Biology is the study of life. That statement seems simple enough. But what exactly is the definition of ''life'', and why would it even matter to me, a non-scientist?
This course will help you better understand the connections, actually the interdependencies, that each of your lives and most of your activities have to biology. Our basis for learning will be understanding biology and the connections between biology and our everyday lives. We will also use biology to learn how science works. Science is simply a formalized way of ''knowing'' that many of us frequently engage in without knowing that we are doing so. As Einstein said, ''The whole of science is nothing more than a refinement of everyday thinking.'' Physics and Reality, 1936
Instead of learning a multitude of obscure yet important facts that would probably be forgotten as soon as the exam is over, our approach will be to understand the ''big picture''. We will not ignore all detail, instead, we will focus on understanding the details that enable us to understand the whole.
We will cover topics like the geological history of the earth, energy transfer in living systems, genetic diversity, evolution and biodiversity, and human activities and their impact on our home, planet Earth. We will also look at how current developments in biological science are rapidly changing many facets of our lives and are pushing the envelope in areas such as food production, medicine, and health care. Of course, there are also the associated philosophical and ethical considerations.
The course is designed with the goal of increasing your understanding of the essentials of biology while helping you to further develop general critical thinking skills. The purpose of this approach is assist you in developing skill in evaluating technical and scientific information. This will equip you with tools to help you be savvy and discerning information consumers in the face of the glut of ''information'' that is part of our daily lives. The result is that you will be better able to separate fact from opinion and therefore become be better informed. Another goal of the course is to assist your development as self-sufficient scholars that know how to collect and evaluate the quality of information you find on any topic that you are interested in -- or perhaps not really interested in, but one that has been assigned.