GRE Reading Comprehension
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Source: XDF
Immediately relevant to game theory are the sex ratios in certain parasitic wasp species that have a large excess of females. In these species, fertilized eggs develop into females and unfertilized eggs into males. A female stores sperm and can determine the sex of each egg she lays by fertilizing it or leaving it unfertilized. By Fisher's genetic argument that the sex ratio will be favored which maximizes the number of descendants an individual will have and hence the number of gene copies transmitted, it should pay a female to produce equal numbers of sons and daughters. Hamilton, noting that the eggs develop within their host—the larva of another insect—and that the newly emerged adult wasps mate immediately and disperse, offered a remarkably cogent analysis. Since only one female usually lays eggs in a given larva, it would pay her to produce one male only, because this one male could fertilize all his sisters on emergence. Like Fisher, Hamilton looked for an evolutionarily stable strategy, but he went a step further in recognizing that he was looking for a strategy.
Which of the following is NOT true of the species of parasitic wasps discussed in the passage?
- A Adult female wasps are capable of storing sperm.
- B Female wasps lay their eggs in the larvae of other insects.
- C The adult female wasp can be fertilized by a male that was hatched in the same larva as herself.
- D So few male wasps are produced that extinction is almost certain.
- E Male wasps do not emerge from their hosts until they reach sexual maturity.