However, many favoured competing explanations and it was not until the emergence of the modern evolutionary synthesis from the 1930s to the 1950s that a broad consensus developed in which natural selection was the basic mechanism of evolution.
Men mange begunstigede konkurrerende forklaringer, og det var ikke før fremkomsten af den moderne evolutionære syntese fra 1930'erne til 1950'erne, at en bred konsensus skabtes om naturlig udvælgelse som den grundlæggende mekanisme for evolution.