Chapter 1: The Science Of Bio Flashcards
Bio unified what?
Much of natural science
Living systems are the most complex what?
Chemical systems on earth
Life is constrained by?
The properties of chem. and physics
Science is becoming?
More interdisciplinary (combining multiple fields)
7 characteristics of all living organisms:
- Composed of cells
- Complex and ordered
- Respond to their environment
- Can grow, develop, and reproduce
- Obtain and use energy
- Maintain internal balance
- Allow for evolutionary adaption
Cellular level:
Atoms, molecule, macromolecule, organelle, cell
Organism level:
Tissue, organ, organ system, organism
Population level:
Species, population (of one species), community (multiple species), ecosystem (including living environment), biosphere
Each level has emergent properties
- result from interaction of components
- cannot be deduced by looking at parts themselves
- “life” is an emergent property
Science aims to understand?
The natural world through observation and reasoning
Science begins with? Meaning what?
Observations. So much if science is purely descriptive
- classification of all life on earth
- human genome sequencing
Science uses both?
Deductive and inductive reasoning
What is deductive reasoning?
Uses general principles to make specific predictions
What is inductive reasoning?
Uses specific observations to develop general conclusions
Scientists use a systematic approach to?
Gain understanding of the natural world known as the scientific method
Scientific method steps?
- Observation
- Hypothesis formation
- Prediction
- Experimentation
- Conclusion
A hypothesis is a possible?
Explanation for an observation
A hypothesis
Must be tested to determine validity
Is often tested many diff. ways
Allows for predictions to be made
Iterative (repeating process to generate a sequence of outcomes trying to reach a specific one)
Hypotheses can be changed and refined with new data
Experiments:
- Test hypothesis
- Must be carefully designed to test only one variable at a time
- Consists of a test experiment and a control experiment
Predictions:
Hypotheses should make predictions
Predictions provide a way to test the validity of hypotheses
Hypothesis must be rejected if the experiment produces results inconsistent with the predictions
The more experimentally supported predictions a hypothesis makes, the more valid the hypothesis