Evolution theory 1 .docx - Lamarck vs Darwin In the early...

Lamarck vs Darwin
In the early 19th century, scientists still didn’t understand how living things evolved.
While the idea of evolution had been around for a while, the phenomenon went
unnamed and was without a proposed mechanism. A scientist by the name of Jean-
Baptiste Lamarck noted that animals seemed very well suited to their environments.
He suspected that throughout their lifetimes animals improved themselves. For
example, a giraffe's long neck was thought to be the result of the animal's continual
stretching in order to reach food that was higher from the ground.
Lamarck also thought that these changes were caused by the animals' struggle to
survive and were
passed onto the next
generation, which
then continued the
evolutionary process.
A new baby giraffe
would have a longer
neck as a result of its
parents stretching for
their food.
According to Lamarck's idea, what would happen if two animals that had spent their
lives using their right limbs far more than their left limbs had offspring?
if you said something similar to their offspring would have an overdeveloped or
stronger set of right limbs you're correct! Around two years after Lamarck's death, a
young Charles Darwin set off on a voyage that would change his life and science
forever. Prior to setting sail on the HMS Beagle, Darwin had spent some time studying