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A Plague of Frogs--Study Questions
Chapter 8 – “Choosing Sides”
1. What are the two views that people could take in thinking about the world?
Answers will vary.
2. Explain why chemicals are under a “perpetual cloud of suspicion?”
We swim in an ocean of 60-100K chemicals, of which many are benign, however, no one knows when critical chemicals will react and alter our environment.(107)
3. Describe the class of chemicals designed to alter our environment?
Pesticides are formulated to kill or suppress living organisms.(108)
4. Distinguish between Type I and Type II errors and their impact on society.
Answers will vary.(111)
5. Why is there no “silver bullet” in solving this scientific mystery?
Answers will vary.(109)
6. Discuss the pros and cons of parasitic infestation versus chemical contamination of the environment.
Answers will vary.(109)
7. Explain how research science is analogous to medieval fiefdoms.
Answers will vary.(112)
8. Why did Burkhart want to develop a “paired study”?
This would clarify the impact of different environmental loads in wetlands.(119)
9. What did Lucier consider “wishful thinking”?
The MPCA’s hope of finding a correlation between the deformities and a particular chedmical wishful thinking.(118)
10. What as the ultimate question developed by Burkhart during 1997 for NIEHS to study?
Did wetlands that produced deformed frogs have a chemical load that was different from wetlands where the frogs were normal?(119)
11. What was the enormous assumption hiding within Burkhart’s strategy?
Barkhart thought that if he could find a chemical “load in ponds where the deformities occurred then he could then isolate and identify a specific compound that actually caused the
abnormalities.(119)
12. What protocol is used in deriving a molecular signature?
Answers will vary.(120)
13. How would using molecular signatures be applicable to this investigation.?
Answers will vary.
14. What would an ideal bioassay question have been for Burkhart’s investigation.
Under the best circumstances, a bioassay would use one of the native frog species that was suffering high rates of deformities in the field such as leopard frogs.(120)
15. What did Scoff believe was causing the deformities?
He believed there was a connection between the organism’s endocrine function interacting with the environment.(123)
15. Explain the possibilty that methoprene could be the culprit in the case of the deformed frogs?
A precedent had been set indicating methoprene’s interuption of insect endocrine systems, whereas Tietge discovered that it had the ability to mimic hormones by acting as a receptor.
Answers will vary. (123-125)
16. How was methoprene being used in the environment?
Methoprene was being used in pesticides throughout the countryside.(123-125)
17. Trace the pathway of methoprene in the ecosystem?
Insects > water > frogs (123-125)
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