REVIEW & REHEARSE: 8 Evolution and NATURAL SELECTION
!ques1! <i>Check Your Knowledge</i>
Question 8.8
Selecting for increased starvation resistance in fruit flies:
- a) has no effect, because starvation resistance is not a trait that influences fruit flies’ fitness.
- b) has little effect; ongoing mutation counteracts any benefits from selection.
- c) cannot increase their survival time, because there is no genetic variation for this trait.
- d) has no effect; starvation resistance is dependent on the effects of too many genes.
- e) can produce populations in which the average time to death from starvation is 160 hours.
Question 8.9
Georges Cuvier’s discovery of fossils of Irish elk and giant ground sloths:
- a) supports scientific evidence for extinction.
- a) was possible because of Buffon’s determination that the earth was more than 6,000 years old.
- a) was possible only following Darwin’s publication of The Origin of Species.
- a) was made in deep ocean trenches.
- a) suggested that species are immutable.
Question 8.10
While on the Beagle, Darwin was intrigued by glyptodonts because:
- a) glyptodont fossils resembled a species that currently existed but were much, much larger.
- b) glyptodont populations thrived on islands but were always wiped out by predators when they were brought to the mainland.
- c) glyptodont fossils varied in size across the different islands in the Galápagos archipelago.
- d) armadillos occurred in Africa but not in South America; glyptodont fossils in South America revealed the continents had once been joined.
- e) their dental structures indicated they consumed seeds larger than those produced by any plants currently found on earth.
