Outstanding post! What an in-depth explanation of both theories !
So, according to Lamarck's evolutionary reasoning, human beings would evolve to live in a post -cataclysm world . ( Thinking that this world will be destroyed by pollution and nuclear wars )That would be possible because we will be able to adapt to the new environmental conditions .
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Thank you! According to both Lamarck's and Darwin's theory, we would be able to survive such cataclysm (if we are using that example), however the difference between those theories is in the mechanism that would provide us survival. According to Lamarck, new environment (pollution and nuclear wars, or whatever you can think of!) would cause new characteristics to develop in individuals, which would lead to survival of those individuals. According to Darwin's theory (and modern theory of evolution as well), there is already variation in those traits among individuals in our population - new environment would just select individuals with those traits, meaning that only individuals with advantageous traits for living in pollution (for example, some of us are able to stand more radiation without getting cancer or dying) would survive and reproduce. To sum up - environment cannot induce development of traits, it can only select them from already existing pool of traits. Hope that this is clearer now :)
Thanks for replying. Yes, I got a better picture of it.