Use these questions to test your understanding. If you get them wrong, you will be linked back to the relevant part of the notes.
Be sure you study them thoroughly (don't just get a quick fix for your mistake) so your overall understanding is improved.
1. Greenhouse gases ____________
a. absorb visible light and transmit infrared light b. absorb ultraviolet light and transmit visible light
c. absorb infrared light and transmit visible light d. absorb X-rays and transmit infrared light
2. What would the temperature of a planet be if it reflected nearly all the sunlight?
a. it would be very, very cold
b. it could be cold or warm, depending on its distance from the Sun
c. it could be cold or warm, depending on the amount of greenhouse gases
3. Mars' surface temperature would be higher if _______
a. it reflected more sunlight b. it were farther from the Sun
c. its atmosphere contained more greenhouse gases d. it rotated more quickly
4. The only body other than Earth to show signs of running water on its surface is
a. Venus b. Mars c. Mercury d. the Moon e. all inner planets have water on their surfaces
5. Volcanoes on Mars
a. don't exist b. are much larger than on Earth c. are much smaller than on Earth
d. don't have lava e. are made of ice
6. The concerns about global warming on the earth arise because
a. increases in the output of the sun as it evolves will make the earth warmer than it is now.
b. there is a natural fluctuation in the temperature of the earth, and we seem to be in an upswing.
c. changes in the orbit of the earth are bringing it closer to the sun.
e. there is just an irrational panic reaction among certain people.
7. Our understanding of the temperature on the earth a long time ago is based on
b. measuring the relative amounts of oxygen isotopes in ancient seashells
c. measuring tree ring widths in fossil, petrified trees
d. studying the types of plants that grew in different places
e. computer calculations that take the present temperature and weather patterns and work backwards
8. The canals on Mars are
a. long and thin geological features
b. the product of ancient intelligent life, used for irrigation
c. an illusion caused by observers trying too hard to see features on the planet
e. places where the surface has cracked into long fault lines
9. Ultimately, the reason the Martian volcanoes grew to their current sizes is
a. just a chance of Martian geology
b. because ancient Martian oceans eroded the land around them
c. because gravity is weaker on Mars than on the earth
d. a result of the lower atmospheric pressure on Mars
e. because Mars is too small to retain significant interior heat
10. "Terraforming" refers to
a. modifying the atmosphere of a planet to make its climate more like that of the earth
b. making a specialized kind of pottery out of a rare kind of clay
c. sending a spacecraft to another planet to colonize it
d. depositing a sample of the earth on the moon as a momento for future astronauts
e. recovering areas in the arctic to make farming in them possible
11. The surface of Venus
a. is completely unknown to us
b. is dominated by impact craters, similar to Mercury and our moon
c. has features suggesting that the planet once had abundant water
d. is dominated by volcanic geology
e. is a likely place to find life
12. Over decade-to-century time spans,
a. independent measurements of the temperature on earth agree that it is going up
b. independent measurements of the temperature on earth disagree significantly
c. independent projections of the future temperatures are in close agreement
e. there is no clear conclusion that can be drawn about the temperature trend over the past century