Misconception about Evolution
Misconception about Evolution
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When people think of evolution, they mostly assume it results in organisms being perfectly suited to that one environment. To be clear on what evolution is, it is the change in the genetic makeup of a population over time, not just what one organism goes through during its lifetime. When talking about evolution, we must understand that it does not provide us with information about how life first appeared on Earth. Evolutionary biology tells us how life has changed after its origin, or after life started. With this, it is also important to know that evolution does not always happen slowly as one may think. Evolution can happen in a very gradual way, but depending on the organism evolution can be a rapid process as we see in some single celled organisms (Gregory, T. R. 2009). Evolution, as a whole, can be hard to wrap one's head around, but it is important to understand that life evolves randomly or by chance. Randomness does play a role in some organisms’ evolutionary patterns, making the overall process a random process. Evolution is progressive, allowing organisms to continuously improve. This is because natural selection does not ensure organisms will be perfectly suited for their environment, but rather selects a range of traits that are useful in the survival of that organism. (Gregory, T. R. 2009) Natural selection weeds out individuals that are unfit. Organisms now may be fit enough to survive and reproduce but they are still evolving from their ancestors. Evolution takes place to create a stronger organism to fit that environment. Over time, the evolutionary theory has grown and expanded as it has incorporated findings of scientific disciplines to become what it is today.
Image Source: https://thelogicofscience.com/2015/08/31/10-common-myths-about-evolution/
Misconceptions in the Classroom
Misconceptions in the Classroom
Religious views and scientific views of evolution are very different. Creationism is the belief that above all, there has been a divine action in order to form life as humans know it. Contrary to this belief is the theory of evolution where organisms have gone through generations of random and environmental evolution which has led species to their state today. Commonly, grade school teachers have taught creationism as equal to or more viable than the evolutionary theory which could not have been more disproven. Shockingly, still today in some areas of the United states individual teachers are allowed to teach in this manner which is a disservice to many students. In a Berkley journal, misconceptions such as believing science fact and religious belief are equal is wrong (UCMP Team). Treating this problem head on with regulation was and still continues to be the best tactic in combating these ideas being taught against each other.
Standards for teaching practices and curriculum have restricted some of the misconceptions gained at a young age which may help younger adults learn realistic views of how they have evolved not only in the past decades but in the last two and a half million years. The environment of teaching the creationism ideas cancels the necessary discussion there needs to be had on how or if humans are evolving today. While homo-sapiens sapiens today are more immobile than ever in history, that does not mean evolution has stopped. (Pennisi 2017)
A group tracking human evolution in the United Kingdom recently has discovered how to track genomes in the biology of humans. They are acting to prove that although evolution can span over millions of years, as seen physically, the ability to trace genomes allows scientists to trace ancestors back to as late as Roman times. This has allowed us to even prove how how much taller and farrier our species has become just over the past couple hundreds of years(UCMP Team). Among being standing proof that humans alongside all other living organisms evolve, this stands as proof to not only refute the claim of creationism but to factually disprove it.
These studies have also shown us that mutations such as tallness can be passed on easier throughout a generation with the help of changing conditions and a need for taller people. Gradually this has increased having taller offspring. In recent millenia, the same group has discovered that humans have also increased in “head circumference in infants, and hip size in females”(Pennisi 2017) in order to aid in giving birth to larger headed children. These changes in human biology are explained by measuring the changes in hundreds of genes over time and determining that this "phenonminon" was not initiated by one source but by the necessity for a larger waist in women in order to survive giving birth. These changes cannot however be explained by creationism due to the lack of facts that have been discovered and proven by science and the science community. Misconceptions about evolution can be shut down with studies such as these due to their unbiased nature and factual findings free to the public. Teaching evolutionary theory in the classroom is far superior and based on evidence, rather than only ideas and stories, that is why teachers must stray far away from their personal beliefs in order to help their students real curriculum.
References
The UCMP project team: Misconceptions about Evolution, evolution.berkeley.edu/evolibrary/misconceptions_faq.php#i1.
Elizabeth, Pennisi, et al. “Humans Are Still Evolving-and We Can Watch It Happen.” Science, 9 Dec. 2017, www.sciencemag.org/news/2016/05/humans-are-still-evolving-and-we-can-watch-it-happen.
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