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The history of science is the study of the historical development of science and scientific knowledge, including

both the natural sciencesand social sciences. (The history of the arts and humanities is termed as the history of
scholarship.) From the 18th century through late 20th century, the history of science, especially of the physical and
biological sciences, was often presented in a progressive narrative in which true theories replaced false beliefs.
[1]

More recent historical interpretations, such as those of Thomas Kuhn, tend to portray the history of science in

more nuanced terms, such as that of competing paradigms or conceptual systems in a wider matrix that includes
intellectual, cultural, economic and political themes outside of science. [2]
Science is a body of empirical, theoretical, and practical knowledge about the natural world, produced by scientists
who emphasize the observation, explanation, and prediction of real world phenomena. Historiography of science, in
contrast, often draws on the historical methods of both intellectual history and social history. However, the English
word scientist is relatively recentfirst coined by William Whewell in the 19th century. Previously, people
investigating nature called themselves natural philosophers.
While empirical investigations of the natural world have been described since classical antiquity (for example,
by Thales, Aristotle, and others), and scientific methods have been employed since the Middle Ages (for example,
by Ibn al-Haytham, and Roger Bacon), the dawn of modern science is often traced back to the early modern
period and in particular to the scientific revolution that took place in 16th- and 17th-century Europe. Scientific
methods are considered to be so fundamental to modern science that some consider earlier inquiries into nature to
be pre-scientific.[3] Traditionally, historians of science have defined science sufficiently broadly to include those
inquiries.[4]

The history of biology traces the study of the living world from ancient to modern times. Although the concept
of biology as a single coherent field arose in the 19th century, the biological sciences emerged from traditions of
medicine and natural historyreaching back to ayurveda, ancient Egyptian medicine and the works
of Aristotle and Galen in the ancient Greco-Roman world. This ancient work was further developed in the Middle
Ages by Muslim physicians and scholars such as Avicenna. During the European Renaissance and early modern
period, biological thought was revolutionized in Europe by a renewed interest inempiricism and the discovery of
many novel organisms. Prominent in this movement were Vesalius and Harvey, who used experimentation and
careful observation in physiology, and naturalists such as Linnaeus and Buffon who began to classify the diversity of
life and the fossil record, as well as the development and behavior of organisms. Microscopy revealed the previously
unknown world of microorganisms, laying the groundwork for cell theory. The growing importance of natural
theology, partly a response to the rise of mechanical philosophy, encouraged the growth of natural history (although
it entrenched the argument from design).
Over the 18th and 19th centuries, biological sciences such as botany and zoology became increasingly
professional scientific disciplines. Lavoisier and other physical scientists began to connect the animate and
inanimate worlds through physics and chemistry. Explorer-naturalists such as Alexander von Humboldt investigated
the interaction between organisms and their environment, and the ways this relationship depends on geography
laying the foundations for biogeography, ecology andethology. Naturalists began to reject essentialism and consider

the importance of extinction and the mutability of species. Cell theory provided a new perspective on the
fundamental basis of life. These developments, as well as the results from embryologyand paleontology, were
synthesized in Charles Darwin's theory of evolution by natural selection. The end of the 19th century saw the fall
of spontaneous generation and the rise of the germ theory of disease, though the mechanism
of inheritance remained a mystery.
In the early 20th century, the rediscovery of Mendel's work led to the rapid development of genetics by Thomas Hunt
Morgan and his students, and by the 1930s the combination of population genetics and natural selection in the "neoDarwinian synthesis". New disciplines developed rapidly, especially after Watson and Crick proposed the structure
of DNA. Following the establishment of the Central Dogma and the cracking of the genetic code, biology was largely
split between organismal biologythe fields that deal with whole organisms and groups of organismsand the
fields related to cellular and molecular biology. By the late 20th century, new fields
like genomics and proteomics were reversing this trend, with organismal biologists using molecular techniques, and
molecular and cell biologists investigating the interplay between genes and the environment, as well as the genetics
of natural populations of organisms.

Biology is a natural science concerned with the study of life and living organisms, including their structure, function,
growth,evolution, distribution, and taxonomy.[1] Modern biology is a vast and eclectic field, composed of
many branches and subdisciplines. However, despite the broad scope of biology, there are certain general and
unifying concepts within it that govern all study and research, consolidating it into single, coherent fields. In general,
biology recognizes the cell as the basic unit of life, genes as the basic unit of heredity, and evolution as the engine
that propels the synthesis and creation of newspecies. It is also understood today that all organisms survive by
consuming and transforming energy and by regulating their internal environment to maintain a stable and vital
condition.
Subdisciplines of biology are defined by the scale at which organisms are studied, the kinds of organisms studied,
and the methods used to study them: Biochemistry examines the rudimentary chemistry of life; molecular
biology studies the complex interactions among biological molecules; botany studies the biology of plants; cellular
biology examines the basic building-block of all life, the cell; physiology examines the physical and chemical
functions of tissues, organs, and organ systems of an organism; evolutionary biology examines the processes that
produced the diversity of life; and ecology examines how organisms interact in their environment.[2]

The 7 Characteristics of Life:


1. Living Things are Composed of Cells:

Single-cell organisms have everything they need to be self-sufficient.


In multicellular organisms, specialization increases until some cells do only certain things.

2. Living Things Have Different Levels of Organization:

Both molecular and cellular organization.


Living things must be able to organize simple substances into complex ones.

Living things organize cells at several levels:

Tissue - a group of cells that perform a common function.


Organ - a group of tissues that perform a common function.
Organ system - a group of organs that perform a common function.
Organism - any complete living thing.

3. Living Things Use Energy:

Living things take in energy and use it for maintenance and growth.

4. Living Things Respond To Their Environment:

Living things will make changes in response to a stimulus in their environment.


A behavior is a complex set of responses.

5. Living Things Grow:

Cell division - the orderly formation of new cells.


Cell enlargement - the increase in size of a cell. Cells grow to a certain size and then divide.
An organism gets larger as the number of its cells increases.

6. Living Things Reproduce:

Reproduction is not essential for the survival of individual organisms, but must occur for a
species to survive.
All living things reproduce in one of the following ways:
Asexual repoduction - Producing offspring without the use of gametes.
Sexual reproduction - Producing offspring by the joining of sex cells.

7. Living Things Adapt To Their Environment:

Adaptations are traits giving an organism an advantage in a certain environment.

Variation of individuals is important for a healthy species.

Questions:
1. Do all living things have all of the characteristics of life? If your answer is no,
give an example.
2. Name some non-living thing that uses energy.
3. Name some non-living thing that grows.

1.LivingThingsareComposedofCells
AsisdefinedinCellTheory,thecellistheunitofstructure,physiology,andorganizationinlivingthings.Everylife
formbeginswithonecell.

2.LivingThingsHaveDifferentLevelsofCellularOrganization
Throughtheprocessofcelldivisionwithinorganisms,theprocessof"differentiation"occurs.Thismeansthatcells
willbegintochange,or"differ."fromoneanotherandeachcelltypewillperformdifferent"jobs"suchasskincells,
braincells,nervecells,etc.

3.LivingThingsUseEnergy
Allorganismsmusthaveametabolicsystemwhichprovidesthemwiththeenergytoperformdifferenttasks.Plants
generallyobtainenergyfromthesunthroughtheprocessofphotosynthesis,whileanimalsingestfoodforenergy
production.

4.LivingThingsAreHomeostatic
Homeostasisisthestableregulationofanorganism'sinternalstate.Alivingorganismcontrolsthingslike
temperature,heartbeat,andhydration.Somescientistsconsiderhomeostasistobeasubcharacteristictoenergyuse.

5.LivingThingsRespondtoTheirEnvironment
Livingorganismsexhibit"behavior,"whichisinitsmostbasicformasetofresponsestovariousexternalstimuli.
Forexample,certainplantsmayturntheirleavestowardsthesuntobetterobtainenergy.Likewise,animalswill
contractawayfromasourceofpain..

6.LivingThingsGrow
Alllivingorganismsgrowandchange.Theyincreaseinsizethroughoneoftwomethodscelldivisionandcell
enlargement.Celldivisioniswhencellsdividetoformnew,identicalcells.Asthenumberofcellsincreases,the
organism'soverallsizeincreases.Cellenlargementoccurswhenthesizeoftheindividualcellsthemselvesincrease.

7.LivingThingsReproduceorHaveDNA
Alllivingorganismsmustbeabletoreproduceinordertoensurethesurvivaloftheirrespectivespecies.
Reproductionmaybeasexual(fromasingleparentorganism)orsexual(fromtwoparentorganisms).
Thischaracteristicusedtostateonlythat"livingthingsreproduce."Itbecameapparant,though,thatthereare
exceptionstoeveryrule.Themostoftencitedexceptiontothisrulewasthemule!Mulesarethesterileoffspringofa
donkeyandahorse.Twomules,therefore,cannotmateandreproducethemseleves.However,mulesareindeed
livingcreatures.ThischaracteristicthereforehasbeenadaptedtoincludethepresenceofDNA.

8.LivingThingsMove
Alllivingthingsarecapableofsomedegreeoflocomotion.Thismaybewalkingandrunningforanimals,orthe
simplemovementofaplant'sleavesthroughouttheday.Onthesimplestlevel,thischaracteristicapplieseventothe
movementofcellswithinalivingorganism.

9.LivingThingsAdapttoTheirEnvironment
Theabilityofaspeciestosurviveandthriveisdependentuponorganismsbeingabletoadapttochangesintheir
environment.Theprocessofevolution,infact,canbeboileddownsimplytotheprocessofchangethroughtimein
responsetoenvironmentalchange.

10.LivingThingsDie
Thisisprettyselfexplanatory.Therecomesatimeinthelifecycleofallorganismswhentheydieceasetoexhibit
thecharacteristicsoflifenotedinItems19above.

Abiotic factors are nonliving components. They are chemical and geological factors such as rocks or minerals. Biotic
factors include all living organisms that interact with each other and the abiotic factors.

The scientific method is a body of techniques for investigating phenomena, acquiring new knowledge, or
correcting and integrating previous knowledge.[1] To be termed scientific, a method of inquiry must be based
on empirical and measurable evidence subject to specific principles of reasoning.[2] The Oxford English
Dictionary defines the scientific method as "a method or procedure that has characterized natural science since the
17th century, consisting in systematic observation, measurement, and experiment, and the formulation, testing, and
modification of hypotheses."[3]
The chief characteristic which distinguishes the scientific method from other methods of acquiring knowledge is that
scientists seek to letreality speak for itself, supporting a theory when a theory's predictions are confirmed and
challenging a theory when its predictions prove false. Although procedures vary from one field of inquiry to another,
identifiable features distinguish scientific inquiry from other methods of obtaining knowledge. Scientific researchers
propose hypotheses as explanations of phenomena and design experimentalstudies to test these hypotheses via
predictions which can be derived from them. These steps must be repeatable to guard against mistake or confusion
in any particular experimenter. Theories that encompass wider domains of inquiry may bind many independently
derived hypotheses together in a coherent, supportive structure. Theories, in turn, may help form new hypotheses or
place groups of hypotheses into context.
Scientific inquiry is intended to be as objective as possible in order to minimize bias. Another basic expectation is
the documentation,archiving and sharing of all data collected or produced and of the methodologies used so they
may be available for careful scrutiny and attempts by other scientists to reproduce and verify them. This practice,
known as full disclosure, also means that statistical measures of their reliability may be made.

The scientific method is a way to ask and answer scientific questions by making observations and doing
experiments.

The steps of the scientific method are to:


o

Ask a Question

Do Background Research

Construct a Hypothesis

Test Your Hypothesis by Doing an Experiment

Analyze Your Data and Draw a Conclusion

Communicate Your Results

It is important for your experiment to be a fair test. A "fair test" occurs when you change only one factor (variable)
and keep all other conditions the same.

While scientists study how nature works, engineers create new things, such as products, websites, environments,
and experiences.
o

If your project involves creating or inventing something new, your project might better fit the steps of The
Engineering Design Process.

If you are not sure if your project is a scientific or engineering project, you should read Comparing the
Engineering Design Process and the Scientific Method.

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