Charles Darwin
Natural selection is a relatively simple theory that involves five basic assumptions. The theory of natural selection can be better understood by identifying the basic principles on which it relies. Those principles, or assumptions, include:
1. Struggle for existence - More individuals in a population are born each generation than will survive and reproduce.
2. Variation - Individuals within a population are variable. Some individuals have different characteristics than others.
3. Differential survival and reproduction - Individuals that have certain characteristics are better able to survive and reproduce than other individuals having different characteristics.
4. Inheritance - Some of the characteristics that influence an individual's survival and reproduction are heritable.
5. Time - Ample amounts of time are available to allow for change.
Darwin first used Herbert Spencer's new phrase "survival of the fittest" alongside "natural selection" in the fifth edition of On the Origin of Species, published in 1869, intending it to mean "better designed for an immediate, local environment as seen in Naturalism literature.
Title of Selected Literature / Textual Evidence (Quote and Page number properly cited) / Analysis- Explanation of how textual evidence supports this theorist beliefsSigmund Freud
The father of psychoanalysis, Sigmund Freud is best known for his tendency to trace nearly all psychological problems back to sexual issues. Although only parts of his theory of psychosexual development are still accepted by mainstream psychologists, Freud's theory of the Oedipal Complex (The Oedipal complex is a term used by Sigmund Freud in his theory of psychosexual stages of development to describe a boy's feelings of desire for his mother and jealously and anger towards his father. Essentially, a boy feels like he is in competition with his father for possession of his mother. He views his father as a rival for her attentions and affections) has become a cultural icon nevertheless. Freud’s views on women stirred controversy during his own lifetime and continue to evoke considerable debate today. "Women oppose change, receive passively, and add nothing of their own," he wrote in a 1925 paper entitled "The Psychical Consequences of the Anatomic Distinction Between the Sexes." In response to Freud’s theories, Naturalism allowed women to take on a different role and several used the literature that they produced to speak out like no women had done before.
Title of Selected Literature / Textual Evidence (Quote and Page number properly cited) / Analysis- Explanation of how textual evidence supports this theorist beliefs