| Resources | Reproduction | Ethics and Morality |
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What is: Mass mortalities of invertebrate and fish communities (dolphin food sources) subsequently led to declines in dolphin populations that have persisted well beyond the heat wave.
"In the 2011 Austral summer, Western Australian coastal water temperatures rose 2-4 degrees Celsius above long-term averages for more than two months...an estimated 36% of seagrass meadows were damaged." Predict the cascading effects of this habitat loss on dolphin food sources and dolphin survival.
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What is: declined
Dolphin reproductive success _________________ as a result of the marine heat wave.
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What is
From an effective altruism standpoint, how urgent is this issue/how urgent should it be for us? Use the framework of scale, neglectedness, and tractability.
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What is: true.
True or false: Fertility is the vital rate (how quickly vital statistics change in a population) most sensitive to changes in resource availability in marine mammals.
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What is: false
True or false: As a result of the heat wave, the food sources of certain dolphin populations were more greatly diminished than others. Those populations with less diminished food sources had greater reproductive success than those populations with more severely diminished food sources.
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What is
Do we have a greater moral obligation to focus on wild dolphins, like those in Shark Bay, who are suffering from the effects of anthropogenic climate change, or the problem of dolphins in captivity?
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What is: using sponges as tools to forage gave these dolphins access to a unique foraging niche that may have been less severely impacted by the heatwave.
"While there was an overall decline in dolphin survival post-heat wave, survival of spongers [dolphins who use sponges as tools to forage] was not as adversely impacted as that of non-spongers [dolphins who do not use sponges or other tools to forage]." Explain.
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What is: 1) Lower prey availability-->increased time foraging-->reduced vigilance-->greater shark predation on calves; 2) Reduced food availability-->increased neonate mortality when nutritional needs of both mother and calf cannot be sustained; 3) Reduced food availability-->lower female body weights-->suppressed ovulation and/or delayed sexual maturity
Give 3 plausible explanations for reduced dolphin reproductive success as a result of the heat wave.
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What is
Make an argument AGAINST the idea that the Shark Bay dolphins and other Shark Bay wild animals are entitled to political representation.
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