Darwin Vs Lamarck

Theories of evolution by natural processes, theories of evolution by natural selection, and even the existence of evolution at all, have been up for debate for many centuries. While many scientists/philosophers/researchers have been discredited, two evolutional theorists have conducted enough research and have gained enough supporting evidence to obtain naturalists group’s support over the years. These two most widely accepted theorists of evolution were: Jean Baptist Lamarck and his believe of acquired characteristics along with independent progression and his predecessor Charles Darwin, who would discredit Lamarck’s theories to provide the foundation for modern day evolutionary thought. Lamarck cemented the concept that offspring inherit

Through his biggest contribution, the discovery of the Galapagos finches, he was able to disprove Lamarck’s predetermined theory of nature and adaption. In his book, Darwin even goes to the extremes of defining what he means by the term nature so that viewers of book would not be confused with Jean Baptiste Lamarck. Darwin stated, “So again, it is difficult to avoid personifying the world Nature; but I mean by Nature, only the aggregate action and product of many natural laws.”(Darwin, 1909, pg.95) The finches of the Galapagos Islands were a great example of how Darwin uses the word nature. When forced to leave one habitat or environment on the island for nature or naturalist causes whether that be: interspecies competition or lack of resources the birds in response were able to adapt such that they could survive and their species would not die off. This was an immediate response to a subtle change in climate (sand and sun to water and rain forest) that was not predetermined, for theses

While they did not all have similar ideas, they all used each other’s research to dis-prove the others theory and that is what makes Charles Darwin stand out above the rest. His research and his evidence has never been disapproved, in fact, it has only ever been further accredited. Jean Baptiste Lamarck’s upbringing of being religious and from the Catholic Church may have had some reasoning as to why he was not able to form the hypothesis the same as Charles Darwin, but many believe it was Darwin’s upbringing that allowed his ideas of evolution to be broadly explored and later