Selection, the Principle of Evolution
In The Origin of Species, Charles Darwin introduced the principle of selection as the agent driving evolution. In the words of Niles Eldredge, the curator of the American Museum of Natural History –
“When [Darwin] formulated the principle of natural selection, he had discovered the central process of evolution.”
Interestingly, English zoologist and chemist Edward Blyth introduced the phrase “natural process of selection” twenty years earlier. In the first chapter of The Origin of Species, Darwin credits Blyth, noting –
“Mr. Blyth, whose opinion, from his large and varied stores of knowledge, I should value more than that of almost anyone.”
