Charles Darwin's life is one of the finest examples of the fundamental essence of "science".

He was a naturally curious and reflective individual always searching for evidence to explain the natural world around him. (pbs.org 1998) He spent much of his younger years outside and by the time he reached college age he was already an experienced naturalist.

A voyage on a ship named "The Beagle" is the experience that changed Darwin's life and resulted in what we all know. The voyage was five years long in which he spent most of his time taking long "trips" on land exploring the flora and fauna of South America, Galapogos, Tahiti and Australia.

Darwin made careful observations wherevever he went. Darwin's key observations about the diversity of life and the distribution of life was the precurssor to him writing about the Origin of Species.

Upon Darwin's return, he spent 7 to 8 years studying barnacles. His knowledge in this one area sparked his thinking in others. In the following years he developed his revolutionary theory of natural selection that in turn explained a mechanism for what we know as evolution!

Darwin then studied birds like pigeons because he wanted to understand how new species could possibly be created from a common ancestor by the buildup of small changes over generations. He studied pigeons because it was easy to observe these small changes through artificial selection

He then spent another 20 years gathering his evidence before publishing it. The published data revolutionized biology.