Why is a species called a qualitative stage of evolution?
The diversity of the animal world is not static – it is in motion and change under the influence of various environmental factors. Evolution plays a key role in this process. Evolution is the development from a simple organization of matter to a complex one, a transformation that leads to the emergence of new structures, connections and interactions.
Qualitative changes in an object of the animal or plant world represent the acquisition of new qualities, the complication of the properties of living matter.
The concept of a species
The researcher of the biological world, Karl Linnaeus, generalized the scientific knowledge of biological science and introduced the following units of taxonomy into circulation: species, genus, family, order, class.
A species is a collection of individuals with a number of similar traits, united by the ability to interbreed with each other.
A species is the result of the development of evolution, securing its next stage, representing a genetically integral isolated organization adapted to a specific environment, but ready to change under the influence of various evolutionary factors.
Variety of formation of species
Speciation is a complex process of forming new species from existing ones, involving certain stages and implying the presence of influence. Any kind of flora or fauna is complexly structured, contains a multilevel hierarchy, occupies its own ecological niche, has a certain similarity in external and internal structure. To define and systematize it, the following criteria are distinguished:
morphological;
genetic;
ecological – geographic;
ethological;
physiological.
Thus, a species is a system of living nature that forms, preserves and protects a certain gene pool. Its formation contributes to further evolutionary development, the process of natural selection, which continues at the level of not only species, but also genera and families, which, in turn, further contributes to the next evolutionary step. The time scale for a qualitative evolutionary change is hundreds and thousands of years.
