Biology After the Sociobiology Debate : What Introductory Textbooks Say About the Nature of Science and Organisms

This book analyzes the sociobiology debate and details a number of contested issues that have emerged. These issues focus on the interpretations and emphases that both sides have placed on the role of adaptation in evolution; the importance of evolution at the level of the gene versus at the level of organisms and populations; reductionism as a research method; simple Mendelianism versus more complex understandings of the relationship between genotype and phenotype; and ultimately, the nature of science itself. The book includes textual analyses of a selection of university-level introductory biology textbooks written between 1990 and 2010, examining the ways these texts - with their photos, inserts, and various rhetorical devices - cover sociobiology specifically, and animal behavior in general; evolutionary theory; genetic theory; and the nature of science. Biology After the Sociobiology Debate shows how, over the last two decades, sociobiology and the ensuing debates have influenced biological theory about the natures of science and the behavior of organisms, and how that influence is expressed in introductory textbooks. This book is important not just as a sociology of knowledge study, but also because of the ways in which continued biodeterminist discourses may influence debates and policy that are emerging around a new liberal or consumer-based eugenics movement. This book traces the debate over whether, or how much, biological and evolutionary factors are responsible for human behavior, and looks at the effect this debate has had on biology, as seen in introductory biology textbooks. These issues focus on the interpretations and emphases that both sides have placed on the role of adaptation in evolution; the importance of evolution at the level of the gene versus at the level of organisms and populations; reductionism as a research method; simple Mendelianism versus more complex understandings of the relationship between genotype and phenotype; and ultimately, the nature of science itself. The book includes textual analyses of a selection of university-level introductory biology textbooks written between 1990 and 2010, examining the ways these texts cover sociobiology specifically, and animal behavior in general; evolutionary theory; genetic theory; and the nature of science This book analyzes the sociobiology debate and details a number of contested issues that have emerged. These issues focus on the interpretations and emphases that both sides have placed on the role of adaptation in evolution; the importance of evolution at the level of the gene versus at the level of organisms and populations; reductionism as a research method; simple Mendelianism versus more complex understandings of the relationship between genotype and phenotype; and ultimately, the nature of science itself. The book includes textual analyses of a selection of university-level introductory biology textbooks written between 1990 and 2010, examining the ways these texts - with their photos, inserts, and various rhetorical devices - cover sociobiology specifically, and animal behavior in general; evolutionary theory; genetic theory; and the nature of science.__Biology After the Sociobiology Debate__ CONTENTS 10 Acknowledgments 12 Introduction 14 PART I: THE SOCIOBIOLOGY DEBATE 28 Chapter 1: The Sociobiology Debate: An Overview 30 Chapter 2: Constructing Legitimacy and Credibility 60 Chapter 3: The Sociobiology Debate and the Nature 72of Science 99 PART II: THE TEXTBOOK STUDY 134 Chapter 4: Methodological Issues and Textbook Selection 136 Chapter 5: The Raven and Johnson Textbooks 146 Chapter 6: Biology: Discovering Life: A More Qualified 144Presentation 171 Chapter 7: Biology: Principles, Patterns, and Processes: 164A Canadian Compromise 191 Chapter 8: Two Editions of Biology: Moving Toward 183More Balanced and Nuanced Positions 210 Chapter 9: Where To Go from Here? 229 Appendix I: The Circular 14 Textbooks List 242 Appendix II: Notes about Method 246 Bibliography 250 Index 270 Carmen James Schifellite. Includes Bibliographical References And Index.