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| A DESCRIPTIVE GENERALIZATION about how some aspect of the natural world behaves under stated circumstances |
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| An OBSERVATION that has been REPEATEDLY CONFIRMED |
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| A TESTABLE STATEMENT about the natural world that can be used to build more complex inferences and explanations |
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| A WELL-SUBSTANTIATED EXPLANATION of some aspect of the natural world that can incorporate facts, laws, inferences, and tested hypothesis |
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The theory that all living things come from other living things
(one controversial, now generally accepted) |
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mutation-- natural selection-- new trait either doesn't survive or is slowly incorporated into the population
(mutation-natural selection-time) |
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| trace of a long-dead organism that usually develops from the hard body parts of an organism |
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| An IMPRINT in rock that is in the shape of an organism |
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| A mold that is filled with rock-light minerals to form a MODEL |
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| determining if a fossil is younger or older than another based on the LAYER OF ROCK IT IS FOUND IN |
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| Estimating the age in years of a fossil based on the AMOUNT OF SEDIMENT DEPOSITED ABOVE IT |
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| Radioactive Carbon Dating |
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| Determining the age of a fossil based on teh radioactive decay of C-14 |
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- proposed that similar species descended from a common ancestor
- hypothesized that acquired traits were passed on to offspring
- first to state that types of organisms change over time & new types of organisms are modified descendants of older types |
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| Evolution by Natural Selection |
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Proposed by both Charles Darwin and Alfred Wallace, but Darwin is mostly credited.
- organisms best suited to their environment reproduce more successfully and so the "favorable" genes are passed on more often (not an active process!) |
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| To change in response to the environment |
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| An organism's genetic contribution to the next generation (number of fertile offspring produced) |
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| organisms buried in sediments may become fossilized (scientists can trace evolution this way) |
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| structures found in different organisms suggest that they have a common ancestry |
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| Comparative Biochemistry (Macromolecules) |
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| study of molecules that make up different living things (DNA, etc.) |
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| comparing embryos of different species to look for similarities |
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| Features that apparently serve no function in an organism and are thought to have been useful in ancestral species |
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| the change of two or more species in response to each other |
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| occurs when the environment "selects" similar phenotypes, even though their ancestors were quite different |
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| A trait that serves the same function in different species but evolved independently (rather than from a common ancestor) |
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| occurs when 2 or more related populations or species become more and more dissimilar from each other (can lead to new species) |
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| the development of similarities in species that are related but separated (geographically) due to similar biomes with similar other species surrounding them |
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| study of evolution from a genetic point of view (since evolution is the gradual change in genetic material of a population) |
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| the total genetic information available in a population (variation is good for survival!) |
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| occur constantly at a low rate and under normal conditions and can produce totally new alleles for a trait. Many are HARMFUL and are slow to be eliminated by natural selection. |
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| scientists who study fossil evidence of HUMAN evolution |
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| human being with their ancestors |
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| means "wise humans" and is the point in the fossil record where the human species is identified |
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