Artificial selection (or selective breeding) describes intentional breeding for certain traits, or combination of traits. The term was utilized by Charles Darwin in contrast to natural selection, in which the differential reproduction of organisms with certain traits is attributed to improved survival or reproductive ability (“Darwinian fitness”). As opposed to artificial selection, in which humans favor specific traits, in natural selection the environment acts as a sieve through which only certain variations can pass.
The deliberate exploitation of artificial selection has become very common in experimental biology, as well as the discovery and invention of new drugs. Artificial selection can also be unintentional; it is thought that domestication of crops by early humans was largely unintentional.
Read more about Artificial Selection: Historical Development, Contrast To Natural Selection, Laboratory Usage
Famous quotes containing the words artificial and/or selection:
“The tendencies of the times favor the idea of self-government, and leave the individual, for all code, to the rewards and penalties of his own constitution, which work with more energy than we believe, whilst we depend on artificial restraints.”
—Ralph Waldo Emerson (1803–1882)
“When you consider the radiance, that it does not withhold
itself but pours its abundance without selection into every
nook and cranny”
—Archie Randolph Ammons (b. 1926)