NCERT Solutions Curiosity Chapter 10 .1 What Sets the Living Apart from the Non-living? — In-text Questions

Book page 18410 Updated on2026-09-05

Q1.

Look at Table 10.1. Why do you think a pencil is non-living but a pigeon is living?

Answer

Because the pigeon shows every characteristic of life and the pencil shows none of them. Compare them side by side.

Characteristic	Pigeon	Pencil
Moves on its own	Yes — walks, flies, turns its head	No — moves only when you pick it up
Needs food	Yes — grain, seeds, water	No
Grows	Yes — a chick becomes a full-grown pigeon	No — it only gets shorter
Respires	Yes	No
Excretes	Yes — droppings	No
Responds to stimuli	Yes — flies off when you clap	No
Reproduces	Yes — lays eggs	No — a pencil never makes a small pencil
Dies	Yes	No — it can only break or finish

Why the whole set matters: a pencil sharpened to a point does change, and a pencil rolling off a desk does move — but neither change comes from inside the pencil. In a living being every one of these activities is carried out by the body itself.

Q2.

What do you think are the differences between living beings and non-living things according to you?

Answer

Write the differences as a paired list. These are the ones the chapter builds up.

Living beings	Non-living things
Move by themselves (or at least move parts of the body)	Move only when some outside force or a person moves them
Need food for energy, growth and repair	Need no food at all
Grow from within, and the growth is permanent	Do not grow; they may only be added to from outside
Respire — take in air and release energy from food	Do not respire
Excrete waste products	Produce no body waste
Respond to stimuli such as touch, light, heat, sound	Give no response of their own
Reproduce and make new ones of their own kind	Cannot produce another one like themselves
Have a definite life span and finally die	Do not die; they only wear out, break or get used up

Did you know? The chapter's snail shell is a beautiful trap for this question. The shell does not move, yet it is a part of the body of a living snail — proof that you must look at the whole animal, not at one still-looking piece of it.

Q3.

What similarities do the identified living beings share with each other?

Answer

Take the living things from your list — the pigeon, the plant, the house lizard, your classmates — and look for what they have in common. Every one of them:

shows some movement, of the whole body or of a part;
needs food, water and air to stay alive;
grows from a small young one into an adult;
respires;
gets rid of waste from the body;
responds to a change in the surroundings — light, touch, heat, sound;
reproduces, so its kind continues;
dies after a certain span of life.

Why this list is so useful: the pigeon and the money plant look nothing alike, and neither of them looks like you. Yet all three tick the same eight boxes. That is why these eight are called the characteristics of living beings — they cut across every difference of shape, size and habitat.

Q4.

You may have identified movement as one of the similarities among living beings. You have also seen cars moving on a road. Does it mean that a car is living? List the tasks that you can do but a car cannot.

Answer

No, a car is not living. It moves, but movement alone does not make a thing alive — and a car cannot move until a driver turns the key.

Tasks you can do but a car cannot:

What I can do	Can a car do it?
Eat a roti and use it as food	No — petrol is fuel, not food; the car cannot digest it or repair itself with it
Grow taller every year	No — a small car never becomes a big car
Breathe in and out	No
Sweat, or pass urine	No — its smoke is exhaust from burning fuel, not body waste
Pull my hand back from a hot cup	No — it feels nothing
Have a baby brother or sister	No — cars are built in a factory, not born
Heal a cut on my knee by myself	No — a dent must be beaten out by a mechanic
Start moving on my own, whenever I want	No — it needs a driver every single time

The lesson: movement is a useful clue but a weak test. A river, a fan and a kite all move and none is living. Always check the full set of characteristics before you decide.

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