Chapter 1 - Introduction: Exploring Life
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Chapter 1 - Introduction: Exploring Life
GNS AP Biology
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Chapter 1 - Introduction: Exploring Life
NEW AIM: What is Science?
What is
Science
Science is something that you do. It is a verb. It’s the process we use to try and know
something. It is the only way to try to know something.
Chapter 1 - Introduction: Exploring Life
AIM: What is Science?
How do we do
science
?
Chapter 1 - Introduction: Exploring Life
AIM: What is Science?
It’s all about making observations...
Ex. The structure of DNA
Chapter 1 - Introduction: Exploring Life
AIM: What is Science?
The observations:
Phoebus Levene
Russian Organic Chemist
Rockefeller University
1928
One of the first models of DNA
(the tetranucleotide)
Chapter 1 - Introduction: Exploring Life
AIM: What is Science?
The observations:
Erwin Chargaff
Austrian Biochemist
Columbia University
1952
Chapter 1 - Introduction: Exploring Life
AIM: What is Science?
The observations:
Erwin Chargaff
Austrian Biochemist
Columbia University
1952
Chapter 1 - Introduction: Exploring Life
AIM: What is Science?
The observations:
Rosalind Franklin
British Chemist/Physicist
King’s College
1953
Chapter 1 - Introduction: Exploring Life
AIM: What is Science?
The current DNA model:
James Watson (mol. biologist) Francis Crick (biophysicist)
University of Cambridge
1953
Chapter 1 - Introduction: Exploring Life
AIM: What is Science?
How were the foundations of genetics unraveled?
Chapter 1 - Introduction: Exploring Life
AIM: What is Science?
How were the foundations of genetics unraveled?
Chapter 1 - Introduction: Exploring Life
AIM: What is Science?
SCIENCE:
It is all about careful
observation (data collection)…
Followed by building models
that fit the data…
Chapter 1 - Introduction: Exploring Life
AIM: What is Science?
SCIENCE:
The most sophisticated scientific instrument we know of?
Chapter 1 - Introduction: Exploring Life
AIM: What is Science?
SCIENCE:
All you do is collect and process data…formulate hypotheses…and
use them to make predictions all day
Chapter 1 - Introduction: Exploring Life
AIM: What is Science?
SCIENCE:
Come up with your own example of you doing science today…
and write it up
Chapter 1 - Introduction: Exploring Life
AIM: What is Science?
We are always doing science!
Because you are always making observations, predictions, etc… When you
walk down the hall you are collected data (visual data with your eyes,
auditory data with your ears, etc…). With this data you generate questions
and make predictions.
For example, you observe someone running at you.
Hypothesis: The person will run into me.
Prediction: If I do not move then I will get hit.
Experiment: Stay put.
Results: The person hit me supporting my hypothesis.
Chapter 1 - Introduction: Exploring Life
AIM: What is Science?
How does the scientific
enterprise actually work?
Chapter 1 - Introduction: Exploring Life
AIM: What is Science?
What do scientists do with their findings?
They publish them in scientific journals like Science, Nature, Cell, EMBO, PLOS One, etc…
Chapter 1 - Introduction: Exploring Life
AIM: What is Science?
Tentative and Fallible
The findings of science are based on observation, but the observations
could be misleading. For example, the Earth appears to be flat…
Likewise, people thought Newton’s law of gravity was correct, but Einstein
came along and revised it. This type of thing happens all the time.
In addition, it was originally thought that water was HO. All of the
observations pointed to HO at the time…
The more reliable observations you make, the closer one gets to knowing
the truth…
Chapter 1 - Introduction: Exploring Life
AIM: What is Science?
Theory
1. Very broad in nature (describe many, many different phenomenon).
2. Supported by enormous numbers of observations
3. Examples:
Theory of Evolution
Cell Theory
Law
1. Very concise in nature (describes a very specific phenomenon).
2. Supported by enormous numbers of observations
3. Examples:
Law of Gravity
Laws of thermodynamics
Laws of motion
Chapter 1 - Introduction: Exploring Life
AIM: What is Science?
GOD
and
Science
Chapter 1 - Introduction: Exploring Life
AIM: What is Science?
So is this class really about
science
?
Chapter 1 - Introduction: Exploring Life
AIM: What is Science?
The hierarchy of life,
emergent properties, and
the structure -function
relationship
science
?
3 - Introduction:
The MoleculesExploring
of Cells
Chapter 1
The
Scientific
Life Study of Life
Howdoisorganisms
all life
AIM:
build/break
macromolecules?
AIM:How
What
are
theunited?
major
characteristics
of life?