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26 Cards in this Set
- Front
- Back
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Describe Aegyptopithecus
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-largest of Oligocene anthropoideans
-known from numerous fossilized teeth, skulls, and limb bones -appears ancestral to later Old World anthropoids -lived 35 mya -looked like a primitive monkey |
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Omomyids
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-resembles living tarsiers
-most were much smaller than adapids -adapted for climbing, clinging, and leaping -nocturnal -omnivorous |
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Proconsul
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-early Miocene fossils
-tropical forests and woodlands of eastern Africa -full skeleton of Proconsul africanus, which was about the size of a modern gibbon -Very ape-like in head, teeth, shoulder and elbow. -Monkey-like in trunk arm, and hand |
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Altiatlasius
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-oldest probable primate
-fragments of fossils found in late Paleocene deposits in N. Africa |
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Anthropomorphism
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The attribution of human characteristics to nonhuman animals
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Example of anthropomorphism
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Curious George or King Kong
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Ecological niche
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A species' way of life: what it eats, how it finds mates, raises its young, relates to companions, and protects itself from predators
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Prehensile
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The ability to grasp, with fingers, toes, or tail
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Sexual Dimorphism
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The observable phenotypic differences between males and females of the same species
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Stereoscopic Vision
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A form of vision in which the visual field of each eye of two-eyed (binocular) animal overlaps with the other, producing depth perception
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relative dating methods
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arrange material evidence in a linear sequence, in comparison to other objects
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Isoptopic Dating Methods
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dating methods based on scientific knowledge about the rate at which various radioactive isotopes of naturally occuring elements transform themselves into other elements by losing subatomic particles.
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3 types of Relative Dating Methods
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1. stratigraphic superposition
2. typological sequences 3. Biostratigraphic dating |
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Stratigraphic Superposition
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-aka law of superposition
-states that layers lower down in a sequence of stata must be older than the layers above them -exception: law of cross cutting relationships |
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Law of Cross Cutting relationships
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where old rocks are crosscut by other geological features, the intruding features must be younger than the layers of rock they cut across
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Typological Sequences
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-classifying fossils or artifacts in a series on a basis of similarities and differences
-objects that look most alike are grouped together and ordered |
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Biostratigraphic dating
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-relies on patterns of fossil distribution in different rock layers
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2 kinds of fossil species that are most useful for relative dating
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1. those that spread quickly over a large area following widespread extinction of their parent species
2. those that evolved so quickly that a fossil representing any evolutionary stage is a good indicator of the relative age of other fossils found in association with it. |
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Nonisotopic dating
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Dating methods that assign age in years to material evidence no by using rates of nuclear decay
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Seriation
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A relative dating method based on the assumption that artifacts that look alike must have been made at the same time
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Lucy
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-australipithecus afarensis fossil
-found 40% intact during the 70's and undisturbed -Donald Johanson and collegues were able to recontruct her body skeleton (not heat) in great detail |
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Australipithicus Afarensis
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-fossils found in Laetoli, Tanzania and Ethiopia (Arat Depression)
-Range b/w 3.9-3 mya -first fairly complete adult skull found in early 90's, confirmed its small brained, ape-like features -some features of skeleton reaveal its adaptation to habitual bipedalism |
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Australipithecus africanus
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-fossils associated with 3 myo hominids w/ small front teeth and large cheek teeth
-found in S and E Africa, in 20's -Possessed enlarged cheek teeth, but faces were small and lightly built -also known as gracile autralipithicines. -lived b/w 2-3 mya -foramen magnum was directly below skull -fossil finds indicate that some were able to control fire and cook -unclear if they were capable of making tools -all fossils from S. Africa have been recoverd from five sites. |
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Australipithecus Boisei
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-The fossil skull known as the Zinjanthropus" was reclassified as A.boisei
-potassium argon method was used to date the volcanic rock lying around the fossil-1.75 mya -ranged between 2.1 and 1.1 mya -LAST in the Australipithecine line as the Homo species was beginning to evolve |
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Homo Habillis
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-species of large brained, gracile hominids, 2 million years and younger
-One of the first homo species -Discovered in 1963 by Leakey, at Olduvai (Tanzania) -skull with huge cranial capacity -named this "handyman" -fossils date 2.4-1.5 million years ago -progressively larger cranial capacity than earlier hominids -utilized tools, now tradition at Olduvai |
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Homo erectus
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-large-brained, robust hominids that lives b/t 1.8 and .4 mya
-FIRST HOMINID SPECIES TO MIGRATE OUT OF AFRICA, shortly after it appeared -Oldest known fossil is of a boy found at the Nariokotome III site, on the West side of Lake Turkana in 1984 |
