evidence against Darwin - 7 main objections 

• evolution still just a theory - still has questions, lacking proof
• no fossil intermediates - no evidence of transition between organisms
  • increasing fossil evidence says otherwise
• intelligent design - organs too complex for a random process
  • organs develop as series of slight/tiny improvements
• evolution violates 2nd law of thermodynamics - things tend towards disorder, not order
  • organisms shouldn’t become more advanced
• proteins too improbable - 20 proteins, near countless number of arrangements
  • extremely low chance maybe, but still possible when given enough time
  • “give a monkey a typewriter…if given enough time, he will write Shakespeare”
• natural selection doesn’t imply evolution - production of radically different organisms possible in laboratory now
• irreducible complexity argument - each part essential to overall process, can’t evolve
  • each part considered to evolve as part of the working system

Darwin ’s major points - variation in all natural populations 

• most have potential to reproduce at rate that can deplete all natural resources
• resources limited >> those w/ most advantageous adaptations survive
• natural selection - “survival of the fittest”
  • produces different reproduction rates
  • not necessarily directly related to death
• fitness - number of surviving offspring left in the next generation
  • combination of survival, mating success, number of offspring per mating
  • usually involves female fitness (hard to determine father)
  • behavioral ecology - study of how natural selection affects behavior
  • adaptive significance - how behavior increase survival/reproduction

3 tenants of natural selection - number of fertilized eggs isn’t always the number of offspring

• nonrandom survival - things don’t survive randomly
• nonrandom mating - purposeful action
• nonrandom fecundity - a reason to why certain creatures produce more offspring
• survival strategies
• altricial - unable to care for itself
• precocial - born ready/mature
• reproductive trait - number produced at each reproduction
• parental care - needed for animal to grow/survive