Science — AI-generated practice question

Life processes are the maintenance functions that keep an organism alive — such as nutrition, respiration, and excretion. All these processes require molecules to be constantly moved around inside the organism.

Living structures are well-organised, but the environment continuously tends to break down this order. To prevent this breakdown and maintain their organised structure, living organisms must keep repairing themselves. Since all structures are made of molecules, this repair requires continuous molecular movement inside the organism.

Viruses, however, show no molecular movement until they enter a host cell. This means:

• They cannot carry out any maintenance or repair of their own structures.
• They cannot perform basic life processes independently.
• They do not maintain any internal order on their own.

Since molecular movement is considered essential for life — as it drives all maintenance processes — the complete absence of it in viruses makes it difficult to classify them as truly alive. Hence, the debate exists.

Source: Chapter 5, Introduction — Life Processes

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• The examiner expects you to link molecular movement → maintenance of organised structure → life processes in a logical chain.
• Key phrase to use: "living structures are well-organised and tend to break down; molecular movement is needed to maintain/repair them."
• Then apply this to viruses: no molecular movement = no independent maintenance = not clearly alive.
• Avoid writing a general essay on life processes; stay focused on the molecular movement–virus connection.
• 5 marks = roughly 5 logical points or 2–3 tight paragraphs, which this answer provides.