When a Lineage Runs Out of Answers

You'll learnthat extinction is a lineage ending when it can no longer keep reproducing, often because it cannot adapt fast enough to change.

A species goes extinct when it can no longer keep reproducing — often because its world changes faster than it can adapt — not because it was weak. Whether a population weathers the shock turns on its genetic diversity: the pool of variants selection has to draw on. Twelve short steps; press Next for each one.

AP BIOLOGY · 12 STEPS · 6 QUICK CHECKS · DIVERSITY = RAW MATERIAL · LOW DIVERSITY → HIGHER RISK · BACKGROUND vs MASS · v5

extinction · diversity · deep time

Before you start

What you're looking at

Twelve lineages drawn as horizontal lines running through time toward the present; most stop short of it.

The question

What is extinction, really — a verdict on weakness, or the ordinary end of a lineage that cannot keep up?

Step 1 / 12