Copyright © 2003 Pearson Education, Inc. publishing as Benjamin Cummings INTRODUCTION THE STUDY OF LIFE

Copyright © 2003 Pearson Education, Inc. publishing as Benjamin Cummings Movement – Capability of moving from place to place or moving some of their parts Responsiveness – Irritability or the reaction of the organism to stimuli Growth – Increase in size Nutrition – Animals feed on organic materials while plants feed on inorganic matter CHARACTERISTICS OF LIFE

Copyright © 2003 Pearson Education, Inc. publishing as Benjamin Cummings Reproduction – Enables the species to multiply and increase in number Excretion – Elimination of waste Definite organization – Organized in a very orderly fashion CHARACTERISTICS OF LIFE

Copyright © 2003 Pearson Education, Inc. publishing as Benjamin Cummings Organisms are made up of: –organ systems –organs –tissues –cells –molecules ECOSYSTEM LEVEL Eucalyptus forest COMMUNITY LEVEL All organisms in eucalyptus forest POPULATION LEVEL Group of flying foxes ORGANISM LEVEL Flying fox ORGAN SYSTEM LEVEL Nervous system ORGAN LEVEL Brain Brain Spinal cord Nerve TISSUE LEVEL Nervous tissue CELLULAR LEVEL Nerve cell MOLECULAR LEVEL Molecule of DNA

Copyright © 2003 Pearson Education, Inc. publishing as Benjamin Cummings Biology is the scientific study of life Interactions between different kinds of organisms affect the lives of all –Recall the example of flying foxes and eucalyptus trees THE SCOPE OF BIOLOGY

Copyright © 2003 Pearson Education, Inc. publishing as Benjamin Cummings In discovery science, scientists describe some aspect of the world and use inductive reasoning to draw general conclusions –Example: scientists have described how newborn flying foxes cling to their mother’s chest for the first weeks of life Scientists use two main approaches to learn about nature THE PROCESS OF SCIENCE

Copyright © 2003 Pearson Education, Inc. publishing as Benjamin Cummings In hypothesis-driven science, scientists use the “scientific method” –They propose a hypothesis –They make deductions leading to predictions –They then test the hypothesis by seeing if the predictions come true

Copyright © 2003 Pearson Education, Inc. publishing as Benjamin Cummings The main steps of the scientific method With the scientific method, we pose and test hypotheses Observation Question Hypothesis Prediction Test: Experiment or additional observation Test does not support hypothesis; revise hypothesis or pose new one Test supports hypothesis; make additional predictions and test them

Copyright © 2003 Pearson Education, Inc. publishing as Benjamin Cummings Experiments designed to test hypotheses must be controlled experiments Control groups must be tested along with experimental groups for the meaning of the results to be clear

Copyright © 2003 Pearson Education, Inc. publishing as Benjamin Cummings TWO MAIN DIVISION Zoology – study of animals Botany – study of plants BRANCHES OF BIOLOGY

Copyright © 2003 Pearson Education, Inc. publishing as Benjamin Cummings MAJOR FIELDS Taxonomy – science of grouping and naming organism Morphology – deals with the forms and structure of organism Embryology – deals with the development of organism BRANCHES OF BIOLOGY

Copyright © 2003 Pearson Education, Inc. publishing as Benjamin Cummings MAJOR FIELDS Physiology – deals with functions and activities of organism Genetics – deals with the transmission of traits and characters Ecology – deals with the interrelationships of living things in their environment BRANCHES OF BIOLOGY

Copyright © 2003 Pearson Education, Inc. publishing as Benjamin Cummings MAJOR FIELDS Biogeography – deals with the distribution of the organisms on the earth’s surface Evolution – deals with the origin of life and living forms BRANCHES OF BIOLOGY