You've probably heard it a million times in descriptions of evolution and natural selection. Charles Darwin even liked to say it. But the phrase "survival of the fittest" is wrong, and understanding why can help us better understand what it means to be human.

It takes a special species like Homo sapiens to devour something designed to fend off predators. Given our obsession with spiciness, it's astonishing that we haven't simply decided that eating thornbushes is truly delicious. Now that scientists have revealed the gene responsible for mustard spiciness, I predict we're…

Charles Darwin married his cousin, Emma Wedgwood, in January 1839 — but not before giving it some serious thought. In the months leading up to his marriage proposal in November of 1838, the preeminent naturalist maintained a number of lists, scrawled in his journal, dedicated to the pros and cons of marriage, and the…

Since the dawn of agriculture, humans have been making technological advances that insulate us more and more from the selective pressures that once shaped our evolution — but they've also made the question of whether and how human populations are still affected by Darwinian evolution increasingly unclear.

This awesome video is the brainchild of Tyler Rhodes, an animation student at Virginia Commonwealth University. With the help of some elementary school students, he simulated multiple generations of evolution in the cutest way imaginable, complete with this visual proof.

The latest Symphony of Science track is out, and it is a doozy. Listen to David Attenborough, Richard Dawkins and Bill Nye get their rave on for evolution. Who knew synths intermingled with amoebas on the Tree of Life? Hat tip to Krakenstein2!

When we domesticate animals, we alter their evolutionary development to favor the traits that we find most desirable. Usually, that process takes hundreds, even thousands of years. But fish hatcheries can scramble a species' genetics in a single generation.

In general, the more aware of reality you are, the more likely you are to survive. But sometimes lying to yourself has its advantages. Possessing an over-inflated belief in yourself can help you perform better than accurately knowing your abilities.

The male Houbara bustard of North Africa is one of the animal kingdom's most extravagant creatures, with huge ornamental feathers and complex, energetic mating practices known as "booming." But all that booming has dire consequences for their actual reproductive chances.

Survival of the fittest is, at its heart, an expression of the idea that natural selection will favor those species that are best adapted to their environment. But there might also be a place for the unfit after all.