dunkin donuts munchkins
the munchkin is supposedly the part taken to make a donut hole...
The Munchkin illustrates the concept of exaptation well, though it requires a baker as “selectorâ€, whereas natural selection operates with no selector. A doughnut in this example is a circular piece of dough with an empty circular middle. Imagine that the shape is created by making a round of dough, and then cutting out the middle piece, leaving you with the doughnut and some extra dough. Imagine further that the baker typically throws the middle piece aside as it serves no purpose. The middle piece here is a spandrel – it serves no function to the baker, but is rather a leftover portion of the functional dough – the doughnut.
However, the baker decides that those leftover pieces are too much of a waste. She decides to roll them into a ball and sell them separately from the doughnuts. She gives them a name, Munchkin, and markets them to dieters, children, and dog-owners for treats, and finds that these formerly useless pieces are now bringing in money. They have been co-opted for the function of money making, and therefore the Munchkin is an exaptation. Now she finds them so popular, the baker is creating different flavors, and fun boxes in which to sell the doughnut holes.
What originated as a mere by-product of the doughnut has now come to serve the function of a profitable treat.-more at
http://evostudies.org/2009/07/the-spandrels-of-dunkin-donuts-or-how-the-munchkin-came-to-be/ Linkback:
https://tubagbohol.mikeligalig.com/index.php?topic=80998.0