BIOC 201 QUESTIONS WITH CORRECT
ANSWERS
1.1 Defining life as "a system that is energy utilizing, self-replicating, and capable of
Darwinian evolution" is internally redundant because ✔✔a system that is capable of
Darwinian evolution is already defined as self-replicating, and must be energy utilizing
to affect its own replication.
1.2 Science, like any discipline, is rooted in certain axiomatic assumptions. We talked
about several important "first principles" and one of them was: ✔✔Relational properties
which give rise to cause and effect
1.3 A hypothesis must be capable of being ✔✔experimentally tested and invalidated.
1.4 The process of reasoning through linked consequential statements where a
conclusion is made based on assumed premises is called: ✔✔deduction
1.5 Evolution is fundamentally about the progression of lower life forms into higher
ones. ✔✔False
1.6 The evolutionary model gives us ✔✔a way of linking different species through
lineages developed by natural selection, a fundamentally directionless process itself.
1.7 What are the main elements from which life is composed? ✔✔Nitrogen, carbon,
hydrogen, oxygen, sulfur, and phosphorus
1.8 If two equally electronegative atoms are joined to form a molecule, then the covalent
bond that is formed will be ✔✔nonpolar.
1.9 In an electrically neutral atom ✔✔the number of electrons is the same as the atomic
number.
1.10 What are the mass numbers of C, H, N, O ? ✔✔12, 1, 14, 16
2.1 Why are atoms so small? ✔✔To get the same level of constancy of outputs from
biological systems with constituent parts larger than atoms would require an
astronomical size for living things. This size would be disproportionate to the size of the
environment and the parts that make up the system would be incapable of random
(diffusive) movement.
, Atoms are the inputs for the Square Root of n Law, so actual error associated with a
response gets smaller as n gets larger. The smallness of atoms at 10e-10 m permits
billions of atoms to contribute to the n value.
If they were not small then the determinacy of biological activities would not be
continuously precise. Living things are great averaging machines that need a very large
'n' to behave in a directed and predictable fashion.
2.2 In the first chapter of What is Life? Schrodinger suggests that life differs from
ordinary matter principally in its ✔✔complexity
2.3 If a chemical reaction is reversible, then ✔✔it must eventually reach chemical
equilibrium.
2.4 Consider the reversible following biological reaction:
A-P-P-P <======>A-P + P-P
If P-P is degraded to P + P in another reaction, then the original reaction above will be
driven toward the production of ✔✔A-P + P-P
2.5 In Miller's experiment what conditions favor the formation of amino acids? ✔✔a
reducing atmosphere
2.6 Miller has an unchecked assumption in his experiment for which he failed to develop
an appropriate control. His unguarded assumption is _______________, and he could
have used a control which_____________. ✔✔that the apparatus is sterile and stays
sterile; checks for the presence of microbes in the apparatus at the experiment's
conclusion.
2.7 A solution with a low pH is more ______________ than a solution with a high pH.
✔✔acidic
2.8 A buffer will ✔✔keep the pH of a solution at a fixed pH
2.9 If table salt is placed into water, he constituent atoms become ions. Oxygens in
water molecules will align their 2 lone pairs around sodium. If 1026 water molecules are
in hydration shells how many, at any given moment, do not have their oxygens aimed at
the metal ion? ✔✔10e13
2.10 If the valence shell of an atom has seven electrons, its diatomic form is likely to
✔✔form a biologically toxic gas.
ANSWERS
1.1 Defining life as "a system that is energy utilizing, self-replicating, and capable of
Darwinian evolution" is internally redundant because ✔✔a system that is capable of
Darwinian evolution is already defined as self-replicating, and must be energy utilizing
to affect its own replication.
1.2 Science, like any discipline, is rooted in certain axiomatic assumptions. We talked
about several important "first principles" and one of them was: ✔✔Relational properties
which give rise to cause and effect
1.3 A hypothesis must be capable of being ✔✔experimentally tested and invalidated.
1.4 The process of reasoning through linked consequential statements where a
conclusion is made based on assumed premises is called: ✔✔deduction
1.5 Evolution is fundamentally about the progression of lower life forms into higher
ones. ✔✔False
1.6 The evolutionary model gives us ✔✔a way of linking different species through
lineages developed by natural selection, a fundamentally directionless process itself.
1.7 What are the main elements from which life is composed? ✔✔Nitrogen, carbon,
hydrogen, oxygen, sulfur, and phosphorus
1.8 If two equally electronegative atoms are joined to form a molecule, then the covalent
bond that is formed will be ✔✔nonpolar.
1.9 In an electrically neutral atom ✔✔the number of electrons is the same as the atomic
number.
1.10 What are the mass numbers of C, H, N, O ? ✔✔12, 1, 14, 16
2.1 Why are atoms so small? ✔✔To get the same level of constancy of outputs from
biological systems with constituent parts larger than atoms would require an
astronomical size for living things. This size would be disproportionate to the size of the
environment and the parts that make up the system would be incapable of random
(diffusive) movement.
, Atoms are the inputs for the Square Root of n Law, so actual error associated with a
response gets smaller as n gets larger. The smallness of atoms at 10e-10 m permits
billions of atoms to contribute to the n value.
If they were not small then the determinacy of biological activities would not be
continuously precise. Living things are great averaging machines that need a very large
'n' to behave in a directed and predictable fashion.
2.2 In the first chapter of What is Life? Schrodinger suggests that life differs from
ordinary matter principally in its ✔✔complexity
2.3 If a chemical reaction is reversible, then ✔✔it must eventually reach chemical
equilibrium.
2.4 Consider the reversible following biological reaction:
A-P-P-P <======>A-P + P-P
If P-P is degraded to P + P in another reaction, then the original reaction above will be
driven toward the production of ✔✔A-P + P-P
2.5 In Miller's experiment what conditions favor the formation of amino acids? ✔✔a
reducing atmosphere
2.6 Miller has an unchecked assumption in his experiment for which he failed to develop
an appropriate control. His unguarded assumption is _______________, and he could
have used a control which_____________. ✔✔that the apparatus is sterile and stays
sterile; checks for the presence of microbes in the apparatus at the experiment's
conclusion.
2.7 A solution with a low pH is more ______________ than a solution with a high pH.
✔✔acidic
2.8 A buffer will ✔✔keep the pH of a solution at a fixed pH
2.9 If table salt is placed into water, he constituent atoms become ions. Oxygens in
water molecules will align their 2 lone pairs around sodium. If 1026 water molecules are
in hydration shells how many, at any given moment, do not have their oxygens aimed at
the metal ion? ✔✔10e13
2.10 If the valence shell of an atom has seven electrons, its diatomic form is likely to
✔✔form a biologically toxic gas.
