Evolution is the process where organisms change over generations leading to new organisms. Organisms inherit their particular characteristics (their traits) from their parents through genes. Changes (called mutations) in these genes can become a new trait in the offspring of an organism. If a new trait makes these offspring better-suited to their environment, they will be more successful at surviving and reproducing than other organisms. This process is called natural selection and causes favorable traits to become more common. Over many generations, a group of organisms can accumulate so many new traits that it becomes a new species.^[1] The result of four billion years^{{cn}} of evolution is the diversity of life in the world today.^{{cn}}

Evolutionary biology is the study of evolution, especially the natural processes that account for the variety of organisms, both alive today and long extinct. The understanding of evolutionary biology began with the 1859 publication of Charles Darwin's On the Origin of Species. The next important step was Gregor Mendel's work with plants, with which he helped to explain the hereditary patterns of genetics. This led to an understanding of the mechanisms of inheritance.^[2] The discovery of the structure of DNA and advances in the field of population genetics provided insight into the source of variations in creatures. Scientists better understand the development of new species from ancestral species, or speciation, because of modern research. Evolution is the principal theory that governs our understanding of zoology, botany, agriculture, medicine, molecular biology, paleontology, taxonomy and any other scientific field that attempts to understand life.

Add suggestions you'd like to submit for consideration and refinement here. For example, you might have a suggestion that is not ready for an edit to the above lead, but still important enough in your view for others to see, consider, refine, or dismiss.

• Consider replacing "Because no two organisms have exactly the same traits, they will live and reproduce differently, some more successfully than others" with something that conveys "Organisms live and reproduce differently because no two organisms have exactly the same traits, and some traits provide differential advantages" but worded better.

You are a passionate man. However, it is way past my bedtime and likely yours as well. Catch you tomorrow on this one!--Random Replicator (talk) 06:19, 21 January 2008 (UTC)Reply

Bedtime? That was when my alarm clock went off this morning! Have moved a lot of discussion and some ideas to the talk page and have implemented some of the points, hope that helps move things forward. .. dave souza, talk 15:47, 21 January 2008 (UTC)Reply

The lead sentence is bad. You have to have a style that engages the reader into the article in addition to writing at an appropriate level. You don't have to knock people unconscious with your lead sentence, either. It appears that a simple declarative sentence leading into the article is not possible (as usual, no one bothered to respond to my post, but I'm more than used to that by now, and it's one step up from calling me names behind my back!). This article is intended as an introduction to the scientific concepts behind evolution. This makes it different from the standard encyclopedia and the usual Wikipedia article. Alerting the reader to this, without disclaimers, seems to me to be a good idea. If it were not a special type of Wikipedia article, I can see arguments against doing this. But pretending it's a standard article when it's not isn't helpful. The lead paragraph is unreadable, imo. It has soporific qualities. IMO it's also bad to be too in love with sophisticated vocabulary, not just complex. This is my suggestion for the lead section, taking issue with some problems in the current one, elaborated below:

Introduction to evolution is an overview of biological evolution intended for the reader new to scientific explanations of the natural processes by which all species develop from earlier forms of life. All living things on the planet earth share a common relationship with each other and with all extinct organisms as a result of the process of evolution. Evolution occurs due to the accumulation of changes through time that takes place in a population of organisms over successive generations. All living organisms inherit these changes in their genes, which are made up of information molecules called DNA. Changes in these molecules, called (mutations), can become a new feature, or trait, in the offspring of a living organism. New traits in an offspring are almost always minor, but create differences in the members of a population that lead to no two members doing equally well in the same environment. One member may do poorly and produce few or no offspring. Another member may do well because of a unique favorable trait and produce many offspring. This process is called natural selection. Over time, the favorable trait will become more common in the descendents of the population. Over many generations many new traits may accumulate in a population making the organism so much different from its ancestors that it is no longer recognizable as the same species.

Traits are not "new features" because the old features are traits, also. The process is called "natural selection," it's not owned by scientists. The favorable trait only has to become more common, not common. Speciation doesn't require a scientist to recognize it. I see some changes have been added, since I went at this, I'll look at them. I do expect this to be completely ignored, so there's no point in reading the new lead before posting this. --Amaltheus (talk) 06:27, 21 January 2008 (UTC)Reply

I can point out some problems but don't have time to do the rewrite right now, and it appears that following the request to post lead suggestions here was not for me-again the exclusive club of which any outsider suggestions are not allowed.

"Evolutionary biology is the study of evolution, especially the natural processes that account for the variety of creatures, both alive today and long extinct. The understanding of evolutionary biology has advanced far beyond Charles Darwin in the mid-19th century. The next important step was Gregor Mendel's work with plants. His research helped to explain the hereditary patterns of genetics. This led to an understanding of the mechanisms of inheritance.^[1] The discovery of the structure of DNA and advances in the field of population genetics provided insight into the source of variations in creatures. Scientists better understand speciation or the development of new species from ancestral species because of modern research. Research by scientists in many different fields supports evolution. Evolution is the principal theory that governs our understanding of zoology, botany, agriculture, medicine, molecular biology, paleontology, taxonomy and any other scientific field that attempts to understand life."

Mendel's work on plants was contemporaneous with Darwin's publication of On the Origin of Species. There weren't great advances between the two publications, Darwin's book and Mendel's papers. His research did not lead to an understanding of the mechanisms of inheritance, later scientists studying inheritance and coming upon his research led to an understanding of the mechanisms of inheritance and a great appreciation of Mendel. You should probably say population genetics in the lead, also. There was a hell of a lot of work between this discovery and Watson and Crick, like most of the scientific work done that gives us the way we study evolutionary biology today and the platform upon which our genetic evolutionary biology sits. The modern synthesis can't be left out. --Amaltheus (talk) 06:52, 21 January 2008 (UTC)Reply

I do not support that this is in a user's talk space to be nuked upon conclusion. TableManners^C·U·T 17:48, 21 January 2008 (UTC)Reply

If you want, it can all be archived for ever at the article's talk page archives. Seriously, I don't care. Cheers! Wassupwestcoast (talk) 17:57, 21 January 2008 (UTC)Reply

Well, I think we should decide whether or not these discussions of the lead are on or off the record now. TableManners^C·U·T 18:05, 21 January 2008 (UTC)Reply

On the record, it is! I will insure that all of this will be archived with the main article. Cheers! Wassupwestcoast (talk) 18:34, 21 January 2008 (UTC)Reply

From WP:Lead:

Next to establishing context, the lead section should briefly summarize the most important points covered in an article in such a way that it can stand on its own as a concise version of the article .... It is even more important here than for the rest of the article that the text be accessible, and consideration should be given to creating interest in reading the whole article ....

In general, specialized terminology should be avoided in an introduction. Where uncommon terms are essential to describing the subject, they should be placed in context, briefly defined, and linked. The subject should be placed in a context with which many readers could be expected to be familiar.... Readers should not be dropped into the middle of the subject from the first word—they should be eased into it.

Are we doing what the guideline suggests? This article is not supposed to duplicate Evolution. I think we are re-writing the lead to 'Evolution'. I know a couple of the editors actually teach adolescents. Imagine a simple experiment. If a teacher were to distribute randomly either the lead to 'Intro to Evolution' or 'Evolution' to an average group of ninth grade kids, would there be a measureable difference in the two groups understanding of evolution? Note the greatest reading accomplishment for the average fourteen-year-old is to have read all of Harry Potter. Now, as it is, I suspect the two groups would show no statistical difference. Cheers! Wassupwestcoast (talk) 18:34, 21 January 2008 (UTC)Reply

• Consider moving second paragraph to a new section (keep the paragraph, put in a ==Section name== between the lead and the demoted paragraph.

This is the lead, what do you mean 'new section' Cheers Wassupwestcoast (talk) 18:38, 21 January 2008 (UTC)Reply

By putting in a sub-heading, one automatically places the text into the body of the article. It is no longer in the lead. We can do that but it is not building the lead. By the way, the lead is the summary of the entire body of the article. Presumably, every thing in the lead is already present and would be a duplicate. Cheers! Wassupwestcoast (talk) 18:38, 21 January 2008 (UTC)Reply

Biological evolution is the natural process that explains the common relationship of all life on earth now and in the past. Evolution is a result of the combined changes in inheritable features—called traits—that occur in a population of organisms over successive generations. All living organisms can inherit these changes because they have genes, which are made up of molecules called DNA. Changes in these molecules, called mutations, can become a new feature in the offspring of a living organism. These new features are almost always minor changes. Because no two organisms have exactly the same traits, they will live and reproduce differently, some more effectively than others. Scientists call this process natural selection. Over time, favorable traits become more common in the descendents of the organisms. Over many generations, new traits accumulate in a population to such a degree that the organism has changed and scientists recognize it as a new species.^[2] The result of four billion years of evolution is the diversity of life around us, and it is estimated that 1.75 million different species are alive today. ^[3][4]

Evolutionary biology is the study of evolution, especially the natural processes that led to the variety of organisms alive today and produced innumerable varieties that are long extinct. The understanding of evolutionary biology began with the pioneering work of Charles Darwin in the mid-19th century. The next important step was Gregor Mendel's research work with plants, which helped to explain the hereditary patterns of genetics.^[5] This eventually led to an understanding of the mechanisms of inheritance in the modern evolutionary synthesis of the 1930s. The discovery of the structure of DNA in the 1950s and advances in the field of population genetics provided insight into the source of variations in organisms. With the benefit of modern research, scientists are obtaining a better understanding of speciation, the development of new species from ancestral species. Research by scientists in many different fields confirms evolution as the principal theory that governs our understanding of zoology, botany, agriculture, medicine, molecular biology, paleontology, taxonomy and any other scientific field that seeks to understand life.

There were several changes from the older lead incorporated in this version, and the sandbox version has also been modified. It may be useful to try to compare them side by side, and pick out and comment on preferred versions, or propose new options. Thanks, .. dave souza, talk 20:10, 21 January 2008 (UTC)Reply

• Biological evolution is the natural process that explains - Can "natural processes" "explain"? This seems like odd diction to me. Awadewit | talk 00:16, 22 January 2008 (UTC)Reply

• Evolution is a result of the combined changes in inheritable features—called traits—that occur in a population of organisms over successive generations. - I think this sentence is starting to get complicated again (there are four linked words in it). Awadewit | talk 00:19, 22 January 2008 (UTC)Reply

• Scientists call this process natural selection. - This is still awkward, as it focuses on the scientists and their naming, rather than the definition of natural selection. Awadewit | talk 00:21, 22 January 2008 (UTC)Reply

• We are missing a sentence or two on the evidence for evolution, which constitutes a large section of the article. Awadewit | talk 00:26, 22 January 2008 (UTC)Reply

The following is a summary of the entire article in 300 words. Almost all of the text comes from the body of the article.

Darwin's explanation of evolution relied on his theory of natural selection. Observations of variations in animals and plants formed the basis of the theory, which Darwin published in On the Origin of Species in 1859. Darwin’s theory of natural selection laid the groundwork for modern evolutionary theory, and his experiments and observations showed that heritable variations occurred within populations and were governed by natural selection.

Genes are the basic units of heredity in living organisms. The exact form of the genes in an organism is called the organism's genotype and this set of genes influences the properties (or phenotype) of an organism. From a genetic viewpoint, evolution is a generation-to-generation change in the frequencies of alleles within a population that shares a common gene pool. A population is a localized group of individuals belonging to the same species. An allele is one specific form of a gene. A gene pool is the complete set of alleles in a single population. Each allele occurs a certain number of times in the gene pool. The fraction of genes within the gene pool for a given allele is called the allele frequency. A population in which the frequencies of alleles are constant is not experiencing evolution. It is very rare for natural populations to experience no change in the frequency of alleles from generation to generation. Frequencies of alleles in a gene pool typically change, resulting in evolution of populations over successive generations. This migration between populations is called gene flow. Speciation is the lineage-splitting event that results in two separate species forming from a single common ancestral population. The accumulated genetic changes may result in separated populations that can no longer interbreed if they are reunited.

The theory of evolution, which explains the variations in biological species, is founded on several basic observations. Evolution is therefore not a random process for creating new life forms.

Cheers! Wassupwestcoast (talk) 20:24, 21 January 2008 (UTC)Reply