Struggle for existence facts for kids
The struggle for existence is a big idea in natural history. It describes how living things compete to survive and have babies. Charles Darwin used this phrase over 40 times in his famous book, The Origin of Species. He even made it the title of one of his chapters!
Darwin got this important idea from reading a book by Thomas Robert Malthus. Another scientist, Alfred Russel Wallace, also used this phrase often.
The idea of living things competing is actually very old. Many natural historians noticed how different species fight for resources. But Malthus was one of the first to think about how members of the same species, like humans, compete for things they need to live.
Darwin first learned about Malthus's ideas while he was traveling on the HMS Beagle. Later, he thought a lot about Malthus's idea that human populations could grow very quickly. If they didn't, it was because of things like not enough food, or because of wars and diseases.
Darwin started to see that every living thing could grow in numbers very fast, like 2, then 4, then 8, and so on. But this doesn't happen in nature. He realized this was because of competition between animals, limited food, the weather, and sicknesses. All living things are connected in this struggle for existence. He also saw that the competition is strongest between animals of the same kind.
Later, Darwin put these ideas together with two more. First, in this struggle, some individuals are better at surviving than others. Second, these helpful traits can be passed down from parents to their children. This led him to his big idea of evolution through natural selection. Wallace came up with the same idea on his own!
Darwin used "struggle for existence" as the title of the third chapter in his The Origin of Species in 1859. He explained that he used the term in a broad way. It included how living things depend on each other. It also meant not just staying alive, but also being successful at having offspring. For example, a plant in a dry place struggles for water, meaning it depends on moisture to live.
Darwin wrote: "A struggle for existence inevitably follows from the high rate at which organic beings tend to increase." He first thought about how selection happens because of this struggle on July 15, 1838.
In 1858, Wallace sent an essay to Darwin. Wallace had been recovering from malaria in the Malay Archipelago. His essay also mentioned: "The life of wild animals is a struggle for existence." Wallace had learned this from the same book by Malthus. This led to Darwin and Wallace publishing their ideas about evolution by natural selection together in 1858.
Related ideas
Images for kids
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In 1879 George Bouverie Goddard showed "The Struggle for Existence" as a fight between wolves.
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Charles Darwin used the term broadly, giving as an example "a plant on the edge of a desert" struggling for moisture.
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In the late 1830s, Charles Darwin began developing his ideas of "warring of the species" leading to natural selection.
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Peter Kropotkin wrote the book Mutual Aid: A Factor of Evolution in response to the idea of evolution by natural selection.
On the Origin of Species#Struggle for existence, natural selection, and divergence
