Criticial Thinking Questions

Chapter 3 Question 3:
The principle to uniformitarianism is the "past is the key to the present". This essentially means that scientist are essentially able to hypothesize about what happened in the past with the materials and processes available or seen today.
One example of this is being able to determine that sandstone most likely derived from sand dunes millions of years ago. As the obvious wind patterns in both the stone and the sand are very similar.
Chapter 3 Question 5
Geological processes affect everything here on Earth and most certainly humans and our way of life. Whether we speak of the damages of earthquakes and volcanoes or the environmental effects on oil and water.They can affect our lives in most all things determining where to get our drinking water essential for life or where we should or shouldn't build a home. Geological processes affect the weather, the climate and the overall stability of our planet.
Chapter 2 Question 1
The minerals on Mars, the moon, Venus and Earth would all be very similar based on the fact that they were all swirling balls of dust and gas and formed at relatively the same time due to a cosmic collision.
Chapter 2 Question 3
As a liquid water is not a mineral because it is not a solid.
Beach sand is not a mineral because it is made up of organic material usch as shells and coral.
A diamond is a mineral as it fits the definition of a mineral.
A vitamin pill is not a mineral as it is made by humans.
A gold nugget is a mineral, it fits the description of a mineral.
A fishbone is not a mineral as it is composed of organic material.
An Emeral is a mineral, it fits the decription of a mineral .
Chapter 3 Question 3
The numerical age of rocks is estimated by the principles of Stratigraphic Superposition and reinforcing those estimates with surrounding fossils. I live in Louisiana which is primarily forest and marsh, we do not have any local rock formations that I am aware of.
Chapter 3 Question 4
According to "Earth Floor:geologic Time" (2004), At the beginning of the Paleozoic, life existed only in or near the ocean. Trilobites, shellfish, corals, and sponges appeared, followed by the first fish. Land plants appeared near the end of the Ordovician and for the first time we see the green of land plants in our global view. Huge forests and swamplands formed during the warm climate of the Mississippian and Pennsylvanian periods that later fossilized into the giant coal beds of the eastern United States. Animal life also moved onto the land, first the arthropods (spiders and insects to you), then the amphibians, and later the reptiles. The most abundant animals on land and sea during the Paleozoic were those like shellfish and insects that lacked backbones, so the Paleozoic is often called "The Age of Fish"." At the beginning of that Era, life forms developed hard parts like shells, teeth, bones, and woody parts that were easily preserved as fossils.
The pimary fossils found from this era include, fish, sponges, sea urchins and later jawless sharks.
Chapter 14 Question 1
Earth and Venus evolved so differently due to their proximity to the sun. Earth is rich in oxygen and poor in carbon dioxide due to the photosynthesis process. However the reverse is true on Venus because it is too hot to support plant life. If Earth were closer to the sun it would accelerate the evaporation process, disrupt weather patterns, potentially dry up and could not support life as we know it because of the heat.
Chapter 14 Question 4
Had the end of Cretaceous not wiped out the dinosaurs, mammals would probably not evolved because dinosaurs would have killed them before their evolutionary process could begin.

Reference:
Earth Floor:Geologic Time. (2004). Retrieved from http://www.cotf.edu/ete/modules/msese/earthsysflr/paleozoic.html