Darwin's Finches

[ProStoY_PatSaN]

can environmental changes change genetic structure of finches?

According to darwinism never! In darwinism animals do not adapt to their enviromnent like i need longer beak so my children will have longer beak. Theres natural selection (no adaptation) which select the more succsesfull trait and lesser succesfull traits are deleted from population. So if you put finches with normal length of beaks to the particular island, some children of these birds will have longer neck some will have shorter beak, some will have beak like their parents and which trait will be more succesful that will survive. Genetic material is changing randomly and environment do select these changes. (bad darwinism )

are evolution and natural selection the same thing?

[canalon]

are evolution and natural selection the same thing?

Yes... and No.
Evolution is the result: living beings are changing in the course of time, and natural selection is the name given to the mechanism that drives this changes (why some are conserved and some disappear). In fact Evolution as is understood need:
1- mechanisms to generate diversity (mutations in the largest sense)
2- a mechanism "to evaluate" the value of each change, this what is usually called natural selection (in case of breeding you have a selectio that is not entirely natural)..

Patrick

[Thisisanfield]

I think evolution was the underlying cause in emergence of different types of beaks. Finches needed to adapt to their respective environments to obtain food from different sources such as deep from the soil or in trunks of trees. Genes can be considered as playing a part of the finche's evolution but the main reason I believe is evolution caused by the diversity of environmental conditions.

[MrMistery]

genes, evolution and natural selection are interconected You can't have one without the other

[123Herpatology]

the finches in the galapagos islands are an example of adaptive radiation right? and if so, was the term "adaptive radiation" and its specifics coined by the notorious charles darwin?

[rambo]

Your speaking more of a question concerning mendel's laws and his theory on recessive and dominant traits. Darwin is trying to explain in his finches that birds evolve their habit, such as eating a new material. over time their peak may change to help them. Plus, one bird cannot just change his beak if its genes read differ. it would have to evolve over time. Darwin is trying to express that one day in history there were no sub species of anykind of species. just alot of different species like dogs with the same look. or bird that all eat the same food.