Lecture #1 Flashcards
Why have math in Class
Overall: Need math in order to be a good scientist
AAMC report –> med schools ay that what they need from undergrads that they are lacking is applying quantitative reasoning
Example - Understanding statistical outcome of a clinical trial
Why Study Evolution
- Nothing in Biology makes sense except in light of evolution
- Consistency in biology = constructions in biology imposed by evolution
- No modern biology operates without evolution
- Evolution is the process that is repsonsible for biodiversity of the world
- Ties together all of modern biology (no aspect of modern biology is isolated from it)
- spans all levels of biological organization – links molecules to population’s and ecosystems
- It is fundamentally important to much of applied science (Both implicit and Explicit)
Evolution leads to
Diversity in form + function
Evolution + Applied science
Evolution = important to much of applied science (Matters in real world)
Implicit: Ability to understand systems that rely on evolutionary framework
Ex. usefulness of model organisms – need to know ancestry of the organisms
- We can then infer our biology based on other animals
- Shows why we should be able to learn anything about us from a fruit fly
Explicit: Evolution process = part of solution
Example – drug resistance (HIV – works on evolutionary concepts and ecosystems)
- HIV Antiviral cocktail – works on the evolutionary concept of adaptive landscapes
HIV/COVID + Evolution
Very tied to evolutionary biology – Where viruses come from + relation to other viruses + dynamics of host transmission + what level of vaccine is needed
- Overall understanding of any pathogen (Like HIV) is fully rooted in evolutionary biology
Example – What level of vaccine efficiency needed comes from co-evolutionary model
Theory in Scinece Vs. Vernacular
Word theory is very different in science
Vernacular: Hunch/speculation/hypothesis
Science: Set of overarching mechanisms + principles that explain a major aspect of natural world supported by individual lines of evidence
- Supported by multiple lines of evidence
- Evolutionary theory = the same as any other scientific theory
- Theory = system that organized facts and laws
- Theory = well confirmed + ob jective observations and laws in a well reasoned and empirically supported way that allows us to make sense of the world
- A theory in this sense is a system that organizes
facts (well-confirmed, objective observations)
and laws (describing relationships in science)
in a well-reasoned and empirically supported
way that allows us to makes sense of the world.
Metaphysical Naturalism vs. Methodical Naturalism
Metaphysical naturalism: There is no such thing as the supernatural
Methodological naturalism: Means you can’t rely on supernatural explanations for physical phenomena
Metaphysical naturalism – Means that there is no such things as supernatural BUT Methodological naturalism means There may be something to exist beyond nature BIT that is entirely outside the bounds of science
Metaphysical naturalism
There is no such thing as the supernatural
- means that nothing beyond the physical world exists (the physical world is the entirety of existing)
- Extension of materialism
- The physical world is the entirety of existence and that all of reality is result of natural phenomenon
Methodological naturalism
Means you can’t rely on supernatural explanations for physical phenomena (for empirical observations)
- Need to have this is science (if not then science stops)
- Came out of the enlightment – once adopted this idea = then made progress (progress could be made once ascribed to this midset)
- Proof of impportance of principal = the progress we made since elightment
- Without this we can give up when we encounter something that we don’t understand
KEY for scinetific understanding
- In order to science to work = need to operate under unwavering premise of naturalism
MEANS – There may be something to exist beyond nature BIT that is entirely outside the bounds of science
- We can’t resort to supernatural explaintions for empirical observations
Root of evolution
Evolvere – To unfold + to unroll
Evolution (overall)
Has multiple meaning in different contexts – used in many contexts to means change/development through time
- In our class = we are talking about biologic evolution
Biologic Evolution
Change in heritable properties of population in organism across generations OR change in allele frequency through time
- Population level - Simple definition but plays out in complex ways
Implications from evolution
Framework of evolutions brought with it some implications –> Challenged some long-held beliefs of the world – changes the way people think about the living world
- Chnage = the form of the living world
- Individual perspective = limited – do not see much change in lifetime – easily in isolation to think that the world has always been the same as the world that you are observing
- Accpeted first in geology before biology
- Biology was already moving in this direction in the years leading up to Darwin
- Biologic phenomena are explained by mechanisms concepts
- Break from the earlier tradition of Aristotle Final Vs. Efficient causation
- Biologic phenomena are not driven by some ultimate purpose
- History is a crucial part of understanding nature
- What we have now results from constraints in history
- Historial constrigencey impacts outcomes of natural phenomena
- What we have now results from constraints in history
- Variations is ubiqitous component of biological systems
- MAJOR break from platonic essentialism –> they thought that variation is just miastakes
Example of History is a crucial part of understanding nature
Example = shows that Historical constigencey impacts the outcomes of natural phenomena
Example – Recurrent laryngeal Nerves → needed for speech
- Would be more efficient IF just near Vagus nerve BUT instead it loops under aorta
- Ineffective – worse in Giraffes (meters) + worse in dinosaur (10s of meters) –> In all it is more inefficient
- Worse for axon + ties up circulatory system
Reason it is this way - comes from ancestors with a different circulatory system (ancestors with gill pouches)
- This system was efficient in old circulatory systems – know that the circulatory system has changed it is not efficient but you can’t just change the nerves
Old view on variation
They used to think that variation is just mistakes not the norm (Platonic essentialism) THEN realized that variation is compoennet of biological systems
