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Name_______________________________________Per_______Date___________
Cosmos: A Spacetime Odyssey – Episode 12
THE WORLD SET FREE
“Once there was a world…”
1. The primary reason Venus is so much hotter than the Earth is
__Venus has no oceans to moderate its temperature.
__it’s 30% closer to the sun than Earth is.
__clouds of sulfuric acid that cover the planet.
__a dense atmosphere of carbon dioxide.
__it works out, eats sensibly, and takes care of itself.
2. Earth’s advantage is that its carbon is locked in solid vaults of
3. As a result of absorption of the carbon dioxide in the ocean, the CO2
that remains in the atmosphere is fewer than _____ molecules out of every
10,000.
4. But if that concentration were doubled, Earth would get uncomfortably
____________________.
5. The annual global changes in CO2 are governed by
__the forests of the North.
__the oceans of the South.
__the oceans of the North.
__the forests of the South.
6. Sample of Earth’s ancient atmosphere can be found in samples of
7. CO2 concentration in the atmosphere is _____% higher than it was
before the Industrial Revolution.
8. If we didn’t have any carbon dioxide in the atmosphere, the Earth
would just be a great big ______________________________.
9. Volcanoes add CO2 to the atmosphere at the rate (at most) of 500
while our civilization adds CO2 at the rate of 30
10. Based on atomic-level analysis, the dramatic increase in CO2 in the
atmosphere is due to
__volcanic activity
__human activity
__a nearly even split of volcanic and human activity
11. Weather is hard to predict, but climate is predictable. Climate has
changed many times in the long history of the Earth, but always in
response to a global force. The strongest force driving climate change
right now is
12. The brightest natural surface on the Earth is _________________________
and the darkest is ____________________________________________________.
13. Positive feedback mechanisms include (check all that are correct)
__ice turning to sea-water reducing Earth’s reflectivity, increasing
absorption.
__making CO2 purple so that it’s visible to the human eye.
__thawing permafrost producing carbon dioxide and methane.
__raising the cliffs of Dover to as-yet unseen heights.
14. Energy output of the sun has been _?_ over the past several decades.
__increasing
__decreasing
__remaining constant
Earth heats up more during __the day __the night | __summer __winter.
15. What transformational energy source was first demonstrated at the
World’s Fair in Paris, 1878?
16. Fueling a ship with energy. Coal: 100 men in one week.
Oil:
17. One percent of the wind’s energy would be enough to
18. The Apollo program was conceived as a demonstration of the United
States’ superior ____________________ technology.
19. John F. Kennedy, 1961: We choose to go to the Moon in this decade
and do the other things. Not because they are easy, but because they are