?
• Darwin realized that changes in species over time
provided the only plausible explanation for his
observations

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Finches of the Galápagos Islands

A. Warbler finch B. Common cactus finch C. Large ground finch D. Woodpecker finch
(Certhidea olivacea) (Geospiza scandens) (Geospiza magnirostris) (Camarhynchus pallidus)

©Kjersti Joergensen/Shutterstock.com
Ralph Lee Hopkins/Getty Images

Mark Moffett/Minden Pictures

Alan Root/Bruce Coleman Ltd.

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Selective Breeding and the Struggle for
Existence
• Darwin knew that selective breeding of plants or
animals enhanced desired characteristics in
future generations – a process he called artificial
selection
• Read Thomas Malthus’ Essay on the Principles of
Population, which discussed the effects of
individuals competing for limited food resources
• Realized that species typically produce many more
offspring than are needed – some survive and
reproduce, others die without reproducing

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Darwin’s Inferences
• Observation:
• Individuals within populations vary in size, form,
color, behavior, and other characteristics
• Many of these variations are hereditary
• Inference:
• If certain hereditary traits enabled some individuals
to survive and reproduce more than others, then
those traits would become more common in the
next generation
• Darwin called this process natural selection

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Darwin’s Inferences (cont'd.)
• Natural selection favors adaptive traits,
genetically based characteristics that make
organisms more likely to survive and reproduce
• By favoring individuals that are well adapted to the
environments in which they live, natural selection
causes species to change through time
• Darwin realized that natural selection could cause
populations to become more different over time
(evolutionary divergence) and produce new
species

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Darwin’s Observations and Inferences
Observations
Most organisms produce more than one or two
offspring.
Populations do not increase in size indefinitely.
F ood and other resources are limited for most
populations.
Individuals within populations exhibit variability
in many characteristics.
Many variations appear to be inherited by
subsequent generations.
Hypotheses Prediction
Individuals within a population
compete for limited resources.
A population’s characteristics will change over
the generations as advantageous, heritable
characteristics become more common.
Hereditary characteristics
may allow some individuals
to survive longer and
reproduce more than others.
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Darwin’s Theory of Evolution
• Darwin argued that all organisms that ever lived
arose through descent with modification, the
evolutionary alteration and diversification of
ancestral species
• Envisioned this pattern of descent as a tree (Tree
of Life) growing through time, with each limb
representing a body plan suitable for a particular
way of life
• Proposed natural selection as the mechanism that
drives evolutionary change

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 The Tree of Life

Reproduced by kind permission of the Syndics of Cambridge University Library. MS.DAR.121:p.36.

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Four Characteristics of Darwin’s Theory
• The origins of biological diversity can be explained
by purely physical processes
• Evolutionary change occurs in groups of
organisms, rather than in individuals
• Evolution is a multistage process occurring over
generations
• Evolution occurs because some organisms
function better than others in a particular
environment

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STUDY BREAK 20.2
1. What observations that Darwin made on his
round-the-world voyage influenced his later
thoughts about evolution?
2. How did Darwin’s understanding of artificial
selection enable him to envision the process of
natural selection?
3. What were the four great intellectual triumphs of
Darwin’s theory?

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20.3 Evolutionary Biology Since Darwin
• Genetic variation is the basis of evolution – the
study of population genetics links the ideas of
Mendel and Darwin
• A unified theory of evolution (modern synthesis)
integrates data from biogeography, comparative
morphology, comparative embryology,
paleontology, and taxonomy
• Modern synthesis focuses on the gradual
processes of evolutionary change within
populations

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Focus on Research: Darwin’s Life as a Scientist
• Darwin spent the rest of his life after the voyage of
the H.M.S. Beagle gathering data to test his ideas
and unravel the workings of natural selection
• Kept notebooks about variation in plants and
animals, focusing on variation that was amplified by
selective breeding
• Gathered facts and wrote about evolution almost
until the day he died in 1882

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Two Levels of Evolutionary Change
• Microevolution
• Describes small-scale genetic changes in
populations
• Responds to shifting environmental circumstances
• Example: a shift in bill size of a finch species
• Macroevolution
• Describes larger-scale evolutionary changes in
species and more inclusive groups
• Results from gradual accumulation of
microevolutionary changes

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Evidence of Evolutionary Change
• Biologists interpret the products of natural
selection as evolutionary adaptations
• Some adaptive structures have been modified by
evolutionary processes over millions of years (e.g.,
bird wings)
• Sometimes, natural selection operates on a short
time scale (e.g., development of pesticide
resistance in insects)

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Experimental Research: Evolution of Insecticide
Resistance
KEY
1. When mosquitoes were first exposed to DDT,
Resistant
only about 5% of the population was resistant
and the insecticide killed the remaining 95%. Not resistant

2. Resistant individuals survived and reproduced,

passing the genes for resistance to the next generation.

100 3. About one year later,

nearly 50% of the
90
population was resistant.
80 The same concentration
of DDT killed only 50%
Percentage killed

70 of the population.
60
50 4. Resistant individuals again
survived and reproduced.
40
30
5. After just a few
20 more months, about
75% of the population
10 was resistant and the
0 same concentration of
0 2 4 6 8 10 12 14 16 18 DDT killed only 25% of
the population.
Months

Source: A. M. Shalaby. 1968. Susceptibility studies on Anopheles culicifacies with DDT and Dieldrin in Gujarat state, India.
Journal of Economic Entomology 61:533–541.

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The Fossil Record
• Darwin’s theory proposes that all species that
have ever lived are genetically related
• The fossil record documents continuity in
morphological characteristics – evidence of
ongoing change in biological lineages
(evolutionary sequences of ancestral organisms
and their descendants)
• Example: Evolution of birds can be traced from a
dinosaur ancestor through fossils such as
Archaeopteryx lithographica

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Bird Ancestry

A. Archaeopteryx fossil B. Phylogenetic tree showing the origin of birds

Living birds
60

bobainsworth/iStockphoto.com

Tyrannosauroids

Oviraptorosaurs

Dromeosaurids
Ornithischian dinosaurs
70

80

90

Allosaurids
100

Cretaceous
110

Compsognathids
120

Millions of years ago.

Archaeopteryx
130

140
Toothless beak,
fused wing
150 digits, short
feathered tail

160
Long forelimbs
170
Feathers closed and asymmetrical
Jurassic

Coelophysoids
180

Feathers closed with barbules

190 and hooks, nest-brooding

Tufted feathers
200
Hollow cylindrical feathers
210
Eoraptor

Three digits in hand

Triassic

220

230

Hollow bones, furcula (wish bone)

240
Four digits in hands

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Historical Biogeography
• Geographical distributions of plants and animals in
relation to their evolutionary history (historical
biogeography) are generally consistent with
Darwin’s theory of evolution
• Species on a continental land mass are clearly
related to one another and are often distinct from
those on other continents
• Example: Monkeys in South America evolved from
a different common ancestor than monkeys in
Africa and Asia

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Comparative Morphology
• Analyses of the structure of living and extinct
organisms (comparative morphology) are based
on comparisons of characteristics that are similar
in two species because of genes they inherited
from a common ancestor (homologous traits)
• Example: Forelimbs of all four-legged vertebrates
are homologous because they evolved from a
common ancestor

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Molecular Techniques and Embryology
• Early embryos of related species are often similar,
but morphological differences appear as the
embryos grow and develop their adult forms
• Example: How snakes lost their legs
• Lizards, mammals, and birds develop similar “limb
buds” from which legs or wings grow
• Snakes, which evolved from four-legged ancestors,
have no forelimbs because a mutation extends
expression of the Hoxc8 gene forward in the body

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Genetics of Limb Loss in Snakes

A. Most lizards, like this monitor lizard (Varanus species), have four B. Most snakes, like this grass snake (Natrix species), lack limbs
limbs attached to their backbones. altogether.

George Bernart/NHPA/Photoshot

hotowind/Shutterstock.com
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Genetics of Limb Loss in Snakes
C Some primitive snakes, like D. Molecular analyses reveal that the E. In pythons, both Hoxc6 and Hoxc8
this ball python (Python regius), expression of Hoxc6, but not Hoxc8, are expressed alongside the backbone, beginning just
have vestigial hindlimbs, visible at the base of behind the head (see arrow).
as a pair of clawlike mating the neck in a The expression of these
spurs near the base of the tail. chick embryo two genes appears to
(see arrow) Head suppress the development Head
causes limb of limb buds and
buds and forelimbs and
forelimbs to Promote the
develop nearby. Neck Backbone development of ribs
at that location.

Limb bud
Mating (forelimb)
George Bernart/NHPA/Photoshot

spurs Backbone
KEY
Ribs Hoxc6 Ribs
Hoxc8

Limb bud
(hindlimb)

Limb bud
(hindlimb)

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© 2017 Cengage Learning. All Rights Reserved.
Wooly Mammoth’s Closest Relatives
• Evolutionary biologists compare genetic
sequences of different species to determine their
evolutionary relationships
• Example: Woolly mammoth (Mammuthus
primigenius)
• More than 98% of the mammoth’s gene sequence
is identical to the African elephant’s (Loxodonta
africana)
• Mammoth DNA sequences are even more similar
to those from the Asian elephant (Elephas
maximus)

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Woolly Mammoths

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© 2017 Cengage Learning. All Rights Reserved.
Molecular Insights: Domestication of Dogs
• Research Question: To which populations of
ancient wolves are ancient dogs and modern dogs
most closely related and when did domestication
take place?
• Conclusions:
• The analysis suggests that living dogs fall within
four evolutionary lineages
• The closest ancient wolflike relatives of most
modern dogs lived in Europe
• The domestication process began between 18,800
and 32,100 years ago

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 Years before present

60,000

80,000
70,000
40,000
20,000

50,000
30,000
10,000
0
Belgium
Belgium
Belgium
Russia
Alaska
Japan
Russia
Switzerland
Italy
Poland
Switzerland
Dog D
Switzerland
Argentina
USA
USA
Dog A
Alaska
Russia
Saudi Arabia
Iran
Saudi Arabia
Oman
Russia
Finland
Russia
Alaska
Germany
Germany
Dog C
Mexico
Mexico
Mongolia
China
China
Croatia
India
Israel
Sweden
Sweden
Russia
Phylogenetic Tree for Wolves and Dogs

Poland
Israel
North America
Russia
Spain
North America
Ukraine
Sweden
Dog B
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Evolution is the Core Theory of Modern Biology
• The theory of evolution is a contentious subject
largely because it suggests that humans and apes
are descended from an apelike common ancestor
• The concept of orthogenesis, which suggests
that evolution produces new species with the goal
of improvement, arose early in the 20th century
• We now know that evolution proceeds as an
ongoing process of dynamic adjustment – humans
and apes will continue to evolve for as long as
their descendants persist

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STUDY BREAK 20.3
1. What two problems slowed the acceptance of
Darwin’s theory among scientists?
2. What is the difference between microevolution
and macroevolution?
3. What types of data provide evidence that
evolution has adapted organisms to their
environments and promoted the diversification of
species?

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© 2017 Cengage Learning. All Rights Reserved.
 LEARNING OUTCOME: THINGS TO REMEMBER!!

• What is biological evolution? What is the difference

(s) between natural history and natural theology?
With specific examples, describe the contribution of
biogeography, comparative morphology, paleolenlogy
ang geology to to the devlopment of the theory of
evolution.

• Outline the two main ideas proposed by Lamarck in

his theory of evolution. List four main ideas from
Lamarck that was adopted by Darwin in the
development of the theory of Evolution. List the four
main postulates of Darwin theory of evolution.
Explain Natural Selection and how did Darwin
envisage that it can lead to speciation.
• Post Darwin, the theory of evolution is now referred to
as Modern Synthesis. Explain this term. Explain why
or why not vestigial structures are evidence of
biological evolution. What are homologous traits?
Briefly outline the evidence that suggested that the
evolution of modern birds can be traced to non-flying
dinosaur such as Archeopteryx lithographica.

• What is the difference (s) between microevolution and

macroevolution? How did scientists demonstrate that
the extinct Woolly mammoths is related to present
day elephants. What is historical biogeography?
Outline the key experiments that led to the discovery
of when and where dogs were domesticated. What is
the main flaw to the conclusion?
• Describe the role of Hox genes and ZRS regulatory
enhancer in the development of limbless, streamlined
body of the snake. Suggest possible reason(s) why
natural selection favoured the limbless body of the
snake.

• What is Orthogenesis? With one example, discuss

the flaw inherent in Orthogenesis. Give three
example in which evolutionaly changes can occur
within a short time scale.