{"id":12886,"date":"2021-01-18T08:00:00","date_gmt":"2021-01-18T16:00:00","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.scotthyoung.com\/blog\/?p=12886"},"modified":"2021-02-26T00:06:30","modified_gmt":"2021-02-26T08:06:30","slug":"biology","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.scotthyoung.com\/blog\/2021\/01\/18\/biology\/","title":{"rendered":"What&#8217;s the Best Way to Learn Biology?"},"content":{"rendered":"<p>Recently, I\u2019ve had an interest in learning more biology. Some of that curiosity is pandemic-inspired. Biology is playing an outsized role in all of our lives these days.<\/p>\n<p>Yet much of the interest predates our current crisis. As a teenager, I really enjoyed books like <a href=\"https:\/\/www.amazon.com\/Selfish-Gene-Anniversary-Landmark-Science\/dp\/0198788606\/ref=sr_1_1?dchild=1&amp;keywords=selfish+gene&amp;qid=1610658082&amp;sr=8-1\">The Selfish Gene<\/a> and <a href=\"https:\/\/www.amazon.com\/Red-Queen-Evolution-Human-Nature\/dp\/0060556579\/ref=sr_1_3?dchild=1&amp;keywords=the+red+queen&amp;qid=1610658098&amp;sr=8-3\">The Red Queen<\/a>. Evolutionary biology revealing a hidden pattern in the universe.<\/p>\n<div class=\"wp-block-image\">\n<figure class=\"aligncenter size-large\"><a href=\"https:\/\/www.scotthyoung.com\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2021\/01\/biology.png\"><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" width=\"800\" height=\"492\" src=\"https:\/\/www.scotthyoung.com\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2021\/01\/biology.png\" alt=\"Image inspiration from here: https:\/\/www.youtube.com\/watch?v=Rn9sRkkqGT4\" class=\"wp-image-12889\" srcset=\"https:\/\/www.scotthyoung.com\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2021\/01\/biology.png 800w, https:\/\/www.scotthyoung.com\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2021\/01\/biology-300x185.png 300w, https:\/\/www.scotthyoung.com\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2021\/01\/biology-768x472.png 768w\" sizes=\"auto, (max-width: 800px) 100vw, 800px\" \/><\/a><\/figure>\n<\/div>\n<p>Last year, I stumbled across a course in <a href=\"http:\/\/www.weizmann.ac.il\/mcb\/UriAlon\/download\/systems-biology-course-2018\">Systems Biology<\/a> taught by Uri Alon. Biology is often portrayed as something unfathomably complex. Yet this course showed it in a different light\u2014clever systems for performing particular functions.<\/p>\n<div class=\"inline-podcast\">\n<small>Listen to this article<\/small><br \/>\n<iframe loading=\"lazy\" width=\"100%\" height=\"20\" scrolling=\"no\" frameborder=\"no\" allow=\"autoplay\" src=\"https:\/\/w.soundcloud.com\/player\/?url=https%3A\/\/api.soundcloud.com\/tracks\/974470351&#038;color=%23219895&#038;inverse=false&#038;auto_play=false&#038;show_user=true\"><\/iframe>\n<\/div>\n<p>My favorite example involved Type II diabetes. Why do we suffer from this? The answer, it turns out, is a downside of an otherwise ingenious design:<\/p>\n<ul class=\"wp-block-list\">\n<li>Our body needs to maintain stable glucose levels. Too little and our cells run out of energy. Too much, however, is toxic.<\/li>\n<li>Insulin moderates these glucose levels, being produced by the pancreas.<\/li>\n<li>Yet the insulin levels needed per person range by orders of magnitude. How can our cells both produce enough insulin to respond to momentary fluctuations, but also cross the vast ranges long-term?<\/li>\n<li>The answer is that when we need more, our pancreatic cells multiply to accommodate the demand.<\/li>\n<li>But herein lies the problem. With exponential growth, there\u2019s always the chance a cell will mutate and incorrectly sense the glucose levels. If it senses the level is too high (even when it is normal), it will rapidly out-divide the normal-sensing kind. This, in turn, would lead to too much insulin, and kill us.<\/li>\n<li>To prevent out-of-control mutants, then, our body has a safety switch. If a pancreatic cell senses the glucose level is way too high, it assumes something has malfunctioned and the pancreatic cells self-destruct. The problem is that with our modern, sugary diet, this safety value is more likely to accidentally fire and so we end up with more diabetes.<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<div class=\"wp-block-image\">\n<figure class=\"aligncenter size-large\"><a href=\"https:\/\/www.scotthyoung.com\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2021\/01\/diabetes.png\"><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" width=\"600\" height=\"600\" src=\"https:\/\/www.scotthyoung.com\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2021\/01\/diabetes.png\" alt=\"\" class=\"wp-image-12890\" srcset=\"https:\/\/www.scotthyoung.com\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2021\/01\/diabetes.png 600w, https:\/\/www.scotthyoung.com\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2021\/01\/diabetes-300x300.png 300w, https:\/\/www.scotthyoung.com\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2021\/01\/diabetes-150x150.png 150w\" sizes=\"auto, (max-width: 600px) 100vw, 600px\" \/><\/a><\/figure>\n<\/div>\n<p>Biology is full of interesting designs like this. The <a href=\"https:\/\/www.coursera.org\/specializations\/immunology\">immune system<\/a> is another. How do you create a system that can recognize any possible foreign invader, but ignore all of your own cells? The answer is ingenious, yet comprehensible.<\/p>\n<h2 class=\"wp-block-heading\">Exploring The Spaceship<\/h2>\n<p>Bert Hubert provides <a href=\"https:\/\/berthub.eu\/articles\/posts\/immune-system\/\">the perfect analogy<\/a> for describing why biology ought to be fascinating:<\/p>\n<blockquote class=\"wp-block-quote is-layout-flow wp-block-quote-is-layout-flow\">\n<p>Imagine a flashy spaceship lands in your backyard. The door opens and you are invited to investigate everything to see what you can learn. The technology is clearly millions of years beyond what we can make.<\/p>\n<p>This is biology.<\/p>\n<\/blockquote>\n<div class=\"wp-block-image\">\n<figure class=\"aligncenter size-large\"><a href=\"https:\/\/www.scotthyoung.com\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2021\/01\/spaceship_blog.png\"><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" width=\"600\" height=\"598\" src=\"https:\/\/www.scotthyoung.com\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2021\/01\/spaceship_blog.png\" alt=\"\" class=\"wp-image-12891\" srcset=\"https:\/\/www.scotthyoung.com\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2021\/01\/spaceship_blog.png 600w, https:\/\/www.scotthyoung.com\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2021\/01\/spaceship_blog-300x300.png 300w, https:\/\/www.scotthyoung.com\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2021\/01\/spaceship_blog-150x150.png 150w\" sizes=\"auto, (max-width: 600px) 100vw, 600px\" \/><\/a><\/figure>\n<\/div>\n<p>This analogy neatly links biology with one of my other interests, <a href=\"https:\/\/www.scotthyoung.com\/blog\/myprojects\/mit-challenge-2\/\">computer science<\/a>. Our world is increasingly driven by computers. Understanding code, even if you\u2019re not paid to write it, is increasingly going to be something we all need to make sense of the world.<\/p>\n<p>But biology and computer science aren\u2019t so different. They both involve systems based on information, transforming inputs into outputs and dealing with problems of design. The difference, it seems, is that computers are man-made while biology isn\u2019t.<\/p>\n<h2 class=\"wp-block-heading\">Practical Upsides of Learning More Biology<\/h2>\n<p>Beyond the intrinsic interest, there\u2019s practical benefits to knowing more biology. Every day we make decisions about what food to eat, which medicines to take and weigh the risks of different impacts on our bodies.<\/p>\n<p>Yet misinformation is prevalent. At best, a failure to understand biology means we waste time and money on diets that don\u2019t work and eschewing products that do no harm. At worst, ignorance leads to illness.<\/p>\n<p>As a citizen, biology intersects politics. Which vaccines should we approve? Are GMOs safe to eat? Gene editing, life extension, DNA patents are new problems where laws are still being written. If we decide badly, as a society, we may cause incalculable harm both from delaying progress or enabling disaster.<\/p>\n<p>Philosophically, biology teaches us deep lessons about ourselves. Questions of identity, ontology and even consciousness are informed by the inner workings of what makes us up. I don\u2019t think you can pretend to care seriously about these questions if you\u2019re not willing to look under the hood.<\/p>\n<h2 class=\"wp-block-heading\">What Makes Biology Hard to Learn?<\/h2>\n<p>Having explained why I\u2019m interested, let\u2019s shift to the titular question: what\u2019s the best way to learn it? In particular, why does biology often fail to inspire and why is it often a struggle to understand?<\/p>\n<p>James Somers <a href=\"https:\/\/jsomers.net\/i-should-have-loved-biology\/\">articulates the problem<\/a>:<\/p>\n<blockquote class=\"wp-block-quote is-layout-flow wp-block-quote-is-layout-flow\">\n<p>I should have loved biology but I found it to be a lifeless recitation of names: the Golgi apparatus and the Krebs cycle; mitosis, meiosis; DNA, RNA, mRNA, tRNA.<\/p>\n<p>\u2026<\/p>\n<p>In biology class, biology wasn\u2019t presented as a quest for the secrets of life. The textbooks wrung out the questing. We were nowhere acquainted with real biologists, the real questions they had, the real experiments they did to answer them. We were just given their conclusions.<\/p>\n<\/blockquote>\n<div class=\"wp-block-image\">\n<figure class=\"aligncenter size-large\"><a href=\"https:\/\/www.scotthyoung.com\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2021\/01\/bio-overload_blog.png\"><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" width=\"600\" height=\"600\" src=\"https:\/\/www.scotthyoung.com\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2021\/01\/bio-overload_blog.png\" alt=\"\" class=\"wp-image-12892\" srcset=\"https:\/\/www.scotthyoung.com\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2021\/01\/bio-overload_blog.png 600w, https:\/\/www.scotthyoung.com\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2021\/01\/bio-overload_blog-300x300.png 300w, https:\/\/www.scotthyoung.com\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2021\/01\/bio-overload_blog-150x150.png 150w\" sizes=\"auto, (max-width: 600px) 100vw, 600px\" \/><\/a><\/figure>\n<\/div>\n<p>I suspect the problem with learning biology has two parts:<\/p>\n<ol class=\"wp-block-list\">\n<li><strong>The subject is dense<\/strong>. Biology combines the conceptual difficulties of physics with the voluminous details of a foreign language. Classes require understanding differential equations, as well as the alphabet soup of protein, gene and cell types.<\/li>\n<li><strong>Because it is dense, teachers work hard to drill in the facts<\/strong>. There\u2019s little time for curiosity-driven puzzle solving when you have to memorize a map like <a href=\"https:\/\/user-images.githubusercontent.com\/21294\/94627410-73b6c680-028b-11eb-9501-d7453af56106.png\">this one<\/a>.<\/li>\n<\/ol>\n<p>Dense subjects also tend to be more opaque. A reasonably smart lay person can open up a random social psychology paper and roughly understand what is being talked about. Yet even with a PhD, papers in biology or physics can be hard to follow if you leave your specialization.<\/p>\n<p>When the scholarship is hidden behind years of prerequisite classes, it can be a formidable barrier to self-education.<\/p>\n<h2 class=\"wp-block-heading\">How Should I Learn Biology?<\/h2>\n<p>Until this point, my biology education has been haphazard and scattershot. I\u2019ve read a lot of books. I\u2019ve taken a few courses. But if I were really interested in going further, what should I do?<\/p>\n<p>Here\u2019s some options:<\/p>\n<ul class=\"wp-block-list\">\n<li><strong>Go through a standard curriculum, MIT-Challenge-style<\/strong>. This is a little harder given that biology is less well-supported with free material than computer science. But textbooks are always available, so following a rough curriculum should work, even if I\u2019m not able to do all the tests.<\/li>\n<li><strong>Pick a subtopic and dive deep<\/strong>. I could begin with a particular interest in mind, say <a href=\"https:\/\/en.wikipedia.org\/wiki\/DNA_computing\">DNA computers<\/a> or neuroscience, and build outward from there. Along the way, I would probably get a lot of basics by backwards chaining the prerequisites.<\/li>\n<li><strong>Visit labs or conduct home experiments<\/strong>. The risk of an entirely theoretical approach is that biology isn\u2019t just a body of theory, but a lot of methods to get results. While taking on a full-time lab position isn\u2019t an option for me, perhaps my approach to learning ought to explicitly include more time spent <em>doing<\/em> biology.<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<p>These are some initial possibilities, but I\u2019m interested to hear from you. I know a lot of doctors, researchers and bio-majors follow this blog. What do you suggest for learning the field? Are there textbooks, online courses or guides you would recommend? Please share in the comments!<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Recently, I\u2019ve had an interest in learning more biology. Some of that curiosity is pandemic-inspired. Biology is playing an outsized role in all of our lives these days. Yet much of the interest predates our current crisis. As a teenager, I really enjoyed books like The Selfish Gene and The Red Queen. Evolutionary biology revealing [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":7,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"om_disable_all_campaigns":false,"_monsterinsights_skip_tracking":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_active":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_note":"","_monsterinsights_sitenote_category":0,"_genesis_hide_title":false,"_genesis_hide_breadcrumbs":false,"_genesis_hide_singular_image":false,"_genesis_hide_footer_widgets":false,"_genesis_custom_body_class":"","_genesis_custom_post_class":"","_genesis_layout":"","footnotes":"","_links_to":"","_links_to_target":""},"categories":[3],"tags":[],"class_list":{"0":"post-12886","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","6":"category-personal-development","7":"entry"},"acf":[],"yoast_head":"<!-- This site is optimized with the Yoast SEO plugin v27.4 - https:\/\/yoast.com\/product\/yoast-seo-wordpress\/ -->\n<title>What&#039;s the Best Way to Learn Biology? - Scott H Young<\/title>\n<meta name=\"description\" content=\"Tricky concepts and tons of details. 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