The term often leads into confusion, however, since international compact cars are somewhat larger than their North American equivalents, mostly because no supermini/subcompact size is manufactured by American, Mexican and Canadian car makers up to date.
By the late 1860's, Darwin came to describe this process as the survival of the fittest. This is very different from Lamarck's incorrect idea that the environment altered the shape of individuals and that these acquired changes were then inherited.
Therefore, survival of the fittest may not be the best way to describe what natural selection really is as it applies to evolution. Darwin did not mean it in these terms when he used it in his book after Herbert first published the phrase. Darwin meant fittest to mean the one best suited for the immediate environment. This is the basis of the idea of natural selection. The individual of the population only needs to have the most favorable traits to survive in the environment.