Can't really pin point it?

Hi Tahoessblue,
Are these test questions? They sound like it. Off the top of my head, I would encourage you to think about Darwin's reading of Malthus, Lyell's books on geology, Darwin's experiences on his trip on the HMS Beagle, not least his trip to the Galapagos, and once he was home, his investigation artificial selection, for example in pigeons. All of this greatly informed the development of his ideas. But you need to be able to articulate 1. What he learned from each of these things and 2. How it all came together in his mind to help him formulate his theory of evolution by natural selection.

Good luck!
Just Asking

Darwin as a child had a fantasy concerning fabulous discoveries innatural history. He often boasted in schoool over producing variously colored flowers from the same plant. His father was a successful physician.
He studied religion at Cambridge

Darwin spent @ 5 years on the ship Beagle doing sudy on coral reefs.
The writings of malthus called "population" is said to have made the connection and was the inspiring factor for his latter writings.

Also while Dawin for some reson got all of the fame for his writings, actually a very similar writing was published before his in 1858, It was by AR Wallace. It is "on the Tendency of Species to form Varieties and on the Perpertuation of Varieties and Spcies by natural Means of Selection.

It was not untill a year latter that Darwin actually produced his works, "Origin of Species" What separated Darwin was that he did not stop at his viewpoint as it reflected to coral and plants ( subjects of his studies) but he expanded the ideas to include man.

It is interesting in his writing, he appears to blame man for a lot of the variations in many plants and animals as man adapts these for his own uses.