is chemistry a biological or physical science?

Answer 1

Historically chemistry has been a physical science, and in universities where physical sciences are in a different college or school from biological sciences, you will often see chemistry grouped with physics, not biology. A lot of the early chemistry (pre-20th century) was very physical in nature, which at that time meant measuring things--a lot of the gas laws, for example, arose in that time due to very careful measurements, which are historically associated with physical sciences. Biological sciences are historically associated with studying more complicated systems where isolating one variable at a time is much harder, and therefore things are studied more empirically.

Both because of funding considerations and the interdisciplinary nature of research today, however, chemistry is increasingly associated with biological sciences. Over the past decade there has been an enormous shift in funding priorities for the major funding agencies in the U.S. toward the biological sciences. As a result, both chemistry and physics have really moved towards biological research, and it's pretty common to see professors in many universities in physics, chemistry, or even engineering departments doing research that ten years ago would not have been common outside a biology department. In addition to funding considerations, the convergence of techniques has really brought a lot of sciences together. Techniques that were historically "biology" or "chemistry" (examples for biology: gels, cloning, protein expression and purification; examples for chemistry: HPLC, MS, crystallography, NMR, calorimetry, CD, etc.) are now often being used in various disciplines.

So both in chase of money (both professors in universities, government researchers, and industrial researchers have to justify their work to someone to get money) and because of the increasingly interdisciplinary nature of research and research training chemistry, which has traditionally been a physical sciences, is expanding quite rapidly into a biological science as well.

Answer 2

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is chemistry a biological or physical science?

Answer 3

That's a loaded question that depends very much on one's point of view. I look at sciences as a heirarchy. Basic Mathematics are the foundation, Physics would be tier 1, Chemistry Tier 2, and Biology tier 3.

So to directly answer your question I'd say chemistry is neither just biological or just physical; it lies between the two and catches the edges of both.

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me

Answer 4

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Its physical, hence why so many schools call chemistry classes physical sciences.

Answer 5

It is a physical science that is the underlying basis of all biological activity.