Beneficial Acclimation Hypothesis - Why Is Acclimation Not Beneficial?

Why Is Acclimation Not Beneficial?

While it seems intuitive that acclimation would provide benefits to individuals, the majority of empirical tests of the hypothesis have rejected its general appliction. Why then is acclimation not beneficial? H. Arthur Woods and Jon F. Harrison examined the possible reasons in a 2002 Evolution paper. They suggested that:

1. The timescale of adaptation is much longer than that of environmental variation.

2. Environmental cues for timing of adaptive acclimation are unreliable.

3. It may cost more to adapt than not to.

4. Migration by adjacent populations may swamp out genes for adaptive acclimation.