30 FOR TOK: IB BIOLOGY: THE THINKING BEHIND SUBJECT

What is life? Biology has been asking that question for centuries and has not yet produced a definitive answer. This book explores what the discipline has learned in the attempt, and what those limits reveal about the nature of biological knowledge. 30 For 30 TOK: IB Biology is the fourteenth book in the 30 For 30 TOK series, which pairs thirty IB diploma subjects with thirty searching questions about the nature of the knowledge it produces. This volume focuses on the IB Biology course, asking questions about definition, classification, model-building, and the ethical implications of a science that is increasingly capable of altering the very phenomena it studies. From the contested definition of the gene to the philosophical challenges of evolutionary theory, from the implications of epigenetics for the nature-nurture distinction to the ethical questions raised by CRISPR and synthetic biology, the thirty questions in this book press on what biological knowledge is and what it is becoming. Sample responses model what careful, nuanced engagement with biological thinking and its foundations looks like in practice. Designed for IB Biology students, teachers, TOK educators, and anyone fascinated by what it means to be alive and how science comes to know something so complex.

Pages: 219, Paperback, Independently published