Reading the Rocks (Earth's History)
If you are digging in the Grand Canyon, this is the rule that tells you a fossil found 50 feet underground is older than a fossil found 10 feet underground.
What is the Law of Superposition?
Early embryos of tortoises, pigs, and humans all look shockingly similar because they all temporarily develop these two features.
What are gill slits and tails?
These random accidents or changes in an organism's DNA are the only way completely new traits are introduced into a population.
What are mutations?
This is the process where humans, rather than nature, decide which specific plants or animals get to breed based on desirable traits.
What is artificial selection (or selective breeding)?
Because the global human population exploded after the year 1400, this type of global environmental mapping metric sharply increased.
What is human land use?
Put these three items in the correct order from earliest to latest to appear on Earth: Dinosaurs, Single-Celled Bacteria, Simple Jellyfish.
What is 1. Bacteria, 2. Jellyfish, 3. Dinosaurs?
A basic line graph showing the number of species on Earth suddenly plunges straight down. This represents what major historical event?
What is a mass extinction?
A beach gets hit by a volcanic eruption, turning the sand completely black. Over time, dark-colored crabs become more common than tan crabs because of this process.
What is natural selection?
Modern corn looks nothing like ancient wild grass because humans spent thousands of years doing what to it?
What is selectively breeding it (or domesticating it)?
Clearing away trees and forests right next to a flowing river removes the root systems, leading to a massive increase in what problem along the banks?
What is soil erosion?
If a bone doesn't get covered by this specific material quickly after an animal dies, it will decompose completely instead of becoming a fossil.
What is sediment (or mud/sand)?
The flipper of a whale and the arm of a human have completely different uses, but the internal layout of their bones is nearly identical. Why?
What is because they share a common ancestor?
True or False: The black sand caused individual tan crabs to consciously mutate and change their shells to black.
What is False? (The dark mutation had to already randomly exist in the population).
If a farmer clones and plants the exact same high-yield wheat crop across 1,000 acres, they risk a total crop failure due to a lack of what?
What is genetic variation (or biodiversity)?
If a city blocks a river by installing a massive concrete structure to generate electricity, the ecosystem located downstream will suffer from what?
What is reduced water flow?
A trilobite fossil is found in Layer X in California and Layer Y in Utah. This allows geologists to conclude that Layer X and Layer Y are what?
What is the same relative age?
True or False: Organisms have identical bone structures because they currently live in the exact same environment and do the same activities.
What is False? (It's due to common ancestry, not matching lifestyles).
Name 2 of the 4 core steps of natural selection that describe why a population changes over time.
What are Overproduction, Variation, Competition, or Selection?
Wild wolves are aggressive predators, but modern golden retrievers are gentle family pets due to centuries of this process.
What is domestication?
Pumping too much water out of underground reservoirs for farming causes this consequence to the local root systems of nearby plants.
What is dropping the water table (making it harder for roots to reach water)?
On a 24-hour clock representing Earth's history, complex animals only show up in the evening, meaning life has existed for how much of Earth's total history?
What is a large portion (or most) of it? (Humans are the ones who only show up at the very end).
If a biodiversity graph shows a massive, sharp spike upward right after a mass extinction drop, this indicates a rapid increase in what?
What is biodiversity (or new species developing)?
If a mutation makes a desert lizard match its surroundings slightly better, this trait will become more common because it increases the lizard's chances of doing what two things?
What is surviving and reproducing?
True or False: Artificial selection can accidentally cause negative consequences, like making weeds or pests resistant to chemical sprays.
What is True?
Factory runoff or city waste being dumped directly into a lake system causes this immediate threat to the local wildlife population.
What is water contamination (or pollution)?