Plants and Civilization
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Spring 2001
Student Web Pages
COURSE DESCRIPTION:
BI 115 (4) [3S] lab and lecture introduces the non-science major
to the impact of plants on the past, present, and future of human
civilization. Topics include the origin of agricultural crops,
plants that changed history, the green revolution, medicinal plants,
supermarket botany, and genetic engineering of plants. Also included
is a brief introduction to plant structure, function, and classification.
OBJECTIVES:
When you successfully complete this course, you will be able to:
- understand enough basic plant biology, especially plant structure,
physiology and taxonomy, to make intelligent decisions as consumers
of plant products (herbivores). You will be asked to make decisions
and to justify your decisions using basic plant biology within
the framework of economic, social, and environmental concerns.
- apply the scientific process to topics in basic plant biology,
ethnobotany, and economic botany. You will be asked to participate
in literature searches, hypothesis formation, data collection,
data analysis, interpretation, report presentation (oral and
written).
- analyze the relationship between plants and people. You will
be asked to investigate how different people use plants throughout
the world and to investigate plants that are important in the
history and religions of people from various cultures.
Basic Botany
Agriculture
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