Understanding Plate Tectonics

Who is best known for first describing the continental drift theory in a scientific paper?

• John Baumgardner

• Alfred Wegener

• Isaac Newton

• Albert Einstein

What is the Mid-Ocean Ridge?

• A deep trench in the ocean

• A long ridge of low mountains running along the bottom, in the middle of most oceans

• A large underwater volcano

• A type of coral reef

What is magma?

• Solid rock found in the crust

• Molten rock found within the crust and in the mantle

• A type of sedimentary rock

• A type of igneous rock

What is sea floor spreading?

• The process of oceanic crust being destroyed

• The motion of tectonic plates away from mid-ocean ridges where mantle rocks rise to form new ocean crust

• The formation of new continents

• The erosion of sea cliffs

What is subduction?

• The process of oceanic crust forming new land

• The tectonic process by which relatively thin and denser oceanic crust slowly slides down and under more massive but less dense continental crust

• The rising of magma to form new crust

• The movement of continents over time

What does the Plate Tectonics Theory suggest?

• The earth's crust is made of a single solid plate

• The earth's crust is made of semi-rigid plates floating on plastic rocks in the mantle

• The earth's crust is stationary and does not move

• The earth's crust is made of liquid magma

Who proposed a version of plate tectonics that fits well with the Bible's flood account?

• Alfred Wegener

• John Baumgardner

• Charles Darwin

• Stephen Hawking

What is a problem with Catastrophic Plate Tectonics?

• It requires a stationary, hot mantle plume to drive the spreading action

• It does not require the rising mantle plume

• It cannot explain the movement of tectonic plates

• It is not based on scientific evidence

What evidence contradicts the need for a stationary mantle plume in sea-floor spreading?

• The presence of underwater volcanoes

• Geologic evidence indicating that the spreading zone has moved over time

• The existence of deep ocean trenches

• The formation of new islands

What is the primary composition of the earth's mantle?

• Solid rock

• Molten rock

• Water

• Ice