View a FREE sample

This test consists of 5 short answer questions, 10 short essay questions, and 1 (of 3) essay topics.

Short Answer Questions

1. What theory did Dan Simberloff and Lawrence Abele challenge in an article?

2. What turnover rate did Wilson and MacArthur predict for Krakatau?

3. What is the literary term for the final chapter?

4. What was going to happen to the species' habitat as the Texas plan was implemented?

5. What human actions make island biogeography applicable in this new location?

Short Essay Questions

1. What is the concept of the minimum viable population?

2. What does Quammen say about applying the case of the Mauritius kestrel to other species?

3. How does Quammen describe the indri?

4. What was Quammen looking for at Aru?

5. What did Simberloff and Abele propose as a result of their data?

6. What data did Simberloff and Abele deploy in challenging this theory?

7. What did people argue over in the wake of Simberloff and Abele's 1976 article?

8. Describe Quammen's attempt to see an indri.

9. What was the practical example of species management Quammen cited from Texas?

10. How is the case of the muriqui different from the case of the Mauritius kestrel?

Essay Topics

Write an essay for ONE of the following topics:

Essay Topic 1

Write a character sketch of the author based on his style and content. What values does he hold dear? What are his hopes and fears? What kind of person do you think he is? Anchor your sketch in passages in the book.

Essay Topic 2

Is Quammen somehow at fault for not making solid proposals for how to mitigate switch loss? Is his informative book somehow flawed for failing to make recommendations? Debate this proposition using examples from the book.

Essay Topic 3

If you were going to try to make a difference in the field of rescuing species from extinction, what actions would you take, based on the information presented in this book? What strategies would you employ? What part of Quammen's book leads you to believe that this would be an effective strategy for mitigating species loss.

(see the answer keys)

This section contains 835 words (approx. 3 pages at 300 words per page) View a FREE sample