Question

What is the role of selection and adaptation in the process of evolution?

Answer 1

• Selection is one of the mechanism of evolutionary change. Selection is what makes adaptive changes possible out of the otherwise random nature of mutations.
• Mutations provide the raw material of change in genetic frequencies, while selection provides a non random channeling of those mutations into something adaptive.
• Adaptation is what happens to a population undergoing selection. The population either adapts, or it goes extinct.