Deck 25: Evolution: How Did Life Emerge on the Ancient Earth

Question 1

The first cell on Earth was remarkable because it

A) was quite frugal in using chemical resources.
B) developed effective defense mechanisms.
C) probably contained the same essential amino acids of cells today.
D) required tenacity to seek out the organic molecules it needed to survive and replicate.
E) all of these are correct

Answer 1

C

Question 2

What piece of evidence do scientists now compare to prove humans and chimpanzees are close relatives?

A) physical features
B) behavior
C) DNA strands
D) food preferences
E) the cell protein cytochrome C

Answer 2

E

Question 3

The Cambrian explosion indicates

A) the asteroid strike during the Cambrian period.
B) a nuclear testing in Cambria, England.
C) a decrease in fossil evidence of primitive life.
D) an increase in fossil evidence of primitive life.
E) that life evolved from tidal pools.

Answer 3

D

Question 4

What was the negative role that sunlight had in the evolution of early life on earth?

A) caused melanomas on reptile skin
B) created broad regions of deserts
C) led to greenhouse-type atmospheres
D) broke the organic molecule bonds
E) dried up the primordial pools

Question 5

The window of opportunity, during which life in the form of the first cell could have begun, was how long ago?

A) 3.5 to 4 billion years ago
B) 3.5 to 4 million years ago
C) 200,000 to 100,000 years ago
D) 65 million years ago
E) 1 million years ago

Question 6

Current scientific debates about evolution concern everything below except

A) the rate of the evolutionary process.
B) mechanisms that propel evolutionary change.
C) whether or not evolution exists.
D) evidence for the process of evolution.
E) scientific debates include all of these.

Question 7

Which of the following is a member of the hominid family?

A) Homo sapiens
B) Homo neanderthalensis
C) Australopithecus ramidus
D) Homo erectus
E) all of these are correct

Question 8

What may have been the function of RNA molecules in the earliest life forms?

A) to facilitate the Y-chromosome in reproduction
B) to allow respiration of early organisms to be anaerobic or aerobic
C) to act as enzymes in protein synthesis
D) to recycle products of elimination
E) all of these are correct

Question 9

Which of the following gases were in Earth's early atmosphere?

A) water vapor, ammonia, hydrogen, nitrogen
B) water vapor, ammonia, methane and hydrogen
C) water vapor, oxygen, methane and nitrogen
D) nitrogen, oxygen, carbon dioxide and water vapor
E) carbon dioxide, water vapor, methane, nitrogen

Question 10

What is Darwin's "measure of success" in Origin of Species?

A) struggle for survival
B) ability to reproduce fertile offspring
C) spiritual superiority
D) economic affluence
E) natural evolution

Question 11

According to research groups in several disciplines, where did the first organic molecules form?

A) in the early ocean's primordial soup
B) near fissures on mid-ocean ridges
C) on the surface of other planets
D) in protected tidal pools
E) all of these are correct

Question 12

Evidence for evolution can be found in the

A) human liver.
B) size of horse fossils.
C) geochemistry of vertebrates.
D) eye socket of whales.
E) tailbone of a cave bat

Question 13

What was a consequence of the great bombardment?

A) Earth's oceans boiled away.
B) A global ice age began.
C) The big bang reversed itself.
D) Teaching evolution was outlawed in some states.
E) Pieces of Venus were ejected toward Earth.

Question 14

Which of the following is found in a fossil record?

A) documented changes in a species
B) all fossils found, catalogued, and analyzed since the early sixteenth century
C) 10,000 unique phyla
D) more reptiles than insects
E) all of these are correct

Question 15

What is the most likely cause of the mass extinction that occurred 65 million years ago?

A) The Earth's rotation direction reversed when the north and south magnetic poles reversed.
B) A giant asteroid hit the Earth.
C) Mountain building episodes and other tectonic forces blocked animal migration during times of climate change.
D) Forest fires caused a deficit in global oxygen.
E) An increase in the luminosity of the Sun boiled away the oceans.

Question 16

The "primordial soup" of the Miller-Urey experiments contained

A) a dark brown liquid.
B) lipids.
C) amino acids.
D) fossil fuel
E) a dark-brown liquid, lipids, and amino acids.

Question 17

The ratio of extinct species to living species on Earth is about

A) 1:2
B) 2:1
C) 100:1
D) 1:100
E) 1,000:1

Question 18

The greatest gap in scientists' knowledge about the evolution of humans is from 8 to 4 million years ago. What hominid fossils bracket this period?

A) the one-celled organisms and the shelled organisms
B) the great apes and the first hominids
C) two of the greatest mass extinctions
D) Homo neanderthalensis and Homo erectus
E) primordial soup and the first DNA

Question 19

What might a creationist believe?

A) God created all life in its modern form.
B) Fossils are evidence of the effects of evolution.
C) The Earth is approximately 5 billion years old.
D) There was no catastrophic flood on Earth, even though some people think there was.
E) The Bible is not a good source of information on the history of the Earth.

Question 20

Planetary research in recent years has shown that

A) Mars's northern hemisphere was under an ocean for a billion years.
B) like Earth, Mars has gone through multiple mass extinctions.
C) by being beyond the asteroid belt, Mars was never pelted with meteorites.
D) Martian canals really were constructed by alien engineers.
E) strange tectonic pressures on Mars are projecting meteors toward Earth.

Question 21

Name at least four vestigial organs.

Question 22

Which accurately describes black smokers?

A) rare organisms existing on the mouth of active volcanoes
B) an entire ecosystem that obtains energy from the Earth's internal heat rather than the Sun
C) giant tube worms growing along the mid Atlantic Ocean ridges
D) water samples that have different physical and chemical properties
E) volcanic islands that may have one time been an Atlantic Ring of Fire

Question 23

At what point in geological time did the common ancestor of mammals (including humans) and reptiles (including alligators) live? During what geological era was this?

Question 24

What is a vestigial organ? And why is it important?

Question 25

What is associated with the Cenozoic era?

A) human species evolved
B) dinosaurs were extinct
C) man landed on the moon
D) all of these are correct
E) none of these are correct

Question 26

Define chemical evolution and name the first experiment to demonstrate this process.

Question 27

Contrast the natural rate of extinction with mass extinctions.

Question 28

What does the extinction of the dinosaurs have to do with evolution?

Question 29

What is the scientific basis for stating that the chimpanzee is our "closest relative?" Why is this important?

Question 30

Evidence for a mass extinction can be found in

A) marine animals in the fossil record.
B) Luis and Walter Alverez's research site in Italy.
C) carbon-based molecules in Australian rocks.
D) evidence of a meteorite near the Yucatan Peninsula.
E) all of these are correct.

Question 31

What are the steps necessary to create a fossil?

Question 32

What do fossils tell us? Why is what they tell us important?

Question 33

Explain the difference between adaptation and natural selection.

Question 34

Why is evolution the subject of research in several different fields of study?

Question 35

List one significant fact or feature for Australopithecus ramidus, Australopithecus afarensis, Homo habilus, Homo erectus, and Homo sapiens.

Question 36

Why is a fossil of an animal part such as skin an important find?

Question 37

About 150 million years ago, what was the dominant large animal on Earth? In what geological era did the dinosaurs live and when did they become extinct?

Question 38

What is the significance of ALH84001?

A) a rare fossil unearthed after an Appalachian landslide
B) a paleolithic hominid found in Alabama in 1984
C) an Antarctic meteorite with Martian atmosphere
D) an unusual aluminum-hydrogen compound in a meteorite
E) an alien life form predicted by George Orwell

Question 39

Define the difference between punctuated equilibrium and the gradualism hypotheses. Why do scientists need to consider both hypotheses?

Question 40

Why should we do research about past life on Mars?

Question 41

Why is life on Earth thought to have developed after the end of the great bombardment? When did the great bombardment end?

Question 42

What is thought to have been going on at the Earth's surface that made the deep ocean realm a better place for very early life on Earth to flourish?

Question 43

What is a mass extinction? List some mass extinctions of life, when they occurred, and some information about them.

Question 44

What "crucial development" in the history of living systems took place about 545 million years ago?

Question 45

Aside from criticisms about contradictions between his ideas and religious beliefs, what were some disturbing interpretations of Darwin's ideas after publication of Origin of Species in 1859?

Question 46

Regarding natural selection, what is meant when we say that "many more individuals are born than can possibly survive."?

Question 47

What happened to the Neanderthals?

Question 48

What is the new field of astrobiology?

Question 49

What is Basilosaurus and what does a recent discovery of atrophied fossil leg bones tell us about this fossil's ancestry?