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This test consists of 15 multiple choice questions and 5 short answer questions.

Multiple Choice Questions

1. In sexual reproduction, what does the larger egg cell have that the smaller sperm cell does not?
(a) More food reserves for the future embryo.
(b) The ability to move around to more beneficial environments.
(c) The ability to protect itself from other cells.
(d) A complete set of DNA.

2. What chance does a parent have of giving a particular gene to a child?
(a) A thirty percent chance.
(b) A fifty percent chance.
(c) A forty percent chance.
(d) A sixty percent chance.

3. What does Dawkins say removes humanity from the cruel and harsh laws of nature?
(a) Humans have developed genes for communication, which allows cooperation.
(b) Humans teach children ways to behave and learn better behaviors as adults.
(c) Nothing.
(d) Humans create environments that protect them from natural laws.

4. What does Wynne-Edwards believe about birth rates?
(a) Species might regulate birth rates for individuals.
(b) Birth rates are controlled by a combination of species and individual needs.
(c) Birth rates will always increase unless environmental factors intervene.
(d) Individuals might purposefully reduce birth rates for the good of the species.

5. According to the relatedness calculations in the book, how related is a person to him- or herself?
(a) By zero.
(b) By a hundred.
(c) By ten.
(d) By one.

6. According to the relatedness calculations in the book, is a child more closely related to a sibling or an uncle?
(a) It's impossible to compare.
(b) An uncle.
(c) A sibling.
(d) The child is equally related to both.

7. What does Trivers look at breeding as?
(a) A war between the sexes.
(b) A careful calculation based on resources.
(c) A race with time.
(d) A goal of existence.

8. To what does Wynne-Edwards attribute changes to female mice as the population rises?
(a) Natural selection of individuals.
(b) Random variation in individuals.
(c) Random variation within groups.
(d) Group selection.

9. What does Wynne-Edwards believe about territories that animals fight over?
(a) Individual territories are illusions.
(b) Individual territories provide survival for the individual.
(c) Individual territories are symbolic.
(d) Individual territories provide survival for the species.

10. How is male and female responsibility for offspring different in fish?
(a) Females care for the eggs, and when they hatch, they leave the live offspring to the males.
(b) Females may lay eggs and abandon them, while males fertilize the eggs and are left to care for them.
(c) Males and females both leave their fertilized eggs without investing resources in them.
(d) Males care for eggs, and then females take over when the offspring hatches.

11. What bee eggs get fertilized?
(a) Eggs that will become males.
(b) All eggs.
(c) No eggs.
(d) Eggs that will become female workers.

12. What is a female bird doing, according to Dawkins, by forcing the male to make a nest before she breeds with him?
(a) Judging the male's capabilities of caring for the offspring in the future.
(b) Taking advantage of the male for her own wellbeing.
(c) Making the male prove the worthiness of his genes.
(d) Forcing the male to put off breeding with another and invest energy into the offspring.

13. What does the study of egg clutch sizes that Dawkins cites show?
(a) That there are detriments and benefits to having a lot of eggs.
(b) That there are only detriments to having a lot of eggs.
(c) That there are only benefits to having a lot of eggs.
(d) That having a lot of eggs is, in the end, exactly the same as having few eggs.

14. What four categories does Dawkins have in his game theory analysis of male and female sexual and childrearing behaviors?
(a) Coy females, philandering females, demanding males, and unreliable males.
(b) Accepting females, rejecting females, cooperative males, and uncooperative males.
(c) Faithful females, faithless females, faithful males, and faithless males.
(d) Coy females, fast females, faithful males, and philandering males.

15. According to the relatedness calculations in the book, how much more closely related is a child to a sibling than a half-sibling?
(a) The child is one an a half times as closely related to the sibling.
(b) The child is four times as closely related to the sibling.
(c) The child is three times as closely related to the sibling.
(d) The child is twice as closely related to the sibling.

Short Answer Questions

1. What does Dawkins believe about the tension between survival of different generations?

2. In the natural world, which gender does Dawkins identify as more likely to select the other for breeding?

3. How closely related are two sister bees?

4. What does Dawkins speculate that cuckoo chicks might do?

5. To what does Dawkins attribute a male backing down from a powerful rival over territory?

(see the answer keys)

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