Biology and enquiry

Science is defined as a systematic process of making enquiry about the living things and non-living things in our environment. The term Biology is coined from two Greek work bios meaning life and Logos meaning study. Therefore Biology is simply defined as study of life i.e. study of living things or Biology is defined as science of life ranging from the unicellular organisms to the study of global interaction among millions of organisms            that forms life. It involves the study of life history of individual organism as well as the collective history of all

Organisms. Biology is broadly divided into two:

(a)        Zoology: which is the study of animal, their behavior, feeding and life history?

(b)        Botany: is the study of different type of plant.

Some other specific aspects of Biology are:

Morphology, Anatomy, Physiology, Genetics, Ecology, Virology, Bacteriology, Microbiology, Taxonomy, Histology, Mycology, Embryology, Evolution e.t.c

SCIENTIFIC PROCESS OR APPROACH

Biology and Inquiry: The knowledge of the nature and the role of inquiry to science. Inquiry in Biology enables us to acquaint ourselves with living things around us in a careful systematic manner. To understand these processes of enquiry, facts must be known through science. The orderly and systematic arrangement of facts is achieved through the process of science or scientific approach.

The scientific approach is a process of science which involves the process of  making sequence of enquiries about an object or thing under study.

Scientific process begins with observation, followed by classification, inference, measurement, identification, hypothesis, experiment, control or conclusion, theory law or principle.

(i)         OBSERVATION: This involves the use of human senses to describe an observation by using the characteristics and properties of material. The observation may  lead to classification then to inference and later to measurement and identification of existing problems.

(ii)        HYPOTHESIS: is defined as a sensible proposal or reasonable assumption or a scientific guess that can be subjected to verification or being tested.

(iii)       EXPERIMENT: is defined as the process used for testing of hypothesis through experimentation during which data are collected. The data collected may lead to the development of new ideas. The process involves in experiment are as follows:

(iv)       AIM: This is the purpose for which the experiment is carried out.

(v)        APPARATUS//MATERIALS: These include the materials that will be used for the experiment.

(vi)       METHOD or PROCEDURE: This is used to describe the details that are required step by step.

(vii)      RESULT: This is the record of what is seen during and after the experiment.

(viii)     CONCLUSION: This is used to finalize the outcome of the whole experiment

The end of the experiment can be used to show whether the hypothesis is true or false. If the subsequent experiments shows that the hypothesis is false, the whole idea or concept of the matter under investigation is then repeated or rejected. But when the hypothesis is true after several repeated experiment it is accepted and becomes a THEORY.

A THEORY is a tested hypothesis that has been confirmed to be true. By the time the theory is extensively tested and proven to be true, it becomes a LAW OR PRINCIPLE