And on the flip side, a sufficient abundance of resources and/or lack of predators mean non-optimal species can procreate, and thus find other local optima.
In terms of evolution, the fitness of a species is defined by its ability to reproduce. In the circumstances you describe, selection pressure exists for the species that can reproduce the fastest. Predators or resource constraints are not a requirement for evolution.
> In the circumstances you describe, selection pressure exists for the species that can reproduce the fastest.
My point was there's no pressure without constraints. A faster-reproducing species will only apply a pressure if starts exhausting a resource or similar.
