Life Science: Chapter 8 - Evidence of the Past
Terms
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- fossil
- The solidified remains or imprints of a once-living organism.
- relative dating
- Determining whether an event or object, such as a fossil, is older or younger than other events or objects.
- absolute dating
- Determining the age of an object or event in years, usually by measuring the amount of unstable atoms in the sample.
- geologic time scale
- The division of Earth's history into distinct intervals.
- extinct
- Describes a species of organism that has died out completely.
- Precambrian time
- The period of geologic time scale beginning when the Earth originated 4.6 billion years ago to about 540 million years ago.
- Paleozoic era
- The period of geologic time scale beginning about 570 million years ago and ending about 248 million years ago.
- Mesozoic era
- The period of geologic time scale beginning about 248 million years ago and ending about 65 millions years ago.
- Cenozoic era
- The period of geologic time scale beginning about 65 million years ago and continuing until present day.
- primate
- A type of mammal that includes humans, apes, and monkeys with opposable thumbs and binocular vision.
- hominid
- The family referring specifically to humans and several extinct, humanlike species.
- australopithecine
- An early hominid that evolved more than 3.6 million years ago.
- Neanderthal
- A species of hominid that lived in Europe and western Asia from 230,000 years ago to 30,000 years ago.
- plate tectonics
- The study of the forces that drive the movement of pieces of Earth's crust around the surface of the planet.