• Question: is there any evidence for the theory of evolution?

    Asked by xheneta1 to Dilwar, Lou, Rachel, Simon, Susan on 18 Nov 2013.
    • Photo: Simon Langley-Evans

      Simon Langley-Evans answered on 18 Nov 2013:

      Xheneta

      Yes, the evidence is there in huge amounts. A good example of recent, rapid evolution is the peppered moth. This moth used to be white and lived on silver birch trees where it was camouflaged against the white bark. With industrial pollution in some areas, the tree trunks became blackened and so white moths were easily spotted an picked off by predators. Moths that had a black patterning which normally would have be predated now had an advantage and survived to have offspring. The species changed from predominantly white to black over a short space of time.

      The fossil record has numerous examples to show evolution. For example we know that dinosaurs evolved into birds as there are fossils that have been found which show feathered dinosaurs.

      When Darwin visited the Galapagos islands he found lots of evidence of evolution- giant tortoises on different islands that had divided into new species that were specialised in how they were able to feed. Finches that had evolved to feed on different plants and had gone through changes to become new species in doing so.

      The best evidence comes from looking at the genetic level. By looking at genes in different species we can tell which species are closely related to each other and puzzle out the order in which new species appeared.

    • Photo: Susan Skelton

      Susan Skelton answered on 19 Nov 2013:

      Hi xheneta,
      Yes, there is loads of evidence for evolution. Most of the evidence comes from fossils. One animal that we have a good record for is the horse. Lots of fossils of the horse have been found from all different time periods, so fossils have been found showing all the main stages of it’s evolution.

      The first fossil of the horse is from 60 million years ago! At this time the horse was a dog-sized creature that lived in rain forests. It’s taken 60 million years for it to evolve into an animal that has adapted to living on the plains and stands up to 2 metres high!

      During the evolution process, it’s multi-toed feet, which were suitable for walking across the floor of the rainforest, have evolved into single-toed hooves which are much more suitable for running over open country.

      More evidence can be found by looking at microorganisms like bacteria. Bacteria reproduce very rapidly and can evolve in a relatively short time. As they reproduce, sometime the DNA can be damaged or changed. Most of the time this causes the bacteria to die, but occasionally this change is useful for the bacteria – it might allow resistance to an antibiotic. When that antibiotic is present, the resistant bacteria have an advantage over the bacteria that are not resistant. Antibiotic-resistant strains of bacteria are a starting to be a big problem in hospitals as we have no way of treating these infections.

    • Photo: Dilwar Hussain

      Dilwar Hussain answered on 19 Nov 2013:

      Hi xheneta1,

      There’s lots of convincing evidence for evolution for example the moths Simon described or even at the bacteria level described by Susan below. There’s also Darwin’s description of the change in beak structure of birds on Galapagos Islands over time. I am a bit sceptical about Humans being derived from monkeys though.

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