多选题 Several things, however, suggest that the conventional view needs revising. For example, the genus Lingula has an unbroken fossil record extending over more than half a billion years to the present. Thus, if longevity is any measure, brachiopods are the most successful organisms extant. {{U}}Further, recent studies suggest that diversity among species is a less important measure of evolutionary success{{/U}} than is the ability to withstand environmental change, such as when a layer of clay replaces sand on the ocean bottom. The relatively greater uniformity among the existing brachiopod species may offer greater protection from environmental change and hence may reflect highly successful adaptive behavior.
It can be inferred from the passage that the conventional view is that a large diversity among species of a given class of organisms typically leads to which of the following?

• A. Difficulty in classification.
• B. A discontinuous fossil record.
• C. A greater chance of survival over time.
• D. Numerical abundance.
• E. A longer fife span.