Sanity

     Charles Darwin, born in England in 1809, is widely reknown for his famous theory of evolution (Bio).  According to Ker Than, Darwin’s theory of evolution was first expressed in his book “On the Origin of Species” in 1859.  Melvin Rhodes explains that it gained attention because of its contradiction to the biblical belief of Creationism.  Creationism is the religious belief that all nature was created by God (Bio).  The theory of evolution differs from this because it states that in order to survive and reproduce, organisms change gradually "as a result of changes in heritable physical or behavioral traits" (LiveScience).  Ker Than also explains that using genetics in studies and experiments with Darwin's theory of evolution is known as "modern evolutionary synthesis."  Modern DNA studies have given supporting evidence of Darwin's theory of evolution (Bio).

     Ernst Mayr states for Scientific American that Darwin's three distinct fields of study were evolutionary biology, the philosophy of science, and the modern zeitgeist (studying the spirit or mood over a period of time by using the ideas and beliefs in that time).  Scientific American also provides some key points and statements in Charles Darwin's research, such as the following:

• His theory of evolution is focused on the nonconstancy of species, or the modern conception of evolution.  

• Branching evolution, which implies that the common descent of all species of living things on earth are from a single unique origin

• Evolution of species has to be gradual.  It can't have major breaks or discontinuities to be classified as evolution.

• The mechanism of evolution is natural selection.  For example, the weak species will either die off or evolve to survive and become the strong.