General Thoughts: Biology (6 Viewers)

[catalyst91]

I picked up on a trend about 2 weeks ago for this. Learnt skills and whatnot as much as I could, and went into class and stuff to get a further understanding of most of it. So glad I did. I just had a feeling the majority of the paper would focus on it.

Y u no tell us

 

[-Jonny]

daaang.... I see where u r coming from... cmon srsly I spent less than 10 seconds on that question, all i saw was "rapid periods of change" and I selected it LOL

That's actually what put me off picking C. It was the last question of the test I did actually because I had to keep on coming back to it. I didn't pick C because it had the basic definition of punctuated equilibrium, and I was sure that was a trick

 

[-Jonny]

Y u no tell us

y u no ask

 

[bigbirdbanana]

The diagrams were pretty standard imo. The data logger is in the skills section, whether you used it or not, it's there.

Tbh, no one from my school even knew this skills section existed! We were given a copy of the syllabus for each module and i thought that was all we had to know :S I'm really annoyed about the data logger thing, because we never used, or even discussed it! It's just frustrating when you spend so much time studying what you think is the whole course, only to be assessed on something else.

 

[packwolf]

The rise to the the idea of punctuated equilibrium is because of the incomplete transitional fossils; ie there aren't really any fossils that show a "transitional" state. (Even the archaeopteryx was shown not to be a transitional fossil just recently).

Now the question "How does the fossil record provide evidence?", it provides evidences through contradiction, so due to the lack of fossils that show transitioning between to species (what we would expect in Darwinian theory) we can conclude that punctuated equilibrium is more likely.

Have a look at this:
http://evolution.berkeley.edu/evosite/evo101/VIIA1bPunctuated.shtml
"No preservation: No fossils representing transitional forms are preserved because of their relatively small population size, the rapid pace of change, and their isolated location"

This is saying that no transitional fossils would have been preserved so therefore "The fossil record shows that there are short periods of rapid change in fossil forms" is incorrect as there is no transitional fossils to show rapid change. The fossil record only proves that there are long periods of "stasis" (no transitioning).

If the multiple choice had said ""The fossil record shows that there are long periods of stasis in fossil forms" then this would be correct.
Therefore this leaves A to be most correct, it shows evidence for punctuated equilibrium by having the fossil record incomplete. (incomplete meaning there is a lack of transitional fossils)

The whole idea of punctuated equilibrium was an attempted excuse to explain the lack of transitional fossils, not because there was several fossils found within a short time that showed rapid change from one species to another (and as explained above if this did occur we wouldn't have been able to discover them).

If i need to explain further just ask

I went through the same thought process as you during the exam but i decided C because lack of evidence is not evidence.

 

[catalyst91]

y u no ask

Touche

QUOTE=bigbirdbanana;5556279]Tbh, no one from my school even knew this skills section existed! We were given a copy of the syllabus for each module and i thought that was all we had to know :S I'm really annoyed about the data logger thing, because we never used, or even discussed it! It's just frustrating when you spend so much time studying what you think is the whole course, only to be assessed on something else.[/QUOTE]

Yeah I'm in the same boat..

 

[erob]

What stuff did people talk about in the last 7 marker question?
- I talked about how biological advancements in identifying cause of disease (Pasteur/Koch) allowed treatments to be developed such as antibiotics (first developed by Fleming - penicillin) --> overall better health for society.
- Then I talked about Beadle/Tatum and their 'one gene-one polypeptide' hypothesis and how this proved that the mutation of a gene causes different proteins to be produced and therefore different alleles --> new traits. Thus, by irradiating the fungus, the new traits are beneficial for society as it can cure bacterial diseases.
- Then I bs'd the rest about enzymes...
I wasn't exactly sure how to explain the enzyme stuff it gave, but I tried anyway.

I can't even remember anything I wrote - something about how the knowledge of biological processes has led to the development of medical phenomena (antibiotics and vaccinations) and implications on society are antibiotic resistance and the gradual increase in prevalence of viral diseases due to a decrease in children being vaccined against pertussis etc. Pretty much bullshitted, probably lost marks there.

 

[Midnight_Lotus]

I went through the same thought process as you during the exam but i decided C because lack of evidence is not evidence.

Indeed, but there is absolutely no evidence that shows rapid change in the fossil record, so even though lack of evidence doesn't really equate to evidence, it was the "most" correct answer (gotta hate that :\ )

 

[Riproot]

Re: 2011 HSC Biology Paper

Question 8, the board will accept both Killer and Cytotoxic. I emailed them, and you can too if you don't believe me.

Print screen and post?

 

[iAmCurium96]

http://news.boardofstudies.nsw.edu.au/index.cfm/2011/10/28/HSC-Biology-exam-question-8

 

[bigbirdbanana]

The thing with the punctuated equilibrium question is that the answers were sort of vague; because c) said 'The fossil record shows that there are periods of rapid change in fossil forms', which there are (it doesn't say that we see the transitional forms, but just that there is a rapid change in them). I think a) will probably end up being the correct answer, but i just don't think that their wording is helping to figure out which students actually know their stuff.

Also, that question isn't even from the syllabus. The dot point is: 'describe the concept of punctuated equilibrium in evolution and how it differs from the gradual process proposed by Darwin', it never refers to needing to see/understand the evidence for it - some textbooks don't even cover this. I know that my arguments won't change anything but i just want to express my rage haha.

 

[Riproot]

Re: 2011 HSC Biology Paper

Riproot brah - Q4 multiple choice was C, not A
Think about it, why would they use the word "ALL" -- why bother making emphasis on this?
Remember, a chromosome is DNA wrapped around histone proteins, hence the answer is C not A.
19/20 for u lol thats pretty beast
I'm confident that I got 20/20 for multiple choice. BUt every single mother fucking question after that I fucked up..... predicting low 80's aligned HSC mark for me -- shoulda done past papers rather than notes.... =(

I know! I knew the answer too but I got confused and put the wrong one! /wrists
I know!!!
Not really. I was going for 20/20(the usual) I'm usually better at bio. This test in general was a complete let down. :/
I'm predicting:
19/20
46-49/55
15-19/25
I can't believe I screwed up communication so much, it used to be my best topic!!! /wrists

 

[darkccc]

Well this is what the excel book (the one with all the syllabus dotpoints) has to say about the punctuated equilibrium question: (ByDiane Alford & Jennifer Hill)

The concept of punctuated equilibrium and how it differs from Darwin's views: (pg 55)
This equilibrium may last millions of years but may be punctuated... by rapid evolutionary change. In evolutionary terms, 'rapid' means thousands of years. The concept of punctuated equilibrium helps partly explain why the fossil record is incomplete. If evolutionary change happens in a short time span, then the intermediate forms would not be around long enough to be apparent in the fossil record and it becomes almost impossible to pinpoint this change in ancient layers of rock.

 

[germo]

hmm... investigation on question 8 already taking place. I ticked cytotoxic T cells though.
http://news.boardofstudies.nsw.edu.au/index.cfm/2011/10/28/HSC-Biology-exam-question-8

 

[word123]

Something was wrong with our papers and we had to wait 20mins for them to photocopy a faxed version of the exam. Did anybody else have a major change on the exam????
annoying sitting in a room for 3 and a half hours and then an hour later sitting economics.

 

[catalyst91]

Something was wrong with our papers and we had to wait 20mins for them to photocopy a faxed version of the exam. Did anybody else have a major change on the exam????
annoying sitting in a room for 3 and a half hours and then an hour later sitting economics.

Wow that's shit!
Well having Bio and Eco on the same day is shit by itself, that just makes it so much worse haha.

 

[musicana]

So ridiculous! Found it really hard - bad wording, really specific, tested such a small amount of the syllabus. 7marker for Biotech wasn't even in syllabus (DNA extraction, NOT enzyme).

What was q28 a? About gene expression in skin stem cells is linked to the maintenance of health after the skin is borken?

Ugh worst exam ever.
BOS is investigating into how they messed up q8 btw - cytotoxic and killer T cells are largely the same thing '-.- 2 answers.

 

[2011_]

Re: 2011 HSC Biology Paper

Q4 is C or B (I forget) It says it in one of mah text books. Can't be D because Genes=DNA so that would be redundant to have DNA+Genes.
Q20 is C because punctuated equilibrium is the rapid change in evolution (learned this morning. lol)
Q1 is B. So obvious. All the others are pretty stupid answers (no offence).

Q4 is C I think, I had Q1 as B and Q20 I had C.

 

[brachester]

So ridiculous! Found it really hard - bad wording, really specific, tested such a small amount of the syllabus. 7marker for Biotech wasn't even in syllabus (DNA extraction, NOT enzyme).

What was q28 a? About gene expression in skin stem cells is linked to the maintenance of health after the skin is borken?

Ugh worst exam ever.
BOS is investigating into how they messed up q8 btw - cytotoxic and killer T cells are largely the same thing '-.- 2 answers.

All of these are in my opinion

You have to talk about the understanding of radiation effects on DNA, how it mutate DNA, change its sequence and thus block the metabolic path hence preven the production of a certain proteins (e.g. enzymes) and ultimately change its cells acitivity. You also have to talk about the specificity of enzyme, how it only affects the pathogenic bacteria not human's body etc.

 

[Dylanamali]

Well this is what the excel book (the one with all the syllabus dotpoints) has to say about the punctuated equilibrium question: (ByDiane Alford & Jennifer Hill)

The concept of punctuated equilibrium and how it differs from Darwin's views: (pg 55)
This equilibrium may last millions of years but may be punctuated... by rapid evolutionary change. In evolutionary terms, 'rapid' means thousands of years. The concept of punctuated equilibrium helps partly explain why the fossil record is incomplete. If evolutionary change happens in a short time span, then the intermediate forms would not be around long enough to be apparent in the fossil record and it becomes almost impossible to pinpoint this change in ancient layers of rock.

gg.. textbooks are contradicting each other =/
who knows which answer is correct then.. I was confident with my answer of C.. but seeing posts it could go either way.