A zebra finch raised by foster parents of another species courts that species when adult, even after years living among its own kind. Why is a preference formed in a few early weeks so resistant to a lifetime of contrary experience?

D. Because sexual imprinting sets a template during a limited window.

Ordinary learning predicts the opposite: years among conspecifics should swamp a few foster weeks, and it does not. Later input is not outvoted, it is not consulted. The design fits a fact that does not change and whose best evidence, who feeds you in the nest, is available early, and the cost is that early errors are permanent.