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Monday was the first day of UBN. We started by taking a pre-assessment that I didn't finish and then learning some background information about about biodiversity. We went over the definition itself, as well as the various dimensions of biodiversity -- genetic variety, spatial variety, temporal variety, and functional variety. These are all things that contribute to biodiversity and keep it alive. We also started to discuss the impact of humans on biodiversity, while not delving into urban biodiversity just yet. In particular we talked about the 6th extinction, which scientists believe to be human-caused, unlike the five other natural extinctions. So far I have found the subject of biodiversity to be quite interesting, which surprised me because I was never terribly fond of ecology, to say the least. What is probably holding my attention is that we have been focusing much more so on understanding how things work as a whole than just their definitions. Unfortunately school biology is more focused on the latter.
Sofia J
I dont understand what u mean when u say "we have been focusing on things as a hole" i have only got a pile of definitions out of this course. how ever i think i am going to enjoy the flied work. maybe i need too pay more attention to get this hole broad spectrum thing.............
ReplyDeleteyes i agree people do need to understand what they are learning and not just learn
ReplyDeleteThere are lots of definitions involved but generally they refer to concepts instead of parts of a cell or a protein or some other microscopic thing I don't care about. When learning the definition of a concept, you can't just memorize it, you have to understand it and understand how it applies to various situations, something that I find much more exciting than being able to memorize molecular configurations or obscure sea creatures or whatever.
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