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Misconceptions About Natural Selection

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Paragraph 1: Misconceptions about Natural Selection

One of the misconceptions about natural selection is that humans can’t negatively impact ecosystems, because species will just evolve what they need to survive. This is, perhaps, based on another misconception that natural selection can predict and supply what a species needs. This however is not true. Natural selection happens non-randomly in some individuals in a species who possess adaptive phenotypic traits that have a higher net reproductive success than individuals without these traits (Larry L Mai, 2005, 371). Natural selection can only occur for those adaptive traits that possess heritability. This means that if a population does not possess these genetic variations, evolution in response to environmental changes brought on by humans will not occur in the species. For example, climate changes i.e. global warming has had and is still having quite an adverse effect on the Arctic, causing the sea ice to decline drastically and thus having a negative impact on the ecosystem. Polar bears, whose main source of diet are seals, depend on the sea ice for their hunting methods, which is stalk seals at their breathing holes in the ice. Another animal negatively impacted by the disappearing sea ice are the Walrus. Walrus depend on floating pieces of sea ice to haul themselves out of the water. However, as the sea ice disappears some Walruses and walrus pups drown at sea. If the Polar Bear’s and Walrus’s lack the necessary genetic variation that would allow them to cope with these changes in their ecosystem it is likely their species will die out and go extinct.

References:
Larry L. Mai (2005), The Cambridge Dictionary of Human Biology and Evolution; pg.371

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