development

development, evolution are comparable when they mean growth from a lower to a higher state.

Development stresses the bringing out of the hidden or latent possibilities in a thing whether through growth and differentiation and therefore through a series of natural stages

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development of a seed into a plant

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development of a human being from the embryo

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or through the exercise of human energy, ingenuity, or art

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the development of an industry

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development of a tract of Iand

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development of an argument

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Evolution, on the other hand, stresses an orderly succession of events or of living things, each growing out of the preceding yet marked by changes which transform it and give it a particular identity and usually a more elaborate or more advanced character

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the evolution of species

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the evolution of the drama

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Development is appropriately used when the emphasis is on the realization of the full possibilities of a particular thing through natural or artificial means, and evolution when the stress is on transformations which occur in a type, class, or order of things, the individual instances of which retain a likeness to the parent but manifest differences especially in the direction of complexity and progress

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the Aristotelian canon that the "nature" of a thing must be sought in its completed development, its final form— Inge

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no, "revolution" is not the proper word! What is happening in modern physics is a tremendously rapid evolution— Darrow

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Contrasted words: decline, declension, decadence, devolution, *deterioration, degeneration