This quiz originally appeared in the Awesome Possum game
cartridge. The questions and answers are Copyright 1992-1993
Time Warner Interactive (used by permission). All Rights Reserved.
One-third of the world's forests are in the
- Australian outback
- Amazon
- ocean
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To survive, how much does a hummingbird have to eat every day?
- A quarter of its own body weight
- More than its own weight
- More than a human eats
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If you took all the DNA from all of your cells and
uncoiled it, it
would:
- be a foot long (0.3 meters)
- be a mile long (1.6 km)
- stretch to the moon and back 8000
times
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The thick haze that covers the Arctic every November
to April is
composed of:
- dust from the Canadian tundra
- industrial pollutants that "migrate"
from Russia
- ozone layer fallout
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Which consumes the most water?
- Agriculture
- Households
- Industry
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What is stored in a camel's hump?
- Water
- Body fat
- A deadly poison
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What is a rattlesnake's rattle made of?
- Extra skin left after molting
- New skin
- Calcium carbonate, like in a clam
shell
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Why is the Narwhal different from all other whale
species?
- It has a long unicorn-like tusk
- It is the largest known whale
- It is purple
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Which animal do polar bears most like to eat?
- Penguins
- Seals
- Tropical fish
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Penguins are found only in:
- the Arctic (North Pole)
- the Antarctic (South Pole)
- Iceland
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What happened at Three Mile Island in 1979?
- Part of a nuclear energy plant melted
and released radioactivity
- A major oil spill occurred as a tanker
ran aground
- The light bulb was invented
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Which U.S. state uses the most wind-driven electric
power?
- Connecticut
- Kansas
- California
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Where are the majority of all species on earth
found?
- Coral reefs
- Tropical rainforests
- New York City
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A result of rainforest destruction is:
- flooding in some areas
- drought in some areas
- both
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What is the expected world population in the year
2000?
- 6 billion
- 80 billion
- 400 million
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What is an "introduced species"?
- A plant or animal that was transported
from its original habitat to a new one
- A species living in a zoo
- An important part of plant and animal
etiquette
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A detritivore eats:
- dead organisms
- plants and animals
- humans
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A savannah is comprised mostly of:
- desert
- grassland
- thick forests
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Which city is the most populated?
- Tokyo, Japan
- Mexico City, Mexico
- Los Angeles, United States
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The typical refrigerator/freezer found in American
homes
uses:
- less energy than those designed in the
1940's
- more
- the same
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What percentage of energy used by an average
incandescent light
bulb is wasted as heat?
- 25%
- 55%
- 95%
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A compact fluorescent light bulb uses 1/4 of the
energy used by
an incandescent bulb and will last how many times longer?
- 2 times
- 5 times
- 10 times
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What percentage of the Sahara desert would a solar
electric plant
have to occupy to produce all of the electrical energy used on
earth?
- 1%
- 7%
- 10%
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If American households used the most efficient
refrigerators
produced, how many nuclear power plants would no longer be
needed?
- 1
- 5
- 18
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If every incandescent light bulb in the typical
American home
were replaced by a compact fluorescent bulb, America would become
an energy exporting nation.
- True
- False
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If America used the most efficient lighting now
available, we
would save $30 billion each year and reduce our energy consumption
by:
- 10%
- 25%
- 75%
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Which uses more energy over a 24-hour period, the
typical
refrigerator/freezer or a heated waterbed?
- A refrigerator/freezer
- A waterbed
- They use about the same amount
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The first water pump powered by the sun was created
in:
- the 1st century A.D.
- 1492
- 1805
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In the late nineteenth century, a French inventor
stunned a crowd
of onlookers when he:
- powered the world's first solar steam
engine
- made ice from the heat of the sun
- both of the above
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What color are Black bears?
- Black, only
- Any color except black
- Various colors including white
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Environmental changes have reduced the number of
species to the
lowest level since:
- the big bang
- the Mesozoic era, 65 million years
ago
- 1492
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If all humans stood on each others' shoulders, they
would form a
human tower
- as tall as Mount Everest
- 12 times higher than the moon
- from here to Alpha Centauri
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The poison dart frog is called that because it
- shoots poison darts
- secretes a poison that natives dip their
darts in
- looks like a poison dart
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In 1956 26 African ("killer") queen bees escaped into
the jungles
of Brazil. Now their offspring on the American continent number in
the:
- millions
- billions
- trillions
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How many flowers do bees have to visit in order to
make a pound
(454 grams) of honey?
- Two dozen
- Two thousand
- Two million
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The blue-streak cleaner fish makes its living by:
- eating parasites off other fish
- cleaning submarine windows
- cleaning fishermen's plates
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In 24 hours, a bamboo plant can grow almost:
- 4 inches (10 cm)
- 4 feet (1.2 meters)
- 4 miles (6.4 km)
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During winter, how long can camels survive without
drinking?
- 1 week
- 1 month
- 3 months
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How much water can an average camel drink in 10
minutes?
- 5 glasses
- 5 gallons (19 liters)
- Nearly 30 gallons (114 liters)
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How many blue whales would it take to weigh as much
as one
giant sequoia tree?
- 1
- 4
- 35
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The world's largest tree is a giant sequoia named
General
Sherman. About how old is it?
- 200 years
- A thousand years
- 3500 years
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About 60% of all animal species are
- beetles
- monkeys
- birds
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The horseshoe crab is related to the
- normal crab
- spider
- horse
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Which place contains the greatest mass of living
material per
acre?
- Coastal forests of the Pacific
Northwest
- The great plains of the Midwest
- Tropical rainforests
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In this century, use of fossil fuels has:
- declined slightly
- doubled
- grown tenfold
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How much cleared tropical forest land is required to
produce
enough beef for one quarterpound hamburger?
- 2 square feet (1858 sq. cm)
- 55 square feet (5 sq. meters)
- 10 square miles (26 sq. km)
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What percent of the rainforests in Central America
were cleared
from 1960 to 1985 to make pasture for beef cattle?
- 5%
- 40%
- 100%
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Conserving one gallon (3.8 liters) of gasoline reduces
carbon
dioxide emissions by
- 1 ounce (28 grams)
- 1 pound (454 grams)
- 20 pounds (9 kg)
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How much garbage does the average person in the
United States
produce per day?
- 1 pound (454 grams)
- Almost 4 pounds (1.8 kg)
- Over a ton
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Used motor oil should be:
- poured on the ground
- thrown in the trash
- taken to an approved disposal site
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How much of the old-growth forest in the United
States still
exists?
- None
- 10%
- 50%
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If logging continues at current rates, all unprotected
ancient
forests in Oregon and Washington will be gone in:
- 30 years
- 100 years
- 200 years
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How much carbon does one Douglas fir remove from
the
atmosphere over its lifetime?
- 200 pounds (91 kg)
- 1 ton
- 400 tons
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How many Douglas firs would it take to make enough
timber to
build an average-sized house?
- 1
- 20
- 500
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Compared to the amount of oil spilled by the Exxon
Valdez, how
much used motor oil is improperly discarded by Americans each
year?
- Half as much
- Twice as much
- 10 to 30 times as much
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Which is less expensive to use in the long run?
- Incandescent light bulbs
- Compact fluorescent bulbs
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If all the paper used in American offices were
recycled, how
many trees would be saved each year?
- 50 thousand
- 1 million
- 75 million
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Every navel orange is descended from a single:
- navel
- mutant orange tree
- tangerine
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Which has the most legs?
- A spider
- A fly
- A beetle
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Sharks do not have any:
- gills
- bones
- fins
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Spiders have their ears on their:
- heads
- legs
- stomachs
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The DNA (genetic code) is 99.8% identical between 2
people. How
much of it do we share with gorillas?
- None
- 21.9%
- 98.3%
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What percent of all species that ever lived are now
extinct?
- 1%
- About 50%
- 99.9%
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Which has the largest brain?
- The gorilla
- Neanderthal human
- Modern human
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At what rate are the cells in your body dividing?
- Several per day
- Hundreds per hour
- Millions per second
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Which animal produces a clicking sound that jams a
bat's
radar?
- The dog mouse
- The tiger moth
- The zebra bird
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The Amazonian rainforest was once home to over 6
million
Indians. How many now survive?
- None
- 200 thousand
- 1 million
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How much of the ancient forest in the American
northwest has
been destroyed?
- 10%
- 50%
- 90%
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Wheeling, West Virginia has experienced rainfall
almost as acidic
as:
- lemon juice
- vinegar
- battery acid
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Before the development of agricultural chemicals,
pests
destroyed about 30% of the world's crops. What is the crop loss
now?
- 0%
- 10%
- About 30%
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At current consumption rates, the world will use up
its known
usable oil reserves in less than:
- 50 years
- 150 years
- 1000 years
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How much of all the oil discovered in the U.S. has been
burned?
- 2%
- 40%
- 80%
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How long did it take nature to produce the amount of
fossil fuel
humans burn in 1 year?
- A hundred years
- A thousand years
- A million years
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The main cause of the greenhouse effect is:
- Ozone
- Carbon dioxide
- Nitrous oxide
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80% of the carbon dioxide emitted into the
atmosphere each year
comes from:
- fossil fuels
- rotting vegetation
- methane from cows
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Brazil, Norway and the Philippines get at least half of
their
energy from:
- oil
- natural gas
- renewable sources
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Species are becoming extinct at how many times the
natural
rate?
- 100
- 1000
- 25,000
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What percent of modern medicines were derived from
plants and
animals?
- 5%
- 40%
- 98%
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Which area is home to the greatest number of bird
species?
- Antarctica
- Costa Rica
- North America
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Drift nets, which trap seabirds and ocean mammals as
well as
fish, are sometimes as long as:
- 1 mile (1.6 km)
- 10 miles (16 km)
- 60 miles (97 km)
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How energy efficient is the U.S. compared to Japan in
producing a
unit of economic output?
- Half as energy efficient
- About the same
- Twice as energy efficient
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The opossum is the only North American:
- rodent
- marsupial
- dinosaur
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How acidic is the rain in New England compared to 25
years
ago?
- Twice as acidic
- Eight times as acidic
- Fifty times as acidic
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How much of the toxic waste in the U.S. is improperly
disposed
of?
- 10%
- 50%
- 90%
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How much of Japan's garbage is recycled, compared to
that of the
U.S.?
- Half as much
- Twice as much
- Almost 5 times as much
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What percent of exotic parrots shipped to the U.S.
from South
America die in transit?
- 5%
- 50%
- 98%
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How much uranium does it take to produce as much
energy as
burning a ton of coal?
- A third of a gram
- 8 ounces (227 gm)
- 10 pounds (4.5 kg)
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How much tropical rainforest existed in 1950
compared to
now?
- The same amount
- Twice as much
- 10 times as much
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Over three-quarters of the ocean's petroleum
pollution comes
from:
- tanker spills
- evaporation of unburned gasoline
- drilling mishaps
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How many trees are saved yearly due to use of
recycled
paper?
- None
- 100 thousand
- over 200 million
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Most Australian mammals are:
- primates
- marsupials
- rodents
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At birth, opossums are the size of a
- honeybee
- mouse
- cat
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How much voltage can a South American electric eel
generate?
- 9 volts
- 120 volts
- 600 volts
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Mudskippers are fish that can walk on:
- land
- water
- air
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The Nile crocodile lets plovers enter its open mouth
and eat:
- leeches from its gums
- plaque from its teeth
- germs that cause bad breath
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How much of the surface area of Los Angeles is
paved?
- one-fifth
- one-third
- two-thirds
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How much money would the U.S. save each year if we
reached
Japanese levels of energy efficiency?
- $500 million
- $5.4 billion
- $220 billion
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After the 1973 oil shortage, the U.S. improved its
energy
efficiency and cut oil use by:
- 1 million barrels per year
- 5 million barrels per month
- 13 million barrels per day
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Compared to harvesting raw timber, harvesting waste
paper in
cities creates:
- half as many jobs
- the same number of jobs
- 5 times as many jobs
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How much paper is used each year in the U.S., per
person?
- 50 pounds (23 kg)
- 140 pounds (64 kg)
- 600 pounds (272 kg)
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End of Part 2
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Go on to Part 3