The historical development of wildlife occurs according to certain laws and is characterized by a combination of individual features. The successes of biology in the first half of the 19th century served as a prerequisite for the creation of a new science - evolutionary biology. She immediately became popular. And she proved that evolution in biology is a deterministic and irreversible process of development of both individual species and their entire communities - populations. It occurs in the biosphere of the Earth, affecting all its shells. This article will be devoted to both the study of the concepts of a biological species and the factors of evolution.
The history of evolutionary views
Science has passed the difficult path of forming worldviews about the mechanisms that underlie the nature of our planet. It began with the ideas of creationism expressed by C. Linnaeus, J. Cuvier, C. Lyellay. The first evolutionary hypothesis was stated by the French scientist Lamarck in his work “Philosophy of Zoology”. The English researcher Charles Darwin was the first in science to express the idea that evolution in biology is a process based on hereditary variation and natural selection. Its foundation is the struggle for existence.
Darwin believed that the appearance of continuous changes in biological species is the result of their adaptation to the constant change of environmental factors. The struggle for existence, according to the scientist, is a set of interconnections of the organism with the surrounding nature. And its reason lies in the desire of living beings to increase their numbers and expand their habitats. All of the above factors and includes evolution. Biology, which 9th grade is studied in the lessons, considers the processes of hereditary variability and natural selection in the section "Evolutionary doctrine".
Synthetic hypothesis of the development of the organic world
Even during the life of Charles Darwin, his ideas were criticized by a number of such famous scientists as F. Jenkin and G. Spencer. In the 20th century, in connection with violent genetic research and the postulation of the laws of heredity of Mendel, it became possible to create a synthetic hypothesis of evolution. In her writings, it was described by such famous scientists as S. Chetverikov, D. Haldane and S. Ryde. They argued that evolution in biology is a phenomenon of biological progress in the form of aromorphoses, idioadaptations affecting populations of various species.
According to this hypothesis, the evolutionary factors are the waves of life, gene drift and isolation. Forms of the historical development of nature are manifested in processes such as speciation, microevolution, and macroevolution. The above scientific views can be represented as the summation of knowledge about mutations that are a source of hereditary variability. As well as ideas about the population as a structural unit of the historical development of a biological species.
What is an evolutionary environment?
This term refers to the biogeocenotic level of organization of wildlife. Microevolutionary processes occur in it, affecting populations of the same species. As a result, the emergence of subspecies and new species is possible. Here, processes are observed that lead to the appearance of taxa — genera, families, and classes. They relate to macroevolution. Scientific studies of V. Vernadsky, which prove the close interconnection of all levels of organization of living matter in the biosphere, confirm the fact that biogeocenosis is an environment of evolutionary processes.
In climax, that is, stable ecosystems, in which a wide variety of populations of many classes is observed, changes occur due to coherent evolution. The species in such stable biogeocenoses are called coenophilic. And in systems with unstable conditions, an inconsistent evolution occurs among ecologically plastic, so-called coenophobic species. Migrations of individuals of different populations of the same species change their gene pools, disrupting the frequency of occurrence of different genes. So says modern biology. The evolution of the organic world, which we will consider below, confirms this fact.
Stages of the development of nature
Scientists such as S. Razumovsky and V. Krasilov have proved that the pace of evolution underlying the development of nature is uneven. They represent slow and almost imperceptible changes in stable biogeocenoses. They sharply accelerate during periods of environmental crises: technological disasters, melting glaciers, etc. About 3 million species of living creatures live in the modern biosphere. The most important of them for human life is studied by biology (7th grade). The evolution of the simplest, enteric, arthropod, chordates is a gradual complication of the circulatory, respiratory, nervous systems of these animals.
The first remains of living organisms are found in Archean sedimentary rocks. Their age is about 2.5 billion years. The first eukaryotes appeared at the beginning of the Proterozoic era. Possible variants of the origin of multicellular organisms explain the scientific hypotheses of the phagocytella I. Mechnikov and E. Goethel’s gastrea. Evolution in biology is a way of developing wildlife from the first Archean life forms to the diversity of flora and fauna of the modern Cenozoic era.
Modern concepts of evolutionary factors
They are conditions that cause adaptive changes in organisms. Their genotype is most protected from external influences (conservative gene pool of a biological species). Hereditary information can still change under the influence of gene chromosomal mutations. It was in this way - the acquisition of new signs and properties - that the evolution of animals took place. Biology studies it in such sections as comparative anatomy, biogeography, and genetics. Reproduction, as a factor in evolution, is of utmost importance. It provides a generational change and a continuity of life.
Man and the biosphere
The processes of the appearance of the Earth's shells and the geochemical activity of living organisms are studied by biology. The evolution of the biosphere of our planet has a long geological history. It was developed by V. Vernadsky in his teaching. He introduced the term “noosphere”, understanding under it the influence of a person’s conscious (mental) activity on nature. Living matter, which enters into all the shells of the planet, changes them and determines the cycle of matter and energy.