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Ullica Christina Olofsdotter Segerstråle

Defenders of the Truth: The Battle for Science in the Sociobiology Debate and Beyond First Edition

by Ullica Segerstrale (Author)

4.2 26 ratings

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When Edward O. Wilson published Sociobiology, it generated a firestorm of criticism, mostly focused on the book's final chapter, in which Wilson applied lessons learned from animal behavior to human society. In Defenders of the Truth, Ullica Segerstrale takes a hard look at the sociobiology
controversy, sorting through a hornet's nest of claims and counterclaims, moral concerns, metaphysical beliefs, political convictions, strawmen, red herrings, and much juicy gossip. The result is a fascinating look at the world of modern science.
Segerstrale has interviewed all the major participants, including such eminent scientists as Stephen Jay Gould, Richard C. Lewontin, Richard Dawkins, John Maynard Smith, Nobel Laureates Peter Medawar and Salvador Luria, and of course Edward Wilson. She reveals that most of the criticism of
Wilson was unfair, but argues that it was not politically motivated. Instead, she sees the conflict over sociobiology as a drawn-out battle about the nature of "good science" and the social responsibility of the scientist. Behind the often nasty attacks were the very different approaches to science
taken by naturalists (such as Wilson) and experimentalists (such as Lewontin), between the "planters" and the "weeders." The protagonists were all defenders of the truth, Segerstrale concludes, it was just that everyone's truth was different.
Defenders of the Truth touches on grand themes such as the unity of knowledge, human nature, and free will and determinism, and it shows how the sociobiology controversy can shed light on the more recent debates over the Human Genome Project and The Bell Curve. It will appeal to all readers of
Edward O. Wilson or Stephen Jay Gould and all those who enjoy a behind-the-scenes peek at modern science.

ISBN-10

0198505051
ISBN-13

978-0198505051
Edition

First Edition
Publisher

Oxford University Press
Publication date

May 25, 2000
Language

English
Dimensions

7 x 1.5 x 9.75 inches
Print length

504 pages
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Editorial Reviews

Amazon.com Review

How do scientists separate their politics from their work--or is such a distinction even possible? These questions frame the two levels of sociologist Ullica Segerstrale's analysis of the sociobiology controversy, Defenders of the Truth. From E.O. Wilson's 1975 publication of Sociobiology to his 1998 release of Consilience, he has consistently been the often-unwilling center of the vitriolic debate over human nature and its scientific study. Heavy hitters like Richard Dawkins, Stephen Jay Gould, and John Maynard Smith have lined up to attack and defend the scientific, political, and moral interpretations and implications of Wilson's synthesis, and Dr. Segerstrale tells a compelling story of their battles on multiple fronts. The author knows her science, having trained extensively in biochemistry before turning to sociology. While she distances herself from assessing the validity of the various claims, Segerstrale is clearly sympathetic to Wilson, who seems almost naïve at times when his ideas are interpreted ideologically rather than scientifically.

That, of course, is the heart of the contention surrounding sociobiology. The political left, well-represented among evolutionary biologists, has long considered any genetic influence on human behavior anathema--such theories are believed to support racist policies, even in the unlikely event that they were not merely reflections of racist attitudes. To their credit, many scientists held more complex beliefs, but some used the ideological argument as a back door to introduce their own neo-Darwinian scientific theories. The struggle for understanding has been eclipsed for some time by the struggle for political and academic survival and dominance, and Segerstrale reports and scrutinizes both with humor, intelligence, and aplomb. The end of the controversy--if there can be one--is far off, but a careful reading of Defenders of the Truth will give insight into the forces influencing our scientific self-examination. --Rob Lightner

From Publishers Weekly

In 1975, E.O. Wilson published Sociobiology, a study of evolution and animal societies; its last chapter called for attention to the Darwinian and genetic foundations of human behavior. The book produced prolonged contention among scientists and laypeople over morals, politics, genes, evolution, statistics, sex, race, "intelligence," evidence, truth, "human nature" and other hot-button topics. Why were they all so upset, and what can their arguments tell us? In a broad and detailed view of that intellectual firestorm along with its prequels and sequels, Segerstr?le--a professor of sociology at the Illinois Institute of Technology--shows how "a debate about the nature of science, the relationship of science to society, and the nature of acceptable knowledge was expressed as a conflict between individuals." Debaters revealed not just their political underpinnings but their beliefs and assumptions about what constitutes valid science, what counts as verification, as fact and as falsehood. Segerstr?le begins at the start of the clash, with Harvard titans Wilson and Richard Lewontin; backtracks to Britain in the mid-1960s, with a population biologist's investigations of altruism; and zooms forward to the "Science Wars" of the mid-1990s and the international slugfest over The Bell Curve. Partisans in these controversies will likely find something here to make them angry; they will also learn much they didn't know. Even those who might dispute Segerstr?le's conclusions will appreciate her assiduous chronology of these tangled issues and her accounts of what many of the participants thought they were doing in their "battle for the soul of science in one of the few fields where it might still be fought." (Apr.)
Copyright 2000 Reed Business Information, Inc.

Product details

Publisher ‏ : ‎ Oxford University Press; First Edition (May 25, 2000)
Language ‏ : ‎ English
Hardcover ‏ : ‎ 504 pages
ISBN-10 ‏ : ‎ 0198505051
ISBN-13 ‏ : ‎ 978-0198505051
Item Weight ‏ : ‎ 1.2 pounds
Dimensions ‏ : ‎ 7 x 1.5 x 9.75 inches

Best Sellers Rank: #1,819,000 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)
- #614 in Physical Anthropology (Books)
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James R. Mccall

Or Benders of the Truth?

Reviewed in the United States 🇺🇸 on May 1, 2003

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This is a lovely book - for a certain type of person. First of all, you must care about the long-running nature/nurture controversy that swirled around the publication, in 1975, of E.O. Wilson's book Sociobiology. Also, ideally, you have long sympathized with Wilson as against his main critics, Richard Lewontin and Stephen Jay Gould. That is, you must have long felt that Wilson's assertions in that book and later ones about the heritability of cultural and mental traits in humans were reasonable-perhaps wrong in some details, but certainly interesting, and good starting points. Finally, you should find it intriguing that these three biologists were all at Harvard, and had offices in the same building.
I fit the bill. In 1979 I read Michael Ruse's book "Sociobiology: Sense or Nonsense?" (Sense, he concluded.) I had no sympathy for using Marxism to critique work in science or anyplace else, which is where Lewontin and (less-blatantly) Gould were coming from. Moreover, there was something so right about the idea that humans have predilections that work themselves out in culture, and so exciting about the prospects for this kind of self-knowledge, that I felt the critics of the sort of research that Wilson was proposing were spoilsports, indeed.
But the time was not right. The critics got the best of things early on, and the name "sociobiology" acquired such a stigma that those who wished to do research (and get funded) in genetic influences on the human mind were advised to tread lightly and call their work something else. But things changed. What emerged in the 1990's was something called "evolutionary psychology", a new name for bad old "sociobiology", now respectable and in tune with current public attitudes, which have made a massive shift to a gene-centered view of - well, of just about everything.
Have I just given away the game? Perhaps, but you will have to take my word for it that this book is fun to read - if you enjoy the thrust and parry of ideas and the clash of egos. And, of course, scientists' pettiness and careerism is more entertaining than their usual posturing on pedestals engraved with "The Noble Search for Truth".
In 1980 and 1981 a young (I assume) Ullica got interviews with the main protagonists in the debates - Wilson, Lewontin, Levins, and others in America, plus various of the British contingent as well, such as Dawkins and Maynard Smith. Her area of study was the sociology of science, and she did some shaking and baking early on, using her material for contingent articles. But she kept a weather eye on how things were going in what was really a clash that exposed cultural fault lines in evolutionary biologists who were, fundamentally, on the same side. (Creationists they were not. Some of them might want to refine Darwin, but certainly none of them wanted to reject him!)
Now is a good time to sum up the course this debate has taken over the last quarter-century. The original political rationale seems quaint, and the focus has shifted to concern about how genetics and environment interact - it being more or less agreed that both are crucial. (Thus, an Hegelian synthesis of the dialectical process!) If you wish to know the history and drama of issues such as genes vs. environment, kin selection, group selection, the place of moral responsibility in a world of genetic "determinism", then this is the place to come. These and other issues are explored in a quietly comprehensive way. The personalities also come out, and the whole has the feel of a story, which of course it is, to its main players. And to you, too, if you take it up.

29 people found this helpful

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Cebes

valuable but problematic account of sociobiology debates

Reviewed in the United States 🇺🇸 on November 26, 2010

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This is a difficult book to rate because it has many virtues and as many faults. It is an extremely useful historical account of the Sociobiology debates and their context in the Science Wars. The book is 400 pages worth of detail on the writings, conferences, behind the scenes maneuvering; much of which the author was personal witness to. As such it is an invaluable source of information, as well as an extremely thorough bibliography of important writings on the subject. The author is a good writer and though a sociologist has at least some science background (though not in biology) so is able to delve into some of the technical issues on the subject.

On the negative side: the journalistic account of the affair is useful, but when the author tries to do academic sociological and philosophical theorizing about it, things go downhill. Do we really need such concepts as "parallel meaning universes," "optimization strategies," "alternative critical conceptions," "coupled reasoning," or the strange distinction between scientific "planters" and "weeders"? The author's obsession with categorizing and dichotomizing leads to polarizing the debate even more than it already is. It really seems unlikely that the whole dispute can be explained in terms of two philosophical schools, "metaphysicians" versus "logicians." It is also troubling that the author repeatedly purports to resolve these biological disputes and tell us which side is right on particular questions, despite the fact that the author is not a biologist. Apparently she thinks the disputes are merely sociological not biological, so that a sociologist can decide them.

Even worse, the author has decided in advance that one side is right and the other not only wrong but entirely ideologically motivated. The sociobiologists are portrayed as serious scientific inquirers after truth, whose only fault is their naivete in that they did not foresee the vicious, politically motivated attacks by their critics. In her portrayal, the biologists who criticize sociobiology are all dogmatic Marxists who will not tolerate any departure from correct political doctrine. Not only that they are nasty, mean-spirited, and unfair. At the end, she declares that the sociobiologists are the "winners" of the debate, "without a doubt" and have been "vindicated" from all the "unfair" accusations.

Needless to say this is a wholly inaccurate characterization. Both sides bear some blame for their unfairness, and both sides involve well-meaning scientific inquiries after the truth. The author seems unable to grasp the possibility that people might in genuine good faith be worried about the moral and political misuses of sociobiology, or that there might be a genuine scientific dispute here. And as a result she neglects the non-political criticisms of sociobiology that critique much of it on purely scientific grounds, for example as being speculative and based on flimsy evidence. Thus Kitcher's important critique Vaulting Ambition is barely mentioned, probably because Kitcher has no discernible political agenda; his serious criticism of SB is dismissed as being merely "hard-nosed" (whatever that means). The author seems to have a preconception that the critics of SB must be motivated by deeper, political reasons and cannot be engaged in objective science. Nor is it clear by any means who has won the debate. Some sociobiologists do very good work, but much of it is mere speculation dressed up as science. The debate is not over by any means, despite what the author believes.

ADDENDUM: One factual correction to make. On p. 23, the author describes the infamous ice water incident as involving a "pitcher" of ice water being thrown over E.O. Wilson. But as Stephen Jay Gould relates in The Hedgehog, The Fox & The Magister's Pox, this reflects the later embellishment and exaggeration of the incident. In fact, it was a small cup, not a pitcher full of water. A minor difference, perhaps, but one should also avoid exaggerating the martyrdom of Wilson (will we next hear that he was waterboarded?)

13 people found this helpful

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Jennifer Hoffman

Intriguing without any strong biases

Reviewed in the United States 🇺🇸 on June 4, 2017

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I purchased this book for a review presentation in my Evolution course. Segerstrale does an eloquent job of providing the different sides revolving around the Sociobiology debate without providing her own heavy biased opinion (which is very hard to find involving this issue it seems!). I felt her writing was very easy to follow and quite smooth. I love her style because it gets right to the point without fluffing up any of the background information. She spent a lot of her life finding the answers behind the debate, and it felt like I was taking a trip into her life's work when I read this compilation of "evidence" regarding the debate. Though this is a book on the lengthier side, I would highly suggest reading this if you are at all curious about the sociobiology debate and where you stand in it. Segerstrale does a great job of providing information for you to take your own stance, and I think that is absolutely crucial when trying to figure out your own opinion. Definitely would recommend this read!

One person found this helpful

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Top reviews from other countries

F Henwood

The sociobiology dispute as opera

Reviewed in the United Kingdom 🇬🇧 on August 16, 2014

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Back in 1975 a Harvard University biologist called E O Wilson published Sociobiology: the New Synthesis. Its last chapter posited that much of human behaviour may be influenced by genetics - perhaps more so than culture. Many left-leaning academics took offence and a twenty-five year academic spat broke out.

What this book does is to give an even-handed account of the sociobiology wars as it played out in both Britain and the United States from 1975 to the end of the 20th Century. The book is the product of 25 years research, based on close observation of the dispute as it ebbed and flowed, and meeting the principal protagonists of what she rightly describes as an `opera'.

It is very difficult to discern where the author herself stands in all this, which is reassuring; it gives one the impression that one is reading a balanced, non-partisan account. It elucidates what the parties to the dispute thought were at stake. Some of this seemed quite obscure - like whether the gene is the unit of selection. Wilson's opponents thought of themselves as `firefighters' extinguishing the wildfires of bad science. Their opponents in turn saw them as political police, suppressors of intellectual freedom.

This is a book with many shades of grey. Some radical scientists like Noam Chomsky accept an innatist basis for human nature - and refused to be co-opted into joining the opposition to Wilson and sociobiology generally. What it does not discuss is whether any of this had any impact on the public generally. Did Leowontin's apprehensions about the supposed misuse of sociobiology have any empirical support? But this would have made for a longer book. The aim of the book is to explain what the actors in this drama were thinking, what they thought they were doing, and what they thought their opponents were doing. This the book does very well.

But does any of this still matter? The war seems to have petered out now. There is greater acceptance that perhaps much of human behaviour is influenced - if not necessarily rigidly determined - by genes. The debate on the relationship between nature and nurture seems less polarised than it once was (evolutionary biology seems to me to looking in the right place when it examines the physical properties of the human brain for the origins of our sense of morality and so on. After all, where else are we supposed to look?). So why is this of any interest?

The answer is that the author shows that both camps were animated by moral values and differing conceptions of how science should be done and what it should be for - to change the world or merely to describe it? Science certainly generates plenty of facts. But facts alone never speak for themselves. They are interpreted. One can practise the scientific method impeccably but still come into conflict with other practitioners of integrity who are guided by different moral and political values - and draw different conclusions. All the protagonists in the sociobiology debate accepted evolution as a fact, and rejected a supernatural explanation for natural phenomena. But agreeing on such fundamentals did not guarantee immunisation from controversy.

It is often said that one cannot derive values from facts. That is probably true - but scientists' researches are often shaped by their own values which they bring into the lab, as this book dramtically shows. This is still of relevance to scientific practice today.

6 people found this helpful

Luc REYNAERT

Science and ideology

Reviewed in the United Kingdom 🇬🇧 on February 19, 2010

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By dissecting painstakingly the sociobiology wars, Ullica Segerstråle exposes fundamental discussions about the nature of and the relationship between science, society, morality and politics.
The violent clash of egos revealed the deep chasm between the British and US scientific community. While in Great-Britain (R. Dawkins) science was considered as an autonomous activity (only the facts), the US scientists had a scientific-cum-moral agenda (no barrier between facts and values). This agenda set the ideologues (R. Lewontin, S. Gould) against the biologists-adaptionists (E.O. Wilson).

Sociobiology
Sociobiology is the systematic study of the biological basis of social behavior and the organization of societies in all kind of organisms. It considers that human sex role divisions, aggressiveness, moral concerns or religious beliefs can be linked to man's evolutionary heritage and underlying genetic disposition.

Aim of the biologists-adaptionists
E.O. Wilson's main aim was to force the social sciences to take biology seriously. He wanted to provide a genetically accurate and fair code of natural ethics for man, thereby showing that Christian theologians should not impose arbitrary moral codes which could generate unnecessary human suffering.

Vision of the ideologues
For the ideologues, scientific and political questions were inextricably linked. For them, sociobiologists tried to demonstrate that nature optimizes and that they thereby defended a social statu-quo: what exists is adaptive, what is adaptive is good, therefore what exists is good. The social inequalities, like race, gender, ethnicity, class, status, wealth, power, domination, are then seen as reflections of a natural order.

Richard Dawkins
Towering above the verbal wrestlers, Richard Dawkins stated rightly that values cannot be derived from nature. There is a fundamental distinction between science (how the world is) and politics (how the world ought to be).
The Lyssenko affair demonstrated clearly what happens when scientific objectivity is abandoned.
R. Dawkins rightly insulted the postmodernists as hypocrites for their vision of science (it represents only one way of knowing among others) and rightly attacked viruses of the mind, like religion, which had (and has) the ambition to explain the same things as science.
For a devastating verdict on postmodernism see G.G. Preparata.

(Science and politics)
Contrary to what S.A. Luria pretends, science is very important for politicians. It permitted them to drop atom bombs on Hiroshima and Nagasaki.

The more man knows how the world works, the more he can take action to improve life for everyone. As the great American scientist G.C. Williams stated: `natural selection, albeit stupid, is a story of unending arms races, slaughter and suffering. It is a law of nature and its immorality has to be accepted and, at least, to be thought about. `

While the extremely detailed scientific arms wrestling in this book will mostly appeal to scientists, I nevertheless recommend it highly to all those who want to understand the (scientific) world we live in.

5 people found this helpful

Lana Germanova

Five Stars

Reviewed in the United Kingdom 🇬🇧 on November 7, 2015

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