From Envirowiki

Evolution is the process of natural mutations being selected for fitness (survival of the fittest), and being passed on to descendants, thereby changing the species. This is NOT the same as the survival of the fittest individual.

"It is not the strongest who survive, not the most intelligent... But the ones who are most adaptive to change."

- Charles Darwin

Evolution is the child of natural selection, in which the characteristic mutations that are the most fit (ie. the most beneficial in allowing the organism to adapt to its environment) are 'selected' and passed on to further generations eventually leading to speciation.

[edit] External links

• Something fishy is going on: Research on sticklebacks blows anti-evolution arguments out of the water, Stanford Medicine Magazine, Summer 2006, By Amy Adams