endangered species?

Question

how does protecting an endangered species effect natural selection?

Answer 1

You can take Homo sapiens, and whatever it does, as selection factors.

Or you can define natural selection as the effect of any selective pressure other than those caused by H. sapiens.

But however you define natural selection, the case is that H sapiens introduces a whole array of new factors into the scene. By protecting an endangered species (eg. panda breeding programmes) we alter natural gene flow inside and between populations, and change the survival rates and factors affecting survival... so we may maintain genes that would otherwise disappear from the population... and disable sexual selection, which, if done long enough, might have interesting effects on the creatures' mate preferences... that's how, I guess. I can say nothing more concrete, since we don't know how natural selection would act on the species if we didn't protect it (or it wasn't endangered)

Answer 2

Well, here's the thing. Us humans have caused a lot of pollution, habitat destruction and unnatural pressures on animals. Is this just natural selection or being bad stewards? For example, the California condor is highly endangered. The main causes for this animal's drop in population numbers ends up being lead poisoning from bullets left by hunters (along with many other factors including habitat encroachment, DDT, powerpole collisions). It seems that the main reason this bird is dying out is human-caused. Now, should be just let the bird become extinct because we humans are sloppy? These birds cannpt adapt so quickly to human-caused pressures, as most animals cannot. Because of this, I think conservation is an excellent idea. If we just continue to allow species to die out because we aren't caring for the earth, what does that say about us?

Answer 3

Depends on whether we r the cause of endangerment or not...