Deck 16: Conclusion

Question 1

The vast majority of countries and their leaders

A) agree that global climate change is not a very serious and urgent problem.
B) agree that scientists have been mistaken in their interpretations of the severity of climate change.
C) agree that global climate change is a very serious and urgent problem.
D) disagree as to whether greenhouse gasses contribute to climate change.
E) disagree as to the future of the coal industry.

Answer 1

C

Question 2

At the global level, the biggest environmental problem we currently face concerns

A) multicropping different crops in a single agricultural plot
B) diseases attacking domesticated fowl and mammals
C) increasing population growth among developing countries
D) climate change
E) so-called "environmentally friendly" but destructive technological approaches to meeting food demands

Answer 2

D

Question 3

According to the text, the game changer for our ancestors, whether they were australopiths or early Homo, was

A) their first rudimentary attempts at language.
B) their first rudimentary attempts at technological solutions to problems.
C) their ability to manage their own lives.
D) their capabilities to expand into new habitats.
E) their bipedal locomotion.

Answer 3

B

Question 4

For most of hominin history

A) our ancestors' reproductive capacity was much different from our ape cousins.
B) a woman gave birth every three or four years.
C) women gave birth every two years, then a few thousand years ago began to give birth every three or four years.
D) infant mortality rates were different than those of early farmers and some communities today.
E) had a relatively worse environmental record before the end of the Ice Age.

Question 5

In the lower Tigris-Euphrates Valley, __________________poisoned the fields once farmed by Ubaidians and Sumerians.

A) the Black Death
B) Neolithic herders
C) severe soil erosion
D) high levels of salts
E) animal grazing

Question 6

Whether you see the future of humans as rosy or bleak,

A) the costs of changes outweigh the benefits.
B) the costs of benefits outweigh the costs.
C) tool using is soon to be replaced by cognitive reasoning.
D) hard work, sacrifices and brilliant insights will not be necessary in the future.
E) there's no going back.

Question 7

The reason we can say humans have caused changes in the climate is a result of

A) scientific data manipulation and false reporting.
B) claims coming from television commentators and politicians.
C) measurements of coal and petroleum resources.
D) measurements of carbon dioxide emissions.
E) swimming among the coral reefs.

Question 8

By the end of the Ice Age, there may have been___________ humans, or _________________.

A) 10 million, one person for every 5 square miles of land surface.
B) 100 million, one person for every 100 square miles of land surface.
C) 5 million, one person for every 10 square miles of land surface.
D) 1 million, five persons for every 1 square mile of land surface.
E) 1000 people, one person for every 10 square miles of land surface.

Question 9

Given the data collected by a recent Australian government study on the Great Barrier reef we recognize

A) humans have protected the reef and it is now a model for restoration projects, worldwide.
B) humans are killing the reef through acts of violence so discrete they are unable to be quelled by even military forces.
C) humans are indifferent to the status of the reef.
D) humans are destroying the reef through their own generated pollution.
E) it is a relatively easy task to restore the world landmark.

Question 10

Bioarchaeological studies have shown that overall health quality

A) declined with the development of agriculture.
B) improved with the development of agriculture.
C) declined in great part due to the lack of mosquito control.
D) improved with the lifestyles related to domesticated animals.
E) among farmers was better than among hunter-gatherers.

Question 11

The archaeological record indicates Paleolithic individuals were capable of expanding into new habitats,

A) but their population density remained low.
B) but they did not adapt culturally.
C) but they did not adapt biologically.
D) but they had a measurable environmental impact.
E) but they did not spread out of Africa.

Question 12

Our digestive systems are well adapted to being

A) hunter gatherers
B) pizza eaters
C) couch potatoes
D) farmers
E) scientists

Question 13

Hunter-gatherers extracted their livelihood from available natural resources and Neolithic farmers

A) maintained the environment by planting native plants and domesticating only native animals.
B) plowed, terraced, and cut forests in ways to prevent severe soil erosion and decline of plant and animal species.
C) used practices that discouraged the growth of weeds.
D) used practices that replenished depleted potassium.
E) altered the environment by substituting domesticated plants and animals for native species.

Question 14

The term Anthropocene implies that

A) we were the major force of nature prior to 10,000 years ago.
B) our global impact has accelerated greatly during the past couple of centuries.
C) millions of years from now the record of human life will be eradicated.
D) no other species can be acclaimed to be responsible for the global effects that humans have already achieved.
E) there are more humans than bacteria.

Question 15

Some researchers argue that human population growth initiated the agricultural response at the end of the last Ice Age; others see it happening the other way around. But there's no question that

A) population size and density both tended to decrease as farming produced smaller and less predictable yields.
B) population size and density both tended to increase as farming produced larger and more predictable yields.
C) population size tended to increase and density decrease as farming produced larger and more predictable yields.
D) population size tended to decrease and density increase as farming produced larger and more predictable yields.
E) population size and density both tended to increase as farming produced larger but less predictable yields.

Question 16

Which of the following does not describe the lives of hominin ancestors and their predecessors?

A) They suffered periodic food shortages that sometimes ended in starvation.
B) They suffered from traumatic injury and infectious disease.
C) Their populations were small and mobile.
D) Their reproductive capacity was much different from the apes.
E) Infant mortality rates were high.

Question 17

Science is an approach based on

A) uninformed, ideology-driven claims
B) data collection, testing, and verification
C) limited debates that do not consider alternative approaches and conclusions
D) television commentators and politicians
E) partisan disputes

Question 18

By the year 1800, the Industrial Revolution was well under way and there were about __________persons per square mile; two centuries later there were __________persons per square mile.

A) 250; 500
B) 30; 10
C) 7; 24
D) 10; 1000
E) 18; 105

Question 19

As agricultural techniques and resulting harvests improved,

A) surplus production was still difficult to achieve.
B) surplus production was at the discretion of the individual farmer.
C) surplus production served as a kind of capital, or wealth that stimulated new kinds of socioeconomic interactions.
D) farmers could stop producing full time and become religious leaders.
E) a social and economic hierarchy emerged in all Neolithic societies.

Question 20

Because of their relative genetic similarity,

A) domesticated species of grasses are susceptible to disease, drought, and pests.
B) several roots crops are no longer able to sustain populations.
C) scientists are trying to prevent reestablishing genetic diversity in grasses and several root crops through limiting introduction of heterogeneous strains.
D) domesticated species of grasses are better than domesticated species of fowl and animals.
E) domesticated species of plants are never interspersed with different species of plants.

Question 21

The core components of hominin biocultural evolution took a long time to develop.

Question 22

Early farming practices North Africa ensured that many areas remained productive for thousands of years.

Question 23

The population density at the end of the Ice Age was sufficient for some groups to drive local populations of food animals to extinction.

Question 24

The natural population growth function exemplified in the world population since 1800 is unsustainable, whether speaking of humans or E coli bacteria.

Question 25

Hominins had a good environmental record up to the end of the Ice Age because

A) there wasn't very many of them.
B) they were natural conservationists.
C) they lived in harmony with nature.
D) they were not living at their potential as a species.
E) biocultural evolution did not enable flexibility in different habitats.

Question 26

Human activity in the last two centuries is not the most significant cause of this climate change.

Question 27

Our digestive systems are well adapted to processed food and sedentary behavior.

Question 28

No single factor explains the dangerously accelerating growth of world population over the past few hundred years.

Question 29

Measles became prevalent only with the emergence of larger urban centers, making it the "disease of civilization."

Question 30

The majority of countries and their leaders are not in agreement that global climate change is a very serious and urgent problem.

Question 31

Bioarchaeological studies have shown that overall health quality improved with the development of agriculture.

Question 32

What is not true of the period from the Industrial Revolution to the present?

A) No single factor explains the dangerously accelerating growth rate of world population.
B) The growth rate of world population is equally distributed among nations.
C) Resources are not distributed equally among all nations.
D) It has reached the point where 48 percent of the world population exists on less that $2/day.
E) The growth rate is unsustainable.

Question 33

The effects of increasing cultural changes and population growth are inseparably intertwined.

Question 34

Domestication and agriculture were not the driving forces of the so-called Neolithic revolution.

Question 35

Which of the following has not been the result of the contributions made over millions of years by our ancestors?

A) cities
B) art
C) tripled length of human life span
D) increasing population density
E) textbooks and exams

Question 36

Humans owe their success to biocultural evolution and primate ancestry.

Question 37

What can not be said of scientific inquiry used to understand global climate change?

A) Science is based on data collection, hypothesis testing, generalization and verification.
B) Scientific investigation can be a long process.
C) Scientific investigation frequently involves debate regarding alternative approaches and conclusions.
D) Science advances based on debates that occur in the pages of scientific journals and organized scientific meetings.
E) Much is gained by science from well-intended ideology-driven claims.

Question 38

Rapid global climate change has been proven by science to no longer occur and a marked warming of the earth's atmosphere has ceased.

Question 39

Which of the following is not associated with the development of food production?

A) Measles
B) Tuberculosis
C) Influenza
D) Low populations
E) Malnutrition

Question 40

Many of the practices of Neolithic farmers encouraged the growth of weeds.

Question 41

Why does Jared Diamond say agriculture was "the worst mistake in the history of the human race?"

Question 42

Define the concept, Anthropocene, and what it implies

Question 43

Describe the lives of hunter-gatherers over the past couple of million years in terms of biocultural evolution.

Question 44

List the threats to the Great Barrier Reef.

Question 45

How have humans become a threat to themselves, to other living things and the earth itself?

Question 46

Discuss the two points upon which scientists agree concerning global climate change.

Question 47

Discuss the effects of the population growth from the Industrial Revolution to the present.

Question 48

Explain the scientific basis of the term, global climate change, in terms of the current situation.

Question 49

Discuss the effects of the earliest farmers and cities that arose with the so-called Neolithic revolution.