UNIT 1: THE NATURE OF SCIENCE

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UNIT 1 THE NATURE OF SCIENCE
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GOAL OF SCIENCE

• TO EXPLAIN AND UNDERSTAND THE WORLD AROUND US
• TECHNOLOGY USING SCIENTIFIC KNOWLEDGE AND TOOLS
  IN A USEFUL WAY
• CHANGING BODY OF INFORMATION
• OBSERVATIONS ? QUESTIONS ? HYPOTHESIS ?
  EXPERIMENT ? CONCLUSION
• THEORY BEST EXPLANATION SUPPORTED BY MANY
  DIFFERENT EXPERIMENTS ALL LEADING TO THE SAME
  CONCLUSIONS
• LAW SPECIFIC STATEMENT THAT IS TESTED AND IS
  BELIEVED TO BE TRUE THROUGHOUT THE UNIVERSE

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BRANCHES OF SCIENCE

• BIOLOGY
• CHEMISTRY
• PHYSICS
• GEOLOGY
• ASTRONOMY
• METEOROLOGY
• ZOOLOGY
• BOTANY
• PALEONTOLOGY
• ECOLOGY

• ENVIRONMENTAL SCIENCE
• GENETICS
• AERODYNAMICS
• ANATOMY
• PHYSIOLOGY
• MICROBIOLOGY
• ENTOMOLOGY
• FORENSICS
• PATHOLOGY
• FORESTRY

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Observations vs. Inferences

• Observation information directly collected
  using the five senses
• Qualitative describes
• Color, texture, smell
• Quantitative actual measurable number
• Time, distance, amount
• Inference a logical statement based on the
  observations

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SCIENTIFIC METHOD

• State the Problem
• Research
• Form a Hypothesis
• An educated guess
• Testable
• Design an Experiment
• Variable single factor you are testing
• Only test 1 in an experiment
• Control setup without the variable
• Used for comparison

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SCIENTIFIC METHOD

• Record and Analyze Data
• Dependent variable what you measure
• Responding variable
• Independent variable what you are testing
• Manipulated variable
• Form a Conlusion
• Accept or reject hypothesis
• If reject, change hypothesis and repeat
• Tell Scientific Community
• Retest
• Further Testing

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Metric System

• Advantages
• Powers of 10
• Convert by moving decimals
• Universal for all scientist
• Converting Metric to Metric
• Know prefixes kilo- (1,000) hecta- (100)
  deka- (10) base unit (1) deci- (.1) centi-
  (.01) milli- (.001)
• Other prefixes Giga (1 billion), Mega (1
  million), Micro (1 millionth) Nano (1
  billionth)
• Label prefixes on horizontal line, starting with
  kilo on left and go to milli on right
• Start with what you know and count spaces to get
  to what you want to convert it to
• Move decimal same number of places in same
  direction

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Measuring with the Metric System

• Distance
• Base Unit - meters
• Mass the amount of matter in an object
• Base unit - grams
• Weight - force of gravity on an object
• Go into outerspace weight changes, mass does
  not
• Triple beam balance or scale

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Measuring with the Metric System

• Volume amount of space an object takes up
• Base Unit Liter
• Also can be measure in cubic meters, cubic
  centimeters, etc.
• 1 mL 1 cm3
• Graduated Cylinder
• Meniscus curved portion of top of liquid
• Calculate volume of solid L X W X H

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Measuring with the Metric System

• Time
• Base unit seconds
• Not always based on units of 10
• 60 sec in 1 minute 60 min. in 1 hour 24 hours
  in 1 day etc.
• Temperature measure of the average speed of
  molecules
• Heat amount of thermal energy
• Base units degrees celsius or Kelvin
• K oC 273 or oC K - 273
• oC (oF 32) X .5556 or oF (1.8 X oC)
  32
• Absolute Zero coldest temperature possible
• 0 K or -273 oC