Question

Which of the following best describes how comparative anatomy can be used to determine the evolutionary relationship between two organisms?

Answer 1

Organisms that have a great deal of physical similarity are more likely to share a common ancestor than two organisms with few physical traits in common.

Comparing the physical traits of two organisms makes it possible to determine how long ago they shared a common ancestor.

Studying the physical differences between two organisms will show which organism evolved from the other.

Two species that have few physical traits in common do not share a common ancestor and most likely evolved from different species.

Answer 2

You should use process of elimination for problems like this. Do any of the options strike you as being impossible?

Answer 3

I dont think B is it, I know that scientists compare DNA strands to tell if two organisms evolved from a common organism. I think the answer might be A.

Answer 4

I like the last one.

This is a very sticky question - convergent and divergent evolution have produced a few surprises, shall we say. Some species scientists thought, based on anatomical comparison, distantly related have turned out to be quite close when subjected to DNA analysis; some species which looked very similar have turned out have very different DNA and are not closely related after all.

Answer 5

Okay, thank you for your help, sorry it took so long to respond I've been working on an 80 question study guide. Have a good evening