- Evolution can be explained by what we know about genetics, and what we see of animals and plants living in the wild.
ok.
- The variety of genes (alleles) carried in natural populations is a key factor in evolution.
ok. obviously, variation is necessary for selection, otherwise nothing can be selected.
- Natural selection is the main mechanism of change. Even a very slight advantage can be important, continued generation after generation. The struggle for existence of animals and plants in the wild causes natural selection. Only those who survive and reproduce pass their genes on to the next generation. We find the strength of natural selection in the wild was greater than even Darwin expected.
i don't particularly like the exact words used here, but ok. i would like to see a larger role attributed to randomness and a lesser role attributed to competition. i'll get to this in a moment...
- Evolution is gradual: natural selection occurs, and small genetic changes collect. Species only change little from one generation to the next. Big changes do occur, from time to time, but they are very rare.
for the most part, sure. i would further put forward the idea that those big changes are largely hybrid events, and suggest a "family graph" as an alternate model to a family tree.
- Genetic drift is usually less important than natural selection. It can be important in small populations.
this one, i have serious problems with. there's a huge list of "adaptations" that seem to be defined by random genetic drift rather than natural selection. note that my opposition to the way evolution is understood is that it hasn't entirely eliminated a deity, not that it has. it's still too religious, not not religious enough! vestigial traits are one example that seems to be better described using random genetic drift than natural selection. it's not that i deny competition as a force for evolution, it's that i think they have the primacy of things backwards: randomness defines most evolution, but natural selection can be important when competing over specific scarce resources (and situations of scarce resources would be the exception, rather than the rule, in biology).
- In palaeontology, we try to understand the changes in fossils through time. We think the same factors which act today also acted in the past.
ok - except when evidence exists otherwise. it's really an untenable assumption, when analyzed. but it's necessary - unless it can be demonstrated otherwise.
- As circumstances change, the rate of evolution may get faster or slower, but the causes are the same.
same thing as the last comment. that should be read simply as "the rate of evolution is not constant".