A brief and engaging tour of how life scientists form hypotheses, design experiments, analyze data, and draw conclusions in carrying out good science. Drawing on experiments from classic and modern biology, the authors compose a masterful picture of biology as a dynamic field ripe for a new generation of investigators.

Table of Contents

aeo Biology as a Process of Inquiry aeo The Nature and Logic of Science aeo The Nature and Logic of Science: Testing Hypotheses aeo Doing Biology: Three Case Studies aeo The Social Context of Science: The Interaction of Science and Society Appendix 1 The Analysis and Interpretation of Data Appendix 2 Exercises for Critical Thinking: Possib

Author Biography

Garland E. Allen, Ph.D. (Harvard University) is professor of biology at Washington University in St. Louis where he has taught introductory biology to majors and non--majors for over 25 years. He has also taught at Harvard University and has been the Sarton Lecturer at the AAAS. He is the author of T.H. Morgan, the Man and His Science, Life Science in the Twentieth Century, and co--author with Jeffrey J.W. Baker of The Study of Biology, a series of basic biology texts for college and university students. He is presently serving as co--editor of the Journal of the History of Biology. Dr. Allen is an expert on the history of genetics and the misuse of genetics that resulted in the eugenics movement in the early twentieth century. He lectures to scientific and general audiences and has been involved in teaching courses at the Marine Biological Laboratory in Woods Hole, Massachusettes, where he served as a trustee for eight years, and at the Jackson Laboratory in Bar Harbor, Maine. Jeffrey J.W. Baker taught for many years at Wesleyan University in Middletown, Connecticut and has held faculty positions at Washington University in St. Louis, The George Washington University, the University of Puerto Rico, and the University of Virginia. Professor Baker is the author or co--author with Dr. Allen of more than a doozen books in the biological sciences, a book on the American Civil War, and two science--related childrena s books, one of which was selected by the New York Times Book Review as one of the ten best of the year. He has written extensively concerning modern day conflicts between science and religion and was invited to present his views at the Pontifical Academy of Science in the Vatican. Now retired from teaching but still actively writing and lecturing, Professor Baker divides his time between residences in central Virginia and the Island of Vieques, Puerto Rico.