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James Hutton
A Scientist who wrote " Theory of the Earth". This book rejected the old idea that the Earth was only 6000 years old. In fact, the Earth was older than that by millions of years. He also stated that Earth was in constant evolution. He studied rocks and volcanic activity that were used as evidence to support his claim. His ideas contributed to the idea of evolution. Since a millions of species coming from a common ancestor would require more than 6000 years, his theory suppported this idea. -
Thomas Malthus
An economist that wrote " An Essay On The Principle of Population. This book rejected William Godwin's idea that population growth is a good thing as it increases the standard of living. He stated that populations grow more quickly than food and resources. Eventually this leads to a "struggle for survival" within big populations. Evolution biologists took this into account as this is considered to be one of the factors of evolution. -
Jean-Baptist Lamarck
One of the first people to propose a theory of evolution. He proposed the idea of the inheritance of acquired traits. He studied invertebrates for his theory of evolution. Whatever traits animals acquired in their lifetime would be passed down to their offspring. His theory was wrong because there were major flaws. For example, people who grow muscles will have babies with the same strength, which is not possible. -
Charles Lyell
A geologist who wrote "Principles of Geology". It disproved Lamark's theory of evolution. He said that Lamarck's theory went against nature, religion, and humanity. He came up with the example of the giraffe. When giraffes (aka my sis) reached for higher branches, their necks would lenghten and it would be passed down to their offspring. He used this example to mock Lamarck's theory. -
Alfred Russel Wallace
World's most famous scientist before his death. He contributed to many scientific fields, but most importantly evolutionary biogeography, which is the distribution of animals and plants. He discovered the theory of natural selection before Darwin, and wrote about it in his paper (which he shared with Darwin). He studied many insects including butterflies, which helped with his theory. -
Charles Darwin
Famous for proposing the most widely accepted theory of evolution. His published "On the Origin of Species" rejected the idea that animals appeared spontaneously. Instead, he proposed that animals that are fittest compared to the rest of their species will survive and pass down their genes. He focused on studying the Galapagos finches and noticed that the same bird had different beaks in different areas. With the evidence he collected about the finches, he developed his theory.
