I recently attended the colloquium "The Evolution of Evolution: Darwin Then and Now." It is part of a five part series of discussions on The Science of Evolution: Life, Earth, Universe. The speaker, David Reznick, discussed how the theory of evolution itself has evolved over time, and it was a very interesting discussion to attend.
Reznick began by explaining what the theories of speciation were before Darwin came along. Carolus Linnaeus (originally Carl Linne) first came up with his system for classifying animals in 1735, the system we currently still use today. This of course led many scientists to wonder what was the cause behind all the different types of animals. What makes some so different and some so incredibly similar? Many theories emerged, including divine creation with room to grow (speciation). Our former president Thomas Jefferson even gave his own theories as to why there was such a variety of species' in the world. Before this lecture I did not even know he was a man of science. The concept of extinction however, was a sort of handicap for all the theories to date. None of them could explain why animals would go extinct. There was undeniable proof that this did indeed happen.
Anyway, Darwin came along and published his Origin of Species in 1859 after his famous voyage on the Beagle. Darwin was the first to present an idea of evolution through natural selection, which explained both the diversity of species and the idea behind extinction.
It was a very interesting discussion to attend, and I for one will be attending the next talk in this series, "Life's Rocky Road: The History of Life on Earth." It is on May 14, 7-8pm in the university theatre right across from olmstead hall, if anyone wishes to attend.
-Osvaldo Enriquez
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Osvaldo,
ReplyDeleteAh, a colloquium report! Your was the first I've read so far, and I'm glad you found it interesting to consider attending another. (Not all of the colloquia turn out to be interesting. A lot of them are like the physics lecture I was showing in class, which I find interesting, but virtually no one else does.)
- GS