<P> Molecular data regarding the mechanisms underlying development accumulated rapidly during the 1980s and 1990s . It became clear that the diversity of animal morphology was not the result of different sets of proteins regulating the development of different animals, but from changes in the deployment of a small set of proteins that were common to all animals . These proteins became known as the "developmental - genetic toolkit ." Such perspectives influenced the disciplines of phylogenetics, paleontology and comparative developmental biology, and spawned the new discipline of evolutionary developmental biology also known as evo - devo . </P> <P> One of the tenets of population genetics since its inception has been that macroevolution (the evolution of phylogenic clades at the species level and above) was solely the result of the mechanisms of microevolution (changes in gene frequency within populations) operating over an extended period of time . During the last decades of the 20th century some paleontologists raised questions about whether other factors, such as punctuated equilibrium and group selection operating on the level of entire species and even higher level phylogenic clades, needed to be considered to explain patterns in evolution revealed by statistical analysis of the fossil record . Near the end of the 20th century some researchers in evolutionary developmental biology suggested that interactions between the environment and the developmental process might have been the source of some of the structural innovations seen in macroevolution, but other evo - devo researchers maintained that genetic mechanisms visible at the population level are fully sufficient to explain all macroevolution . </P> <P> Epigenetics is the study of heritable changes in gene expression or cellular phenotype caused by mechanisms other than changes in the underlying DNA sequence . By the first decade of the 21st century it had become accepted that epigenetic mechanisms were a necessary part of the evolutionary origin of cellular differentiation . Although epigenetics in multicellular organisms is generally thought to be a mechanism involved in differentiation, with epigenetic patterns "reset" when organisms reproduce, there have been some observations of transgenerational epigenetic inheritance . This shows that in some cases nongenetic changes to an organism can be inherited and it has been suggested that such inheritance can help with adaptation to local conditions and affect evolution . Some have suggested that in certain cases a form of Lamarckian evolution may occur . </P> <P> Pierre Teilhard de Chardin's metaphysical Omega Point theory, found in his book The Phenomenon of Man (1955), describes the gradual development of the universe from subatomic particles to human society, which he viewed as its final stage and goal . </P>

Which excerpt best develops the central idea of the evolution of useful things