Thomas Malthus\u2019s contribution to natural selection is the: <\/p>\n\n\n\n
Group of answer choices <\/p>\n\n\n\n
a. binomial taxonomic system of naming species. <\/p>\n\n\n\n
c. the observation that an abundance of food would allow a population to increase geometrically and indefinitely, but there simply is not enough food, so populations are limited by food supply. <\/p>\n\n\n\n
d. theory that environmental resources increase to population pressures. <\/p>\n\n\n\n
b. theory that the earth\u2019s old age is based on geologic evidence resulting from cataclysmic events<\/p>\n\n\n\n
The correct answer and explanation is:<\/mark><\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n The correct answer is c. the observation that an abundance of food would allow a population to increase geometrically and indefinitely, but there simply is not enough food, so populations are limited by food supply.<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n Explanation:<\/strong> This imbalance between population growth and food supply creates competition for resources. When the population exceeds the capacity of available resources, it leads to scarcity, which then limits population growth. Malthus’s theory highlighted the role of resource limitations in regulating population sizes. These limitations could lead to various checks on population growth, such as famine, disease, or even war, which would reduce the population to a sustainable level.<\/p>\n\n\n\n Malthus\u2019s ideas were influential in shaping the field of evolutionary biology, particularly in relation to the concept of natural selection. Charles Darwin was influenced by Malthus\u2019s observations when developing his theory of evolution. Malthus\u2019s notion that populations could be constrained by resource limitations paralleled Darwin\u2019s concept of the “struggle for existence,” where individuals within a population compete for limited resources. This competition for survival is a key mechanism in the process of natural selection, where only those best adapted to their environment are likely to survive and reproduce.<\/p>\n\n\n\n Thus, Malthus\u2019s work provided a crucial foundation for the understanding of how natural selection operates within populations.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" Thomas Malthus\u2019s contribution to natural selection is the: Group of answer choices a. binomial taxonomic system of naming species. c. the observation that an abundance of food would allow a population to increase geometrically and indefinitely, but there simply is not enough food, so populations are limited by food supply. d. theory that environmental resources […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"site-sidebar-layout":"default","site-content-layout":"","ast-site-content-layout":"default","site-content-style":"default","site-sidebar-style":"default","ast-global-header-display":"","ast-banner-title-visibility":"","ast-main-header-display":"","ast-hfb-above-header-display":"","ast-hfb-below-header-display":"","ast-hfb-mobile-header-display":"","site-post-title":"","ast-breadcrumbs-content":"","ast-featured-img":"","footer-sml-layout":"","ast-disable-related-posts":"","theme-transparent-header-meta":"","adv-header-id-meta":"","stick-header-meta":"","header-above-stick-meta":"","header-main-stick-meta":"","header-below-stick-meta":"","astra-migrate-meta-layouts":"default","ast-page-background-enabled":"default","ast-page-background-meta":{"desktop":{"background-color":"","background-image":"","background-repeat":"repeat","background-position":"center center","background-size":"auto","background-attachment":"scroll","background-type":"","background-media":"","overlay-type":"","overlay-color":"","overlay-opacity":"","overlay-gradient":""},"tablet":{"background-color":"","background-image":"","background-repeat":"repeat","background-position":"center center","background-size":"auto","background-attachment":"scroll","background-type":"","background-media":"","overlay-type":"","overlay-color":"","overlay-opacity":"","overlay-gradient":""},"mobile":{"background-color":"","background-image":"","background-repeat":"repeat","background-position":"center center","background-size":"auto","background-attachment":"scroll","background-type":"","background-media":"","overlay-type":"","overlay-color":"","overlay-opacity":"","overlay-gradient":""}},"ast-content-background-meta":{"desktop":{"background-color":"var(--ast-global-color-5)","background-image":"","background-repeat":"repeat","background-position":"center center","background-size":"auto","background-attachment":"scroll","background-type":"","background-media":"","overlay-type":"","overlay-color":"","overlay-opacity":"","overlay-gradient":""},"tablet":{"background-color":"var(--ast-global-color-5)","background-image":"","background-repeat":"repeat","background-position":"center center","background-size":"auto","background-attachment":"scroll","background-type":"","background-media":"","overlay-type":"","overlay-color":"","overlay-opacity":"","overlay-gradient":""},"mobile":{"background-color":"var(--ast-global-color-5)","background-image":"","background-repeat":"repeat","background-position":"center center","background-size":"auto","background-attachment":"scroll","background-type":"","background-media":"","overlay-type":"","overlay-color":"","overlay-opacity":"","overlay-gradient":""}},"footnotes":""},"categories":[25],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-265281","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-exams-certification"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.learnexams.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/265281","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.learnexams.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.learnexams.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.learnexams.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.learnexams.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=265281"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.learnexams.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/265281\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.learnexams.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=265281"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.learnexams.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=265281"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.learnexams.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=265281"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}
Thomas Malthus was an English cleric and scholar known for his work on population growth and its implications. In his essay An Essay on the Principle of Population<\/em> (1798), Malthus made a significant observation about how populations grow and the limitations imposed by resources like food. He proposed that if left unchecked, populations would grow exponentially\u2014doubling in size every generation\u2014because of the reproductive potential of organisms. However, he argued that resources, particularly food, grow at a much slower arithmetic rate, meaning they increase by a constant amount each year rather than exponentially.<\/p>\n\n\n\n