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survival of the fittest

the tendency of individuals that are better adapted to a particular environment to be more successful at surviving and producing offspring. This concept is inherent in the theory of evolution by natural selection, as proposed in the 1850s by British naturalists Charles Darwin and Alfred Russel Wallace (1823–1913). See also competition for resources; Darwinian fitness; social Darwinism. [coined by Herbert Spencer in Principles of Biology (1864) and adopted by Darwin as a synonym for natural selection in the fifth edition of his Origin of Species (1869, Chapter 4)]

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Psychology term of the day

January 19th 2025

Electra complex

Electra complex

the female counterpart of the Oedipus complex, involving the daughter’s love for her father, jealousy toward the mother, and blame of the mother for depriving her of a penis. Although Sigmund Freud rejected the phrase, using the term Oedipus complex to refer to both boys and girls, many modern textbooks of psychology propagate the mistaken belief that Electra complex is a Freudian term. The name derives from the Greek myth of Electra, daughter of Agamemnon and Clytemnestra, who seeks to avenge her father’s murder by persuading her brother Orestes to help her kill Clytemnestra and her lover Aegisthus. [defined by Carl Jung]