Evolutionary Biology
What is Evolution
Evolutionary biology is the study of the evolution of different species over the past billions of years. Many scientists have studied evolution since it originally was proposed. Three of these scientists have done considerable research towards evolution. They are Charles Darwin, Jean Baptiste Lamarck, and Alfred Wallace. The theory of evolution was originally published in the book On the Origins of Species in 1859 by Charles Darwin.
Charles Darwin
Charles Darwin is known to have created the theory of Evolution when he published his book On the Origins of Species. Many believe that Darwin created the theory of evolution on his own but this is actually quite wrong. There were many ideas about evolution in the eighteenth century but Darwin's book brought the ideas together to form the whole theory. Charles Darwin worked with Alfred Wallace in a joint publication to explain a branch of evolution that explained the process through natural selection. Darwin later published multiple books on evolution. Some of these books are The Descent of Man, and Selection in Relation to Sex and The Expression of the Emotions in Man and Animals.
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Jean Baptiste Lamarck
In 1801 Jean Baptiste Lamarck proposed a full theory of evolution while other at the time had just been thinking that life had not just been fixed at creation. Lamarck started his scientific career as a botanist but change later on to an expert on invertebrates. As Jean noticed the similarity between the animals and their ancestors minus the slight differences caused by evolution he started piecing together his theory. Jean believed that creatures started as very simple and have been getting increasingly more complex over time. Darwin did not believe this and this is what makes their theories so different from each other. At the time of his theory many scientist were appalled by the theory because it denies any miraculous intervention from a god or deity of any sort.
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Alfred Wallace
Alfred Wallace worked with Charles Darwin on his Theory of Evolution and even had a joint publication of a book with him but that does not mean those theories were the same. In Wallace's theory he explains that life can be changed by survival of the fittest to a limited extent which contrasts with Darwin's theory. While they were both committed to their science Wallace wanted to simply understand the truth about the natural world. While being remembered for his help with Darwin writing his book, Wallace is usually forgotten when it comes to the work he has done and the books that he published.
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