Ap Environmental Science Quiz 1 Chapter One

Front 1

Environment

Back 1

The sum of all the conditions surrounding us that influence life.

Front 2

Environmental Science

Back 2

The field that looks at interactions among human systems and those found in nature

Front 3

System

Back 3

Any set of interacting components that influence one another by exchanging energy or materials

Front 4

Ecosystem

Back 4

A particular location on Earth whose interacting components include biotic and abiotic factors

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Biotic

Back 5

Living

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Abiotic

Back 6

Non-living

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Environmentalist

Back 7

A person who participates in environmentalism

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Environmental Studies

Back 8

A broad field which includes environmental policy, economics, literature, and ethics

Front 9

Ecosystem services

Back 9

The processes by which life supporting resources are produced.

Front 10

Environmental indicators

Back 10

Describe the current state of an environmental system

Front 11

Sustainability

Back 11

Which is living on Earth in a way that allows us to use its resources without depriving future generations of those resources.

Front 12

Biodiversity

Back 12

The diversity of life forms in an environment.

Front 13

Species

Back 13

A group of organisms that is is distinct from other groups in its morphology (body form and structure), behavior, or biochemical properties.

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Speciation

Back 14

The evolution of new species

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Background extinction rate

Back 15

The average rate in which species go extinct every year

Front 16

Greenhouse gases

Back 16

Heat-trapping gases (i.e. carbon dioxide)

Front 17

Anthropogenic

Back 17

Derived from human activities

Front 18

Development

Back 18

Improvement in human well-being through economic advancement.

Front 19

Sustainable development

Back 19

Development that balances current human well-being and economic advancement with resource management for the benefit of future generations.

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Biophilia

Back 20

Love of life

Front 21

Ecological footprint

Back 21

A measure of how much that person consumes expressed in area of land.

Front 22

Scientific method

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An objective way to explore the natural, draw inferences from it, and predict the outcome of certain events, processes or changes.

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Hypothesis

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A testable conjecture about how something works.

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Null hypothesis

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A statement or idea that can be falsified or proved wrong.

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Replication

Back 25

A procedure where scientists take several sets of measurements.

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Sample size

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The number of times a measurement is replicated.

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Accuracy

Back 27

How close a measured value is to the actual or true value.

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Precision

Back 28

How close to one another the repeated measurements of the same sample are.

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Uncertainty

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Is an estimate of how how much a measured or calculated value differs from a true value.

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Inductive reasoning

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The process of making general statements from specific facts or examples.

Front 31

Deductive reasoning

Back 31

The process of applying a general statement to specific facts or situations.

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Critical thinking

Back 32

Process of questioning the source of the information, consider the methods or processes that were used to obtain the information and draw your own conclusions.

Front 33

Theory

Back 33

A hypothesis that has been repeatedly tested and confirmed by multiple groups of researchers and has reached wide acceptance.

Front 34

Natural law

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A theory to which there are no known exceptions and which has withstood rigorous testing.

Front 35

Control group

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A group that experiences exactly the same conditions as the experimental group except for the single variable under study.

Front 36

Natural experiment

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Occurs when a natural event acts as an experimental treatment in an ecosystem.

Front 37

Environmental justice

Back 37

A social movement and field of study that works toward equal enforcement of environmental laws and the elimination of disparities.