Evolution

Cells

You explain to them how evolution is thought to work, and what, based on that, we should expect to find in biology, genetics and palaeontology. Then you allow them to see what we actually do find in biology, genetics and palaeontology. If they're able to understand what has been explained to them and shown to them, they will subsequently accept evolutionary theory (ie. common descent and natural selection) as the best (and indeed only available) explanation.

Novelty, Entrepreneurial, and Mass Media

no

genetics

A meteor strikes Earth.

Herbert Spencer was the early sociologist who applied the concept of evolution to societies.

You may mean post zygotic isolation/barrier to interbreeding between species. Sterile hybrids, such as mules are a good example of this. The zygote can form from the union of two gametes, but the mature organisms can no longer produce progeny usually due to chromosome mismatch.

He has been called the " Charles Darwin " of the 20th century, but his greatest interest was in abiogenesis and that rather from a dialectal materialistic perspective.

Biologist

Biologist is a generalized answer. Biology covers a broad spectrum of career paths. More specific answers could be "Botany" or "Ichthyology" which are branches of biology but more specifically geared to the search for and study of Plants and Fish, respectively.

Natural selection explains adaptive change in the immediate environment.

No. The dinosaurs rose in the Mesozoic era. The end of the Mesozoic era was also the end of the dinosaurs. The era following is the Cenozoic, which we are still in today.

1. Individuals take revenge for wrongs done to them.

2. Awards of money or goods are substituted for revenge.

3. Court systems are formed.

4. A central authority figure intervenes to prevent and punish wrongs.

Mutations.

They, when beneficial, provide variations of organisms genomes for natural selection. Beneficial mutations may confer a slight reproductive advantage to the organism so that genes " promoted " into the next generation change the allele frequency of the population causing evolution.

bye

Charles Darwin

Yes. Without variation in organisms for natural selection to choose from there would be no change in allele frequency over time in the population of organisms under discussion. This is the definition of evolution, so without change over time, no evolution.

First, we'll define eugenics. Wikipedia defines eugenics as the applied science of the bio-social movement which advocates practices to improve the genetic composition of a population, usually a human population.

We can, for the moment, exclude cattle breeding from the scope of this discussion. Of course cattle breeders are always trying to improve their stock, but this is hardly an ethical controversy.

We can also exclude parents who knowingly act to affect, through targeted breeding, the genetics of their children-to-be in such a way as to achieve a certain effect in those offspring, or the one or two subsequent generations. Eugenics is about population-wide effects, not about a few singletons wanting their children to be good at athletics.

We can also exclude governmental efforts to have teenagers practice safe sex rather than produce unwanted offspring. The effect of such a campaign has the potential to be population-wide, but the intention is not to affect the genetic composition of the population, merely to improve the quality of life for parent and child.

So the question is: are there currently movements who are actively trying to affect human breeding with the intention of achieving a specific population-wide genetic effect?

No, I don't think so.

Daing, I could have started with that last bit and left out the rest.

Yes, the evidence from systematics, paleontology, botany and field biology plus the findings of the founders of population genetics.

Darwin had considerable evidence at his disposal. The most famous would be the finch beaks on the Galapagos Islands. But he also noted graduated geographic differences in pigeons, as well as traits bred by pigeon fanciers. Fossils of giant sloths indicated these creatures and forms and varieties long extinct.

Probably the single biggest piece of evidence was the fact most species fit into a nested hierarchy of forms, highly indicative of shared (or common) ancestry.

global cooling 2.8 million years ago resulted in dry grasslands replacing wet forests in parts of Africa.

Both contain DNA

Evolution. Interesting way to put, evolution is the change in allele frequency over time in a population of organisms.