Charles Darwin (1809-1882)
|
|
|
Use the following questions to guide
what you remember from the reading on Darwin assigned for November 4. No
extended discussion of Darwin is included in Does the Center Hold.
And there will be no lecture on Darwin. Still, we may discuss him briefly,
and some questions for the final exam will be based on the chapter from Sofie's World that you read for November 4.
|
|
|
- What two significant thinkers besides Darwin were a part of the
"naturalistic current" that swept across Europe beginning in the middle of
the 19th century?
- How did Darwin get his start as a naturalist?
- Who wrote The Origin of Species, and when was it published?
- What did Darwin mean by natural selection, and why is it important to any successful theory of evolution?
- Who were Lamarck and Erasmus Darwin, and why are they important for understanding the origins of the theory of evolution?
- Views of creation before Darwin saw all vegetable and animal species as immutable. What does it mean to say that a species is immutable?
- Who was Sir Charles Lyell? Why is he important for understanding the origins of the theory of evolution?
- What did Darwin mean by "natural selection," and why was this significant for the history of the theory of evolution?
- What is neo-Darwinism?
- What is a mutation?
- How does the theory of evolution help explain why some antibiotics are loosing their ability to fight disease?
- What two conditions do most scientists today think had to be met before the complex molecules that make up living organisms could form?
|