Chapter 2

Question 0

Archbishop James Ussher calculated the age of Earth based on the Old Testament. He estimated that the creation of the world took place

Answer 0

On exactly October 23, 4004 B.C.

Question 1

Even if philosophers accept and study the importance of change, a full theory of evolution by natural selection cannot exist without

Answer 1

realizing the vast expanses of time over which some changes take place

Question 2

Jame Hutton, a Scottish geologist and naturalist, argued that the geological process of erosion and sedimentation suggested that the world was created

Answer 2

an inconceivably long time ago

Question 3

Building on the ideas first proposed by Hutton, Lyell aimed to explain Earth’s geological features using an approach known as uniformitarianism, which depends on

Answer 3

B and C:

the same geological processes currently observable & geological processes operating over very long periods of time

Question 4

Which of the following examples best illustrates the concept of spontaneous generation?

Answer 4

During flooding, frogs spontaneously arise from mud

Question 5

Early Greek philosophers were among the first to

Answer 5

A and C:

develop a philosophy of a natural world driven by physical laws &
explain the world around them according to fixed laws of nature

Question 6

Early Greek philosophers failed to exploit one of the greatest advantages of methodological naturalism, which is that explanations can

Answer 6

be tested through observation and sometimes manipulation

Question 7

The approach known as catastrophism explains Earth’s geological features appealing to

Answer 7

A and B:

sudden catastrophic geological events & large-scale geological events

Question 8

Unlike those before him, Aristotle

Answer 8

recognized the significance of testing one’s hypotheses

Question 9

Greek philosophers, including Aristotle, developed a keen appreciation for the study of natural history. Which of the following contributions to the study of natural history did Aristotle make?

Answer 9

All of the above:

His book, Physics and Natural History of Animals; Distinguishing among 500 species of birds, mammals, and fishes; Proposing a taxonomy of nature- a classification system of life

Question 10

After Aristotle, one advance in scientific methodology came through the use of logic. This allowed thinkers to

Answer 10

move carefully from facts to general principles

Question 11

Which of the following concepts was a commonality of early Greek theories?

Answer 11

Spontaneous generation

Question 12

Robert Chambers, a Scottish geologist and author of Vestiges of the Natural History of Creation, is often overlooked for which very important contribution?

Answer 12

Thinking of evolution in terms of populations not individuals

Question 13

Despite his insights, Erasmus Darwin came up short of a full-blown theory of evolution by natural selection because

Answer 13

He believed in Lamarck’s theory of the inheritance of acquired characteristics

Question 14

Charles Darwin’s grandfather Erasmus Darwin, an English physician and philosopher,

Answer 14

Argued that all life developed from what he called a single living filament; wrote a book called Zoonomia; argued that humans descended from another primate species and once walked on all fours

Question 15

Lamarck’s hypothesis that traits acquired during the lifetime of an individual are passed on to progeny

Answer 15

Was interesting, reasonable, and based on an idea that was accepted by many scientists and non scientists alike; connected evolutionary change to environmental fit

Question 16

The rediscovery in 1900 of Mendel’s now famous experiments from the 1850’s and 1860’s initially

Answer 16

Added fuel to the argument about whether natural selection acted in a slow way on small genetic changes, or in a sudden, saltational manner

Question 17

In the 1800s, experimental work by August Weisman demonstrated that traits acquired during a lifetime could not be inherited. This dealt with a deathblow to previous theories of Lamarckian inheritance and left scientists with which of the following possible processes of evolution?

Answer 17

Sudden, large changes; slow acting natural selection; saltationism

Question 18

While various religious leaders challenged almost all of Darwin’s major conclusions,

Answer 18

Many British scientists embraced Darwin’s ideas on evolution; many British scientists rejected Darwin’s proposed mechanism of natural selection

Question 19

Darwin faced which of the following major challenges to his theory

Answer 19

Accounting for complex structure with multiple intricate parts; explaining traits and organs of seemingly little importance; and understanding why natural selection does not exhaust the genetic variation in a population

Question 20

Both Wallace and Darwin traveled extensively and were struck by the strong patterns they observed in the geographic distribution of nature’s diversity. Which of the following observations were made by Wallace?

Answer 20

Highly similar species are clustered in time and space; Geographic features seem to play an important role in the clustering of similar, closely related species.

Question 21

Darwin’s hypothesis of common ancestry with branching descent explains

Answer 21

the hierarchical patters of similarity observed in nature; varieties nested within species, nesting within genera; the history and pattern of life’s diversity

Question 22

Darwin’s tree of life metaphor

Answer 22

linked species in varying degrees of similarity according to their historical pattern of descent; described the branching historical relationships among all living things; applies to both the history and pattern of life’s diversity

Question 23

Darwin drew on the work of Thomas Malthus, a political economist, to convince his readers that

Answer 23

there is a competition for limited resources in nature; many individuals in a population do not survive to the age of reproduction; only a fraction of the surviving individuals in a population reproduce

Question 24

Two important differences between the processes of natural selection and artificial selection are

Answer 24

the selective agent and the traits being selected

Question 25

To explain how varieties were on the path to becoming new species, Darwin introduced the concept of

Answer 25

descent and modification

Question 26

What were Darwin’s two fundamental insights about the process of evolution?

Answer 26

The environment selects on variation in the traits of individual organisms; and all species have descended from one or a few common ancestors

Question 27

Francesco Redi’s experiment, addressed the question of whether flies spontaneously generated from meat carcasses. Which of the following statements regarding this experiment is true?

Answer 27

Meat in jars with an open lid developed maggots & ; Meat in lidded jars did not develop maggots

Question 28

Hierarchical patterns of similarity figure; the Hierarchically arrayed groups indicated by the shaded grey boxes are called

Answer 28

clades