“And so I moved that very day into the heart of a quince, where the seeds are few and almost silent.” – Khalil Gibran, from the poem “The Pomegranate”
I was always taught that evolution is a slow process that occurs over generations. The reality is that evolution can occur quickly. A meteorite slams into the earth, smoke and debris deny plants of sunlight, and the dinosaurs begin to die as their food sources whither. Mammals emerge from their tunnels and thrive as they realize their former predators are quickly dying away. Any change in our external environment can lead to faster evolution as species do what it takes to survive. Scientists have even shown[1] that a species can evolve in real time.
