speciation rate

To explore the idea of speciation rates, one can refer again to the analogy of human life spans and ask: How old are my living siblings? The answer might be anything from that of a newborn to that of a retiree living out his or her last days. The average…

…obvious example of a high rate of speciation—a “baby boom” of bird species. Its existence allowed for the possibility that the high rates of bird extinction that are observed today might be just a natural pruning of this evolutionary exuberance.