Competition is a rivalry where two or more parties strive for a common goal which cannot be shared: where one's gain is the other's loss (an example of which is a zero-sum game). Competition can arise between entities such as organisms, individuals, economic and social groups, etc. The rivalry can be over attainment of any exclusive goal, including Recognition (sociology), recognition. Competition occurs in nature, between living organisms which co-exist in the same natural environment, environment. Animals compete over water supplies, food, mates, and other resource (biology), biological resources. Humans usually Survival of the fittest, compete for food and mates, though when these needs are met deep rivalries often arise over the pursuit of wealth, power, prestige, and celebrity, fame when in a static, repetitive, or unchanging environment. Competition is a major tenet of market economy, market economies and business, often associated with business competition as companies ar ...

Athletics may refer to: Sports * Sport of athletics, a collection of sporting events that involve competitive running, jumping, throwing, and walking ** Track and field, a sub-category of the above sport * Athletics (physical culture), competitions based on human qualities of stamina, fitness, and skill ** College athletics, non-professional, collegiate- and university-level competitive physical sports and games Teams * Athletics (baseball), an American professional baseball team currently based in West Sacramento, California, with no city designation, previously known as: ** Philadelphia Athletics (1901–1954) ** Kansas City Athletics (1955–1967) ** Oakland Athletics (1968–2024) * Philadelphia Athletics (1860–1876), an American professional baseball team * Philadelphia Athletics (American Association), an American professional baseball team, 1882–1890 * Philadelphia Athletics (1890–1891), an American professional baseball team * Philadelphia Athletics (NFL), ...

Extinction is the termination of a species via the death of its last member. A taxon may become functionally extinct before the death of its last member if it loses the capacity to reproduce and recover. As a species' potential range may be very large, determining this moment is difficult, and is usually done retrospectively. This difficulty leads to phenomena such as Lazarus taxa, where a species presumed extinct abruptly "reappears" (typically in the fossil record) after a period of apparent absence. Over five billion species are estimated to have died out. It is estimated that there are currently around 8.7 million species of eukaryotes globally, possibly many times more if prokaryotes are included. Notable extinct animal species include non-avian dinosaurs, saber-toothed cats, and mammoths. Through evolution, species arise through the process of speciation. Species become extinct when they are no longer able to survive in changing conditions or against sup ...

Sunlight is the portion of the electromagnetic radiation which is emitted by the Sun (i.e. solar radiation) and received by the Earth, in particular the visible light perceptible to the human eye as well as invisible infrared (typically perceived by humans as warmth) and ultraviolet (which can have physiological effects such as sunburn) lights. However, according to the American Meteorological Society, there are "conflicting conventions as to whether all three ..are referred to as light, or whether that term should only be applied to the visible portion of the spectrum". Upon reaching the Earth, sunlight is scattered and filtered through the Earth's atmosphere as daylight when the Sun is above the horizon. When direct solar radiation is not blocked by clouds, it is experienced as sunshine, a combination of bright light and radiant heat (atmospheric). When blocked by clouds or reflected off other objects, sunlight is diffused. Sources estimate a global average o ...

A territory is an area of land, sea, or space, belonging or connected to a particular country, person, or animal. In international politics, a territory is usually a geographic area which has not been granted the powers of self-government, i.e. an area that is under the jurisdiction of a sovereign state. As a subdivision, a territory in most countries is an organized division of an area that is controlled by a country but is not formally developed into, or incorporated into, a political unit of that country, which political units are of equal status to one another and are often referred to by words such as "provinces", "regions", or "states". In its narrower sense, it is "a geographic region, such as a colonial possession, that is dependent on an external government." Etymology The origins of the word "territory" begin with the Proto-Indo-European root ''ters'' ('to dry'). From this emerged the Latin word ''terra'' ('earth, land') and later the Latin word ''territorium' ...

Water is an inorganic compound with the chemical formula . It is a transparent, tasteless, odorless, and nearly colorless chemical substance. It is the main constituent of Earth's streams, lakes, and oceans. Water is also the fluid of all known living organisms, in which it acts as a solvent. Water, being a polar molecule, undergoes strong intermolecular hydrogen bonding which is a large contributor to its physical and chemical properties. It is vital for all known forms of life, despite not providing food energy or being an organic micronutrient. Due to its presence in all organisms, its chemical stability, its worldwide abundance, and its strong polarity relative to its small molecular size, water is often referred to as the "universal solvent". Because Earth's surface temperature and pressure is relatively close to water's triple point, water exists on Earth as a solid, a liquid, and a gas. It forms precipitation in the form of rain and aerosols in the ...

Food is any substance consumed by an organism for nutritional support. Food usually consists of plant, animal, or fungal origin and contains essential nutrients such as carbohydrates, fats, proteins, vitamins, or minerals. The substance is ingested by an organism and assimilated by the organism's cells to provide energy, maintain life, encourage physical requirements, and support growth. Different species of animals have different feeding behaviours that satisfy the needs of their metabolisms and have evolved to fill specific ecological niches within specific geographical contexts. Omnivorous humans are highly adaptable and have adapted to obtaining food in many different ecosystems. Humans generally use cooking to prepare food for consumption. The majority of the food energy required is supplied by the industrial food industry, which produces food through intensive agriculture and distributes it through complex food processing and food distribution system ...

Ecology () is the natural science of the relationships among living organisms and their environment. Ecology considers organisms at the individual, population, community, ecosystem, and biosphere levels. Ecology overlaps with the closely related sciences of biogeography, evolutionary biology, genetics, ethology, and natural history. Ecology is a branch of biology, and is the study of abundance, biomass, and distribution of organisms in the context of the environment. It encompasses life processes, interactions, and adaptations; movement of materials and energy through living communities; successional development of ecosystems; cooperation, competition, and predation within and between species; and patterns of biodiversity and its effect on ecosystem processes. Ecology has practical applications in fields such as conservation biology, wetland management, natural resource management, and human ecology. The term ''ecology'' () was coined in 1866 by the German sc ...

Nature, in the broadest sense, is the physical world or universe. In this general sense nature refers to the laws, elements and phenomena of the physical world, including life. Although humans are part of nature, human activity or humans as a whole are often described as at times at odds, or outright separate and even superior to nature. During the advent of modern scientific method in the last several centuries, nature became the passive reality, organized and moved by divine laws. With the Industrial Revolution, nature increasingly became seen as the part of reality not subject to intentional human intervention. It was considered sacred by some traditions ( Rousseau, American transcendentalism) but a mere decorum for divine providence or human history ( Hegel, Marx) in others. However, a vitalist vision of nature, closer to the pre-Socratic one, was reborn at the same time, especially after Charles Darwin. Within the various uses of the word today, "nature" often ...

Culture ( or ) is a concept that encompasses the social behavior, institutions, and norms found in human societies, as well as the knowledge, beliefs, arts, laws, customs, capabilities, attitudes, and habits of the individuals in these groups.Tylor, Edward. (1871). ''Primitive Culture''. Vol 1. New York: J. P. Putnam's Son Culture often originates from or is attributed to a specific region or location. Humans acquire culture through the learning processes of enculturation and socialization, which is shown by the diversity of cultures across societies. A cultural norm codifies acceptable conduct in society; it serves as a guideline for behavior, dress, language, and demeanor in a situation, which serves as a template for expectations in a social group. Accepting only a monoculture in a social group can bear risks, just as a single species can wither in the face of environmental change, for lack of functional responses to such change. Thus in military culture, valor ...

History is the systematic study of the past, focusing primarily on the human past. As an academic discipline, it analyses and interprets evidence to construct narratives about what happened and explain why it happened. Some theorists categorize history as a social science, while others see it as part of the humanities or consider it a hybrid discipline. Similar debates surround the purpose of history—for example, whether its main aim is theoretical, to uncover the truth, or practical, to learn lessons from the past. In a more general sense, the term ''history'' refers not to an academic field but to the past itself, times in the past, or to individual texts about the past. Historical research relies on primary and secondary sources to reconstruct past events and validate interpretations. Source criticism is used to evaluate these sources, assessing their authenticity, content, and reliability. Historians strive to integrate the perspectives of several sources to ...