- Charles Darwin was an English naturalist best known for developing the theory of evolution through his book "On the Origin of Species". He studied species of finches on the Galapagos Islands which provided evidence for his theory. Darwin proposed that all life shares a common ancestor and that gradual changes over long periods of time lead to the diversity of life we see today. His theory of evolution through natural selection and evidence from fossils and comparative anatomy of living things is still widely accepted today as the explanation for the development of life.