Why do watermelons have so many seeds?
为什么西瓜有那么多籽 ？
原文地址：https://www.quora.com/Why-do-watermelons-have-so-many-seeds
Robert Frost:
The idea behind seeds is that animals will come along and eat the fruit, wander off somewhere, and then poop out the seeds which will grow into the next generation of plants.
种子背后所隐含的逻辑是会有动物来吃水果，然后随着动物的游走通过排泄将这些种子传播并且成长出下一代。
There's a lot of risk there. What happens if the animal chews up the seeds? What happens if the animal poops in a unsuitable location? What happens if the animal falls in a river and gets carried out to sea? The seeds will be lost.
在这个过程中存在着风险。如果动物把籽给嚼碎了怎么办？如果动物把籽拉到了一个不适合生存的地方怎么办？如果动物掉到水里然后流到海洋了怎么办？这些种子可能会丢失。
To account for these flaws in the otherwise brilliant plan, plants evolved to have more seeds - meaning the plants that produced more seeds were more likely to get at least one seed successfully planted.
在解决这些问题可能存在的许多方案终，植物进化出了更多的种子，这就意味着通过产生更多的种子来保证至少有一粒种子能够成功的存活下来。
More seeds means a greater chance of a next generation. But producing seeds costs energy. It has to be moderated. If watermelons have evolved to have two hundred seeds, it must mean that there is an advantage to having two hundred seeds - an advantage worth the energy cost.
更多的种子意味着产生下一代的可能性更高。但是生产种子需要能量。所以数量上要控制。如果西瓜进化出 200 粒种子，这就意味着 200 粒种子是合适的，是值得花这么多能量去生产的。
At this point you're probably thinking "yeah, fine that makes sense. But, still, why so many? I had an apple yesterday and it had about ten seeds in it. This watermelon has about two hundred!!"
现在你可能在想“没错，这听起来很有道理，但是为什么要有这么多？我昨天吃了个苹果里面只有大约 10 粒种子。西瓜却有 200 粒！“
Yes, but that apple tree had about sixty apples on it. So, that means a total of about 600 seeds to disperse. How many watermelon grow on a vine? Maybe three. There's your same 600 seeds.
没错，但是苹果树上大约有 60 个苹果。所以这就意味着总共大约有 600 粒种子可以播种。西瓜藤上有几个西瓜呢？大约 3 个。这还是 600 粒种子。
