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Materialism, Emergence, and Life: the Interaction of Gene, Organism, and Environment

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Materialism, Emergence, and Life: the Interaction of Gene, Organism, and Environment Review Essay Materialism, Emergence, and Life: TheInteraction of Gene,Organism, and Environment * BRETT CLARK (Departmentof Sociology,University ofOregon) Throughcritically engaging the workof natural scientists, social scientists candevelop a richerunderstanding of the naturalworld (including human life), leadingto a greatercomprehension of the complexset ofinteractions whichmakes life anything butmechanistic. Given the steady owof newsreports on genetic cloning,genetically modied organisms, and patentson genes, socialscientists have an obligationto grapple with the debatescurrently taking place within the naturalsciences. Through thisencounter, sociologists can enhance ourunderstanding of natural andsocial relationships. Lewontin’ s ItAin’ t Necessarily So ,acollectionof essays originallypublished in The New YorkReview ofBooks , provides a searingcritique of scienti c knowledgewhile tackling issues as diverse as heredity,intelligence, cloning,gender, evolution, and genetic engineering. Lewontin’s essays arelucid and insightful, addressing the paramount debatesof our time. Both Lewontin’ s The Triple Helix and Oyama’s The Ontogenyof Information critiquedominant conceptions within evolutionary, biological,and developmental sciences,while illustrating the importanceof * The main worksunder considerationin this reviewessay are It Ain’t Necessarily So: TheDream of theHuman Genome and Other Illusions , 2nd edition,by Richard Lewontin(New York:New York ReviewBooks, 2001); TheTriple Helix: Gene,Organism, and Environment , byRichard Lewontin(Cambridge: Harvard University Press,2000); and, TheOntogeny of Information: DevelopmentalSystems andEvolution , 2nd edition,by Susan Oyama (Durham: Duke University Press,2000). I wishto express my gratitudeto John Bellamy Foster,Jason W. Moore,Thembisa Waetjen, and Denis Wall for their helpfulcomments andsuggestions. Critical Sociology, Volume 28,issue 3 also availableonline Ó 2002Koninklijke Brill NV, Leiden www.brill.nl 418 Clark ² amaterialistand dialectical approach toward understanding the internal andexternal processesoperating throughout nature. Given thathumans areliving creatures,dependent upon and part of nature, this discussion speaks directlyto us. Sociologymoves beyondthe ideologyof bourgeois society, which places the individual“ ontologicallyprior to the social,”by understandingsociety asmore than “the outcomeof the individualactivities of individual humanbeings” (Levins andLewontin 1985:1). Nevertheless, sociologyoften neglects toaccount for the internalstructure of individuals (as organisms) aswell asthe external environment(nature) in analyses ofsociety, life, andhistory. Part of this is due to an aversionto positivism, but it is alsolinked toa retreatfrom materialism in the socialsciences. While teleologicaland mechanistic explanations must be avoided, a materialist conceptionof nature, which is bothontological and epistemological, allows foran approachthat is realist and relational (Foster 2000:6-7). The social isdependent upon the physical-biologicalworld. In fact,society is part of natureand it emerges inrelationto the latter.At the same time,each realm has an independentexistence, whiletransforming the otherthrough their interactions.The development ofthisrelationship is notpredetermined; the futureremains contingent. With thismaterialist approach, we may reject the breachbetween the naturaland social sciences (Bhaskar 1998).Each realmmust be studiedon its own terms as well asin relationto the other. Socialscientists, with the exceptionof sociobiologistssuch as EdwardO. Wilson,generally, standagainst biological and genetic determinism.The inuences ofsocial structures on life chances andpersonal development areasserted in opposition to the argumentsrepresented in The Bell Curve (Fischeret al.1996). Inequalities are grounded in social-historical dynamics, ratherthan ininherent characteristics.Such a critiquedemonstrates the strengthsof sociological inquiry. Unfortunately, the scientic studies themselves arenot often subjected to close scrutiny when refutingtheir claims.Fortunately, scientists such as Stephen Jay Gould(1981), with hisdevastating critique of the inheritanceof intelligence andits basis for socialranking, and Lewontin, in his dismantling of biological explanations forwhy humansact as they do(Lewontin et al.1984), investigate the speculation,fabricated data, and ideological agenda behind the proponentsof genetic andbiological explanations for social hierarchies and organization.At the same time,Gould and Lewontin make the natural sciences,especially topicssuch as genes andevolution, accessible to the general population,allowing the publicto be informed when encountering scientic claims. ReviewEssay 419 ² Materialism andCoevolution In The Triple Helix ,Lewontininsists that the relationshipsand interactions betweengene, organism,and environment are central to understanding evolution.In the past,these realmshave been separated,allowing for ourknowledge of naturalselection to advance.But in order to continue to move forwardthe relationships,between the internaland external processes oflife, must be conceptualized as a whole.Failing to do so neglects the complexityof biologicalprocesses and the dynamiccharacter of life. Scienceuses metaphors, such as Descartes’ s characterizationof the worldas machine, to help explain the workingsof the world,especially thosephenomena that are not directly seen orexperienced by humans (Triple Helix ,p.3). While metaphorsare useful, too often science connes researchto such efforts that only reinforceand reify the principlesof the metaphor,overlooking information that lies outsideof the metaphorical approximation(ibid: 4). Developmental biologyis caught within the blindersof metaphor. “ Development isa metaphor,”Lewontin notes, “thatcarries with it a priorcommitment to the natureof the process. Development : : : isliterally an unfoldingor unrolling of something that isalready present and in some way preformed” (ibid: 5). To illustrate thispoint, in the eighteenth centurypreformationists contended that the adultorganism was already formed and contained in the spermand that developmentwas the continuationof thisbeing into life. In opposition,the theoryof epigenesis proposedthat an organismwas not “ formedin the fertilizedegg, but that it arose as a consequenceof profound changes in shapeand form during the courseof embryogenesis” (ibid: 5-6). While the pictureof a miniaturehuman organism in a spermnow seems ridiculous, developmental biologyhas embraceda similarposition, contending that there isalready a nishedblueprint of the organism,along with all the necessary andrequired information to specify it, within the genes. Development assumesthat the organism‘ developsitself.’ The environment becomesbackground, or simply a basis,for enabling the genes to‘ express themselves.’Living beings become ‘ only outwardmanifestations’ of internal forces.Developmental biologistsfocus on the similaritiesbetween individual organismswhile ignoring or dismissing variation. Common characteristics arereduced to mechanistic operations of genes. Changeis predetermined, followingan ascribedpath until death. Priorto WorldWar II, biological determinism ascribed social, cognitive, andpsychological differences to genes. Butwith the riseof Hitler and the applicationof theories of race towards extermination, environmental theoriesof variation became more popular as a wayof countering biologicalreductionism. Despite this, however, scientists (both social and natural)failed to provide a comprehensiveexplanation for social and 420 Clark ² biologicalchanges. So now, along with a shiftto the rightin politics, genetic explanationsreign. Working from within assumptions, developmental biologistsee the development ofan individualas an unfoldingof the genetic blueprint,while any variationthat exists between individualsis explained asthe resultof variations within the programspeci ed by the genes (ibid:17). Thus, differences in social position, school performances, sexual preferences,and intelligence areseen asthe consequencesof genetic variationsbetween individuals, rather than being consequences of factors outsidethe model. Lewontincharacterizes this type ofreasoning and science asbad biology.While notingthat it is true that “ lionslook different from lambs andchimps from humans because they have differentgenes,” Lewontin asserts,“ ifwewantto knowwhy twolambs are different from one another, adescriptionof their genetic differencesis insufcient and for some of their characteristicsmay even beirrelevant”(ibid: 17). Arguing that an organism doesnot compute itself from genes, Lewontinexplains “thatthe ontogeny ofan organismis the consequenceof a uniqueinteraction between the genes itcarries, the temporalsequence of external environmentsthrough whichit passesduring its life, and random events ofmolecular interactions withinindividual cells. Itis these interactionsthat must be incorporated intoany properaccount of howan organismis formed” (ibid: 17-18). The organismbecomes a siteof interaction between the environment andgenes. Specic historicalconditions in uence the conditionsof an organism’s emergence. Adialecticalin uence isconstantly associated withchanges throughoutlife. Lewontin notes that while “ internally xed successivedevelopmental stages area commonfeature of development, they arenot universal” (ibid: 18). For example, the morphologyof the tropicalvine Syngonium variesdepending upon incidences of light conditions.The shapesof its leaves, aswell astheir spacing, changes
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