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Birth
Charles Robert Darwin was born on 12 February 1809 in Shrewsbury, England. -
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Trip to South America
Darwin was employed as a naturalist on a trip to South America. The trip's main purpose was to survey the coastline to make better maps. During the trip, Darwin was collecting fossils of plants and animals that he brought back home later -
Theory of natural selection
Darwin posted his thoughts about how species are made. He compared the natural selection process with breeding. Breeders choose species with the best qualities and breed them together. The same goes for the wildlife but nature plays the role of a breeder. -
Citation
“… probably all the organic beings which have ever lived on this earth have descended from some one primordial form, into which life was first breathed.” -
The Origin of Species
Darwin and young self-trained naturalist Alfred Russel Wallace worked on the theory of evolution by natural selection, the theory which Darwin spent 10 years gathering evidence but never published. It argues that the numerous traits and adaptations that differentiate species from each other also explain how species evolved over time and gradually diverged. YouTube video - https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=JOk_0mUT_JU -
The Expression of the Emotions in Man and Animals
In this book Darwin argues that humans came from animals, showing there are similarities in human and animal psychology. Darwin's idea caused a lot of controversies, some people called it attack on society’s moral foundations. -
Citation
“Natural selection acts solely by accumulating slight successive favorable variations, it can produce no great or sudden modification; it can act only by very short steps.” -
Death
Aged 73 Darwin died at Down, Kent, England.
