Sentence Elimination- Natural Selection

1. This is nothing remotely like "nature fighting back." This is merely nature operating exactly the way we know it operates, the way it has been operating here for some three and a half billion years
2. Very simply, all too often we've acted as though we could make these small, fast breeding creatures extinct down to the very last member, the way we might do with elephants or pandas
3. We can say, "Yes, it's true that we drive a couple hundred species to extinction every day, but there are tens of millions --hundreds of millions--between us and catastrophe."
4. But of course this constitutes a fundamental misunderstanding of biological realities. What we've done in actual fact is make ourselves the chief agent of natural selection in these enemy species.

Detailed Solution

To choose which sentence is to be eliminated, let’s first summarize the key idea of each option:

A- This is not nature fighting back; this is the way nature is

B- We have tried to make the “small, fast breeding creatures” extinct. We have tried getting bigger creatures- elephants and pandas- down to the last number. But these two cases are different

C- Though several species are getting extinct every day, it is not yet catastrophe.

D- We haven’t understood biological realities. We have become chief selector for enemy species, i.e, we are making the enemy species stronger by allowing only the most resilient to survive.

We can see from the simplification that sentences A and D are related. Both sentences talk of how we have misunderstood nature/biological realities.

A refers to nature "fighting back", that is resisting what we are trying to do. D indicates that the enemy species is getting stronger. We can see that if we arrange these sentences in the order DA it makes some sense.

So the idea is that we haven't understood biological realities and have become the "chief selector" of the enemy species. The fact that they are getting stronger is not nature fighting back. It is the way nature is.

So what is the third sentence that completes the paragraph?

Consider sentence C. It says we are making some species extinct but it is not yet catastrophe. This indicates that the species that is being reduced in number is not an "enemy" species.

Option B talks of how we are trying to make the “small, fast breeding creatures” extinct by bringing them down to the last number, and how this is not working. It fits in with A and D in terms of not understanding nature.

The sentence order for the paragraph is BDA. So the option to be eliminated is C

Correct Answer: Choice (c)

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