No 3672 Set by George Cowley

In honour of Colin Tudge ("Natural selection can be explained in five minutes"), we asked for a ten-year-old's explanation.

Report by Ms de Meaner

Well, your ten-year-olds certainly varied in their vocabularies and spelling. Hon menshes to David Silverman ("He studied 13 species of finch and loads of mutant turtles and every species of barnacle and seaweed he could lay his hands on. I think Darwin needs to get a life") and R J Pickles ("Natural selection explains why some creatures died off and others such as my mum and dad are still around after millions of years"). £20 to the winners; the vouchers go to Chas F Garvey.

Charles Darwin went on a cruise with a beagle and discovered the origin of the pieces that made it possible for the fattest to survive, whatever that means. He also invented Nach'ral selection, which means diff'rent things to diff'rent people. F'rinstance, to Mr Eriksson, it means David Beckham and Michael Owen, but that could change if we "don't get a result" as my dad says. Anyhow, he says it's all a load of pillocks, or I think that's what he said. Whenever the subject's mentioned he says "Evolution, evolution, evolution" in that silly voice he uses when he wants to blame the Prime Minister for something.

According to my mum, McDonald's come into it. The other day I heard her talking to Mrs Grimshaw, who lives next door, and they were discussing me. She said I always select the dearest item on the menu when we go there on Sundays. "Nach'rally" she said. And both her and old Mother Grimshaw laughed like drains.

Chas F Garvey

Natural selection is like where the fat ones and the ugly ones and the ones who can't sing or had panic attacks when Nasty Nigel called their names get told they're not going to be in the band. It is known as survivor of the fittest and I thought Myleene was the fittest and she survived and got in the band so there must be something in it if you ask me. There is a lot of crying whether you are selected or not. Natural selection is also like where they put some of the most famous people in the whole world in a house with cameras and they get voted out because they are not very good and they go mental and the grumpy man who tried to escape wins because it is for comic relief and it is surv-ivor of the funniest and he did farts which is dead funny like on South Park. There is also a lot of crying so it is safe to say that this is a very important law to do with natural selection. Darwin invented natural selection because he won the first Big Brother on Galapagos Island near Scotland.

R Ewing

OK. So evolution's like Man U and Liverpool. They're like the animals. They try to beat each other, getting better and better, and faster and faster. So if you look at videos from 20 years ago, the teams are all slower than they are now, but even so now they're still in the same league, and they still lose sometimes. Oh yeah - and the men in the team get really beautiful girlfriends, like Posh Spice.

Anyway, they're all competing to get to the top of the league but what they don't notice is things are changing. The pitches keep getting waterlogged, matches keep getting called off, and the players keep slipping over. Then comes global warming, the water level rises, the players all drown - fit or not - and we're left with the Liverpool water polo team. They've adapted to the new conditions. And that's what the next people in the human race will be like.

Rebecca Reynolds

Think of David Beckham. Now he's a natural selection for England. And why? Because if you put David Beckham in front of a microphone he sounds like a dork, but if you put him on a football field it's his natural environment, and he fits it, so his fame and wealth will grow.

Now think of Brian Labone. You won't have heard of him, but he used to play centre-half for Everton and England. He quickly became extinct as an England player. Why? Because he was big and slow and could only watch the ball, and a central defender has to move quite fast to stop opponents scoring. If not, his team will probably lose.

Brian Labone was what we call "an evolutionary dead end". He did not have the skills to survive in international football. He was poorly adapted to a competitive environment. Labones have been overtaken by players who have very large amounts of muscle, speed, stamina and aggression. And it is the same with all life-forms on Planet Earth.

Basil Ransome-Davies

Charles Dickens, a famous British evolutionary, said that life has many forms. You can be a pickpocket, an urchin or an ape. Dickens was a cabin boy on the HMS Smith. The voyage was long but very enjoyable. Charles adapted well and gathered proof that a flower girl could turn into a toff (this was when social class was invented). He spent lots of time ashore collecting plants, animals and vassals, as well as making lots of jellogical observations. On his return to London, after writing The Origins of Oliver Twist, Charles put his collection in a catalogue and wondered what existence was all about. He ended up with three theorems:

1 All animals and humans will change as they grow, until they reach a limit of their size, and grinding poverty sets in.

2 Since not all adapt to their environment, some will be fit and some not so fit. This is called "survival of the fittest". This "natural selection" is what life is about.

3 Some survive, some don't. There are not many brontosauruses around today (except on television).

John O'Byrne

No 3675 Set by Gavin Ross

So, after four more years, Britain will be a "foreign country" (Hague). Descriptions, please, in the style of a travel writer of your choice. Max 200 words by 12 April.

E-mail: comp@newstatesman.co.uk

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