As I'm going to argue repeatedly today, biology has become a science
over the last 50 years. And, as a consequence, we can talk about
some basic principles. We can talk about some laws and then begin to
apply them to very interesting biological problems. And so our general
strategy this semester, as it has been in the past, is to spend roughly
the first half of the semester talking about the basic laws and rules
that govern all forms of biological life on this planet.