Fundamentals of geology

Question 0

Sustainability

Answer 0

• earth’s resources are finite
• future generations must have available natural resources
• future generations should not be negatively impacted by current circumstance

Question 1

Fundamental concepts of geology

Answer 1

• human population growth has an impact on environment
• sustainability
• earth is an integrated, dynamic and evolving system
• geological hazards have and always will occur
• scientific knowledge and values

Question 2

Earth as a system

Answer 2

• geosphere
• hydrosphere
• atmosphere
• biosphere
• magnetosphere

Question 3

The scientific method

Answer 3

Involves repeatable observations, measurements and mathematical and experimental confirmations of natural phenomena
-predictions of the phenomena and process that are later confirmed by experiments and observations

Question 4

Scientific laws

Answer 4

Natural phenomena and processes that are known to occur throughout the universe as we know it are called laws
Ex: newtons law of gravity

Question 5

Scientific hypothesis

Answer 5

A hypothesis is an explanation for natural phenomenon that is based on very little and mostly untested evidence

Question 6

Scientific theory

Answer 6

A generally accepted explanation for a natural process or phenomenon that is supported by reproducible and measurable evidence

• subject to refinement
• examples: plate tectonics, photosynthesis, evolution

Question 7

Ptolemy 90-168 AD

Answer 7

View that earth was center of earth, and was a prevailing view til 1500’s
-view fit well with religious view of man being ultimate creation of God

Question 8

Heliocentric

Answer 8

View that sun is center of the universe proposed by Nicolai Copernicus, a polish astronomer & priest (1473-1543)
-Galileo Galilei used telescopes to confirm system and has shown other planets have own moons

Question 9

View of earth -Prior to the Age of Enlightenment (18th century),

Answer 9

the prevailing view of the earth was that of biblical creation, earth has been more or less the same of all it’s history

Question 10

View of earth- James ussher

Answer 10

Archbishop of Church of England “calculated”, based on genealogy in the bible that the Earth was created on 23 October, 4004 BC

Question 11

View of earth-James Hutton

Answer 11

(Scottish, 1726-1797) demonstrated that most rocks must be ancient and that many dramatic processes have occurred over earths history

Question 12

View of earth- George cuvier

Answer 12

(1769-1832) A French paleontologist, recognized in the fossil record that many species have become extinct many times in earths history and new species replaced them
-argued catastrophic events have lead to extinction of species

Question 13

Age of the earth

Answer 13

• Clair Patterson (1922-1995), an American geochemist at Cali institute of tech demonstrated in 1956 using radiometric dating that meteorites are 4.55 billion years old
• accepted age of earth

Question 14

Contribution of Charles Darwin

Answer 14

• recognized that species have changed over time
• species adapt to their environment
• natural selection (heritable traits that make it more likely for an organism to survive and successfully reproduce become more common in a population over successive generations)

Question 15

Duration of geological processes

Answer 15

Some geological process occur on the scales of hundreds of millions of years
-plate tectonics, mountain building
Some processes occur nearly instantly
-earthquakes, volcanic eruptions
Some short-term processes are related to long-term processes
-earthquake occurs b/c plate tectonics