Biology & physiology
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Assignment requested deadline November 12; NLT 10pm. Please read below for information concerning assignment. Support responses with examples and use APA formatting in the paper. You may access the school’s website by logging into:
https://mycampus.southuniversity.edu/portal/server.pt
Please note that when you log into the website you must click launch class, and on the next screen click syllabus to view this week’s readings (weeks 1) and Academic Resources to access the school’s library.
To support your work, use the textbook, lectures and scholarly outside sources. As in all assignments, cite your sources in your work and provide references for the citations in APA format.
Please take in consideration the “Hints from the Doc” below to achieve the best score possible.
Hints from the Doc:
Class, this assignment is fairly straight forward so there are not a lot of loose ends for me to cover to help you. I do find that it helps if you pick two specific things (one living and one never living) that you can look at or hold directly and compare to the lists of properties and characteristics of life we cover this week in the text and lecture.
Students tend to get into trouble on this one when they do not pick specific examples and when they do not compare them for all the characteristics of life described in our text and lecture. Short answers are also a problem. For some reason some students try to get by with the least amount of information as possible. This is not a winning strategy. I have to grade you based on the breadth and depth of understanding you display relative to the assignment. Short answers don’t give you enough verbal space to that and generally wind up with very poor grades.
By Saturday, November 12, 2016, respond to both of the discussion questions listed.
Discussion Question I
Question 1: Properties of life and recognizing living and nonliving things
Consider the properties and characteristics of life. Choose two items (one of which is alive or has been alive and one which has never been alive). Compare and contrast their characteristics. What characteristics do they share and how are they different. Be prepared to discuss the importance of the various characteristics of living things and how their combination makes life an emergent part of the universe.
Discussion Question II
Question 2: Thinking as a scientist, designing research
Consider the process by which scientists think through information and solve problems and how this is similar and different to how nonscientists approach the world. Consider a small problem that is solvable scientifically. Describe the process you would go through in solving that problem. Be prepared to discuss the significance of the scientific approach to the development and advancement of human knowledge
SAMPLE ANSWER
Discussion Question 1: Properties of life & recognizing living from non-living things
An object is considered to be alive if it possesses the following properties of life. The first property is order. All living things have complex and ordered organization in their system. Secondly, a living organism has the ability to adjust its internal environment in order to maintain it within the important limits. For instance, during cold season, a whale is able to regulate its body temperature to limits that will sustain its survival. Living things have the ability to grow and develop. The carry coded information in form of DNA which regulates its growth and development pattern (Robertson, 2016).
Energy processing ability is another property of live. Living organism takes in energy and applies it to perform their daily living activities. Their energy levels are emitted as heat. For instance, a dog obtains its energy by from eating meat, and the energy is used to power its activity such as running and panting. When performing these activities, the dog emits body heat continuously. Living things also have the capacity to respond to the environment stimuli. For instance, if a dog steps on hot surface, it will remove its limb immediately and/or even run away. Similarly, insect feeding plants such as Venus fly trap close its leaves when an insect gets into contact with its sensory hairs. Living things have the capacity for reproduction. They reproduce living things of their own make. Lastly, the reproduction underlies the capacity of the population to evolve over a period of time (Simon, Dickey, Reece, & Hogan, 2016).
Although these seven properties of life are used to differentiate living things from non-living things, some nonliving things do possess some these properties. For instance, motor vehicles have complex fuel and exhaust system; it responds to environmental stimuli, uses energy to perform its activities and emits heat to the atmosphere. In addition, the manufacturings of motor vehicles have evolved from the steam engines, coal, carbon products and most recently, electric vehicles. However, they do not grow, lack DNA and cannot reproduce (they are manufactured); thus, they are nonliving entities. On the other hand, a bacteria is a living entity because it have cells that carryout metabolism, maintains its internal environment within the required limits, and have the ability reproduce organisms of their kind. The concept of bacteria resistance is an indicator of how the bacteria have continued to evolve. Despite its size, bacteria are living entity (Robertson, 2016).
These properties of living things are important and their combination facilitates the ability to live. For instance, all living things feed. The food is processed to provide energy for their daily activities such as movement, growth, development, response to stimuli, respiration and excretion. In addition, the energy is used by living things for reproduction processes, and for developing adaptive responses to the environment (evolution). Therefore, each of the traits plays an integral role that makes the living things to survive in this universe (Robertson, 2016).
Discussion question II Thinking as a scientist, design research
Science is an approach that aids in understanding the worlds nature, based on literature search, explanations and objective answers to research questions. Scientist thoughts are guided by discovery science and hypothesis driven science (Simon, Dickey, Reece, & Hogan, 2016). For instance, as one is preparing her supper, the kitchen lights suddenly go off. You try to switch on the backup generator, but the problem persists. As a nonscientist, one is likely to blame the incidence on supernatural spirits, and one is likely to meditate on the occurrence of this situation. Unlike scientists, the nonscientist approach does not involve formulation of hypothesis, testing it or even trying to solve the problem.
On the other hand, as a scientist, the question that arises immediately is ‘why did the bulb blow up?’ There are dozen explanations to this problem that can be investigated simultaneously including power surge, electricity is lost, or the quality of the kitchen bulb. However, one is likely to focus and test one explanation (based on experience). In this case, the most possible explanation is that the ABG electricity bulb has blown up (where ABG is the brand name). If the incidence have occurred several times in the recent past, then a hypothesis can be formed as follows; the ABG electricity bulb do not last long because they are of low quality. The logical testing process will be as follows (Simon, Dickey, Reece, & Hogan, 2016);
Step 1: Observation – The ABG electricity bulb blow up easily. They do not last more than one month
Step 2: Research Question – The ideal question is ‘what is wrong with the remote?’
Step 3: Formulation of hypothesis
Hypothesis: The ABG electricity bulb do not last long because they are of low quality
Step 4: Prediction
If a replacement of ABG bulbs is done with another brand, then the electricity bulb will last for long
Step 5: Experiment
The ABG electricity bulb is replaced with a new brand. If the new bulb does not last long, then one should formulate another hypothesis and repeat the test, until a satisfactory conclusion to the research question is reached.
From reading this, it is evident that the concept of solving society’s daily challenges is embedded deeply in scientific research method. The significance of solving problems using this approach is that it minimizes influences when solving a problem. This way, it creates an opportunity of developing objective and standardized approaches, which makes one feel confident that the truth will be revealed, and that the issue will be addressed appropriately. This approach is of relevance because the society is bombarded by facts and fiction information from magazines, televisions and website. It is challenging to filter out the truth from the available information’s. However, adopting a culture scientific way of reasoning enables one to test for theoretical facts and to integrate them into reality (Simon, Dickey, Reece, & Hogan, 2016).
References
Robertson, B. (2016). Science 101: Q: How Do We Distinguish Between Living and Nonliving Things? Sci. Child., 053(09) .doi.org/10.2505/4/sc16_053_09_76
Simon, E. J., Dickey, J. L., Reece, J. B., Hogan, K. A. (1–2015). Campbell Essential Biology with Physiology, 5th Edition. [South University]. Retrieved from https://digitalbookshelf.southuniversity.edu/#/books/1323125574/
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