struggle for existence

American  

noun

1. the competition in nature among organisms of a population to maintain themselves in a given environment and to survive to reproduce others of their kind.

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struggle for existence British  

noun

1. (not in technical usage) competition between organisms of a population, esp as a factor in the evolution of plants and animals See also natural selection

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Etymology

Origin of struggle for existence

First recorded in 1820–30

Example Sentences

These distractions keep us from confronting reality: facilitation may be real, but so is the Darwinian struggle for existence.

From Scientific American • Jul. 19, 2021

Casa 0101, a community resource since 2002, faces its own struggle for existence, but with support from an ongoing fundraising campaign, programming is scheduled into July, Lopez says.

From Los Angeles Times • Nov. 9, 2018

He “wakes up” from his programmed illusion of comfortable, bland monotony into a brutal yet genuine struggle for existence, a messianic battle against evil manipulating overlords.

From Salon • Sep. 16, 2018

Darwin described this as the struggle for existence.

From Textbooks • Jan. 1, 2018

An opposite view is that benign environments leave people free from the constant struggle for existence, free to devote themselves to innovation.

From "Guns, Germs, and Steel: The Fates of Human Societies" by Jared M. Diamond