LIFE SCIENCE

Detailed explanation-1: -What does ‘survival of the fittest’ mean? In terms of evolution, an animal that is ‘fit’ is one that is adapted to its environment. This concept is at the core of natural selection, although the term ‘survival of the fittest’ has often been misunderstood and may be best avoided.

Detailed explanation-2: -Natural selection can cause microevolution (change in allele frequencies), with fitness-increasing alleles becoming more common in the population. Fitness is a measure of reproductive success (how many offspring an organism leaves in the next generation, relative to others in the group).

Detailed explanation-3: -Fitness, in other words, is the trait that natural selection “sees” and other traits change only because they are associated genetically with fitness and so get dragged along with the response to selection on fitness itself.

Detailed explanation-4: -Survival of the fittest means that organisms that are better adapted to their environment are best suited to survive and successfully reproduce. “Survival of the fittest” is an expression, developed from Darwin’s theory of evolution.