Museion Original · Biology
developing · Ages 13+ · secondary biology
Natural Selection as Evidence
Selection acts on variation that already exists — not on effort.
Start the path 3 lessons · about 55 minutes
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Three connected investigations
- 01Variation and HeritabilityNatural selection acts on heritable variation that already exists in a population — individuals do not adapt during their own lifetime and pass that change on.Open
- 02Differential Survival and ReproductionCompute how a population's trait mix shifts across one generation of selection, and separate fitness — survival and reproduction that matches the environment — from raw physical strength.Open
- 03Transfer: Antibiotic ResistanceApply differential survival to a fresh case — antibiotic resistance in bacteria — and design an observation that could actually falsify a claim about how the resistance arose.Open
What this path asks you to reason about
- Separate heritable variation from traits acquired during a lifetime.
- Compute how a trait's frequency shifts under differential survival.
- Explain why resistance spreads by selection, not by organisms learning.