Doug Henwood wrote:
> Yeah you were kind of by turning to selfish genes, not the tiger but
> what Kelley said in the quoted snippet. Biology is often invoked to
> put an end to debate or analysis.
Biology shouldn't put an end to debate and analysis put be part of same.
Even such raw biological facts as
> childbirth and lactation take on very different meanings depending on
> social arrangements like household structure, nature of and
> availability of medical care, labor market and welfare state
> features, conventions and representations around childbirth, etc.
i know this is an appeal to authority but:
>From *Mankind Evolving* by Theodosious Dobzhansky[one of the greatest
geneticists]:
"The genotype does not operate by gradual superimposition of independent traits and characters, each transmitted in a neat package labeled "the gene for good behavior" or "the gene for criminality" or the like. To be sure there, is no way known of changing the genotype with which one is born. But the manifestation of genotypes are in principle, alterable. Although our ability to control the development patterns of human beings is severely limited at present (1962), we may have confidence that medicine, education and social engineering are making steady headway."p100
and
"Human evolution has two components, the biological or organic, and the cultural or superorganic. These components are neither mutually exclusive nor independent but interrelated and interdependent. Human evolution cannot be understood as a purely biological process, nor can it be adequately described as a history of culture. It is the interaction of biology and culture. There exists a feedback between biological and cultural processes." p18
Sam Pawlett