Problem: Fossils can be used to match up rock layers. As organisms change over time, they look different. Older fossils will look different than younger fossils. Some organisms only survived for a short time before going extinct. Knowing what organisms looked like at certain times also helps date rock layers. Some fossils are better than others for this use. The fossils that are very distinct at certain times of Earths history are called index fossils. Index fossils are commonly used to match rock layers. You can see how this works in Figure 2.30. If two rock layers have the same index fossils, then they're probably about the same age.

Question: "What helps to date rock layers?"

Answer: "Index fossils"
Answer: yes

Problem: When single father Thurman Williams needed help filling out papers in a custody suit recently, he didn't look to his lawyer for help. He walked to a computerized kiosk at the Lamoreaux Justice Center in Orange and started tapping the keys. As part of a legal experiment, litigants without lawyers across California are using computerized video kiosks to prepare common court filings and seek basic legal advice. The kiosk used by Williams is part of a statewide effort to cope with a flood of litigants who cannot afford or refuse to hire lawyers. Court officials statewide fear the number of self-represented litigants has reached crisis levels and threatens to clog court calendars. Like Williams, more than 6,000 Orange County litigants have initiated court actions on I-CAN! kiosks or accessed the programs on the Internet, using home computers. Similar programs are operating in Sacramento, San Diego and Ventura. A recent study of the kiosks' first 18 months of operation concluded it is too soon to tell if the system will relieve pressure on court calendars. But the report, by UC Irvine's School of Social Ecology, said users were overwhelmingly positive about the free legal assistance. "It's made life a lot easier for me," Williams said. "It's helped keep me from going to the poorhouse." The 29-year-old Orange resident was directed to a kiosk in the Lamoreaux Justice Center by court staff. After putting on headphones and following the directions of a videotaped instructor, Williams filled out a quarter-inch stack of paternity and custody documents. The exercise took 20 minutes; it would have cost him about $800 if he had relied on a lawyer, he said. "It was a lot easier than I thought." Whether they can't afford a lawyer or just want to save money, more Californians are going to court without a lawyer. "I'm just amazed at the numbers," said Commissioner Salvador Sarmiento, who hears between 40 and 90 child-support cases a day in Lamoreaux Justice Center.

Question: "Who made this remark: "It's helped keep me from going to the poorhouse.""

Answer: "Thurman Williams"
Answer: yes

Problem: The new administration had already begun exploring possible diplomatic options, retracing many of the paths traveled by its predecessors.U.S. envoys again pressed the Taliban to turn Bin Laden "over to a country where he could face justice" and repeated, yet again, the warning that the Taliban would be held responsible for any al Qaeda attacks on U.S. interests. The Taliban's representatives repeated their old arguments. Deputy Secretary of State Richard Armitage told us that while U.S. diplomats were becoming more active on Afghanistan through the spring and summer of 2001, "it would be wrong for anyone to characterize this as a dramatic shift from the previous administration." In deputies meetings at the end of June, Tenet was tasked to assess the prospects forTaliban cooperation with the United States on al Qaeda. The NSC staff was tasked to flesh out options for dealing with the Taliban. Revisiting these issues tried the patience of some of the officials who felt they had already been down these roads and who found the NSC's procedures slow." We weren't going fast enough,"Armitage told us. Clarke kept arguing that moves against the Taliban and al Qaeda should not have to wait months for a larger review of U.S. policy in South Asia." For the government," Hadley said to us,"we moved it along as fast as we could move it along." As all hope in moving the Taliban faded, debate revived about giving covert assistance to the regime's opponents. Clarke and the CIA's Cofer Black renewed the push to aid the Northern Alliance. Clarke suggested starting with modest aid, just enough to keep the Northern Alliance in the fight and tie down al Qaeda terrorists, without aiming to overthrow the Taliban. Rice, Hadley, and the NSC staff member for Afghanistan, Zalmay Khalilzad, told us they opposed giving aid to the Northern Alliance alone. They argued that the program needed to have a big part for Pashtun opponents of theTaliban. They also thought the program should be conducted on a larger scale than had been suggested. Clarke concurred with the idea of a larger program, but he warned that delay risked the Northern Alliance's final defeat at the hands of the Taliban. During the spring, the CIA, at the NSC's request, had developed draft legal authorities-a presidential finding-to undertake a large-scale program of covert assistance to the Taliban's foes.

Question: "Who pushed for support of the Northern Alliance?"

Answer: "Hadley"
Answer:
no