What was charles darwin role in the development of theory of evolution?

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Natural_selection

Darwin was the father of evolution- he came up with the theory. I'm pretty sure what caused him to come up with it was the adaptations of animals on Galapagos Island. Finches and frogs and stuff... But I'm not quite sure what you mean by mechanism?

he founded it.

idk

he explored the world and visited the Galapagos Island to study the animals and found out there were animals from the same species that evolved differently to their surroundings

we just went over this in class, hope im right(: basically, he went on a 5 year expedition around the world and when he got to the Galapgos Islands he saw that the tortoises on each Island were slightly different from each other. He published many books about evolution and how he thought each thing came from a similar ancestor, and the 'best' or 'more favorable' traits keep getting passed. hope this helps(:

Charles Darwin was born into a moderately wealthy family in Shrewsbury, England. His father, Robert, had the largest medical practice outside of London at the time and his mother, Susannah Wedgwood, was from a family of wealthy pottery manufacturers. She died when Charles was only 8 years old. Thereafter, he was raised mostly by his father and older sisters. Charles grew up in comparative luxury in a large house with servants. However, this was a socially very conservative time in England that set narrow limits on a young man's behavior and future possibilities. The constraints on women in Darwin's social class were even greater. Most were given only enough education to efficiently manage the homes of their future husbands and raise their children. Young men were expected to go to university in order to prepare themselves to become medical doctors, military officers, or clerics in the Church of England. Most other occupations were considered somewhat unsavory.

only the strong survive, or survival of the fittest

He publish "On the Origin of Species" which set down what we today call evolutionary theory. Darwin wasn't the first to proposed the ideas of evolution but his work brought it to the attention of scientists and the public. Darwin suggested the mechanism of evolution is natural selection. This isn't "Survival of the fittest" that comes from someone else. Darwin just pointed out that those individuals that did with with their environment, tended to reproduce and pass their traits on to their offspring.The famous finches was that different islands had finches with differently shaped beaks and ate different foods. He theorized (explained) this as there was an original breed of finch but over the years they had adapted to the food sources on each island. Those that had a slightly different bill that could get more food, tended to reproduce. The different shaped bill was passed on to the offspring. In time a completely new bill developed.