Darwin And Wallace Summary
A Review of the Discoveries of Darwin and Wallace
In the video produced by the Howard Hughes Medical Institute, an insight into the scientific revelations by Charles Darwin and his close colleague, Alfred Wallace, is closely examined. Devoted naturalists, the pair are captivated by the allure of nature, especially the distinctive flora and fauna that inhabit the “New World” and the Malay Archipelago (then known as the Dutch East Indies). Darwin, then a 22-year-old man, embarked on the HMS Beagle, a survey sloop, as a companion for the captain in late 1831; one of his itinerary’s, the Galapagos Islands, would forever change the scientific community. Twenty years later Darwin’s partner, Wallace, would sail to the Malay Archipelago and confirm …show more content…
Opening with Wallace and the devastating loss of his specimens and data from a ship fire, he believed he was close to cracking the mystery on the origins of present-day organisms. However, Wallace was unaware that Darwin, some twenty years earlier, solved such a thought at a trip to South America. While stopping in Argentina, for instance, Darwin noticed a similarity between the armadillo, and a larger, fossilized glyptodon; their shells were of similar structure. Upon reaching the Galapagos Islands, however, the varied species of finches, yet with similar features, led him to theorize that such species had a common ancestor. By Wallace’s time, Darwin only confided his findings with close confidants, because such views were contrary to those of the Anglican Church. However, Wallace would travel to Malay Archipelago and study the island’s various butterfly species. During a day Wallace was bedridden due to a malaise, he proposed that the butterflies on the islands were once the same species, yet evolved due to their isolation from each other to better suit their environment. These evolutions, he assumed, were largely due in part to mutations that benefited each organism; those with these advantages would pass on their genes, through a term coined by Wallace himself known as “natural selection. Darwin and Wallace would then publish their findings in “The Origins of Species” and “The Malay Archipelago”,
In the video produced by the Howard Hughes Medical Institute, an insight into the scientific revelations by Charles Darwin and his close colleague, Alfred Wallace, is closely examined. Devoted naturalists, the pair are captivated by the allure of nature, especially the distinctive flora and fauna that inhabit the “New World” and the Malay Archipelago (then known as the Dutch East Indies). Darwin, then a 22-year-old man, embarked on the HMS Beagle, a survey sloop, as a companion for the captain in late 1831; one of his itinerary’s, the Galapagos Islands, would forever change the scientific community. Twenty years later Darwin’s partner, Wallace, would sail to the Malay Archipelago and confirm …show more content…
Opening with Wallace and the devastating loss of his specimens and data from a ship fire, he believed he was close to cracking the mystery on the origins of present-day organisms. However, Wallace was unaware that Darwin, some twenty years earlier, solved such a thought at a trip to South America. While stopping in Argentina, for instance, Darwin noticed a similarity between the armadillo, and a larger, fossilized glyptodon; their shells were of similar structure. Upon reaching the Galapagos Islands, however, the varied species of finches, yet with similar features, led him to theorize that such species had a common ancestor. By Wallace’s time, Darwin only confided his findings with close confidants, because such views were contrary to those of the Anglican Church. However, Wallace would travel to Malay Archipelago and study the island’s various butterfly species. During a day Wallace was bedridden due to a malaise, he proposed that the butterflies on the islands were once the same species, yet evolved due to their isolation from each other to better suit their environment. These evolutions, he assumed, were largely due in part to mutations that benefited each organism; those with these advantages would pass on their genes, through a term coined by Wallace himself known as “natural selection. Darwin and Wallace would then publish their findings in “The Origins of Species” and “The Malay Archipelago”,