Lords of the Fly: Drosophila Genetics and the Experimental Life

by Robert E. Kohler

The common fruit fly, Drosophila, has long been one of the most productive of all laboratory animals. From 1910 to 1940, the center of Drosophila culture in America was the school of Thomas Hunt Morgan and his students Alfred Sturtevant and Calvin Bridges. They first created "standard" flies through inbreeding and by organizing a network for exchanging stocks of flies that spread their practices around the world.

In Lords of the Fly, Robert E. Kohler argues that fly laboratories are a special kind of ecological niche in which the wild fruit fly is transformed into an artificial animal with a distinctive natural history. He shows that the fly was essentially a laboratory tool whose startling productivity opened many new lines of genetic research. Kohler also explores the moral economy of the "Drosophilists": the rules for regulating access to research tools, allocating credit for achievements, and transferring authority from one generation of scientists to the next.

By closely examining the Drosophilists' culture and customs, Kohler reveals essential features of how experimental scientists do their work.

Genres: History Of Science, Science, Nonfiction, Biology, History, Sociology

344 pages, Paperback

First published May 2, 1994

About the author

Robert E. Kohler is a professor of the history and sociology of science at the University of Pennsylvania. He is the author of Lords of the Fly: Drosophila Genetics and the Experimental Life, published by the University of Chicago Press.

Reviews

[Floris · Rating 5 out of 5]

With this account Kohler tried to apply insights recently developed (in the 1980s and 90s) from the history and sociology of science to a particular field of biological science in the first half of the twentieth century. He aims to show how the Drosophilia, or common fruit fly, became so successful as a laboratory “technology” for genetics research. To show why and how Drosophilia became a successful experimental object, he looks intimately at a group of American researchers (and their practices) that studied them in the 1900s-1940s. The first part of the book looks at the early entry of these flies in the lab, how they were turned into a technology once there, what the moral economy of those labs were, and how Drosophilia researchers exchanged flies and communicated amongst each other (in private). The second part of the book looks at how research developed in the 1920s-40s, focusing in particular on a few researchers who developed innovative research programmes.

Despite its age and somewhat niche topic, the book is still wonderfully readable. I think it’s mostly due to the way Kohler goes about explaining his approach and attention to detail. His aim was not just to write a book about fly genetics in the early twentieth century, but also to advance a new way of writing lab histories, one which is more attentive to social and material cultures. His Introduction in particular is a case study in clarity, explaining without patronising the reader exactly why he feels it is important to understand how organisms can turn into technologies in laboratories, and why it is important to understand the moral economy of those laboratories. The first part of the book is also very compelling, more so than the second, which contains longer discussions of genetics research which are likely to please specialists more than laymen like me.

I did find the final chapter a bit disappointing in this regard. Kohler sells it as an exploration of how field and lab practices conflate, which is something he would become famous for a little later with Landscapes and Labscapes (still a highly cited work). But we have to wait until the second half of the chapter before we get to that theme, and when we do it’s presented more matter-of-factly than I expected, that is as an idiosyncrasy of the researcher he focuses on. Still, the book is still very strong overall. I also like how it was produced: minimal notes, and only really to indicate primary sources consulted; three-tiered bibliography offering something for specialists and non-specialists alike; very clear structuring throughout; and a very pleasant style of writing. You can tell that he enjoyed writing it. I can only recommend this classic for those like me who don’t read a lot of history of biology.

Also, the title is fantastic – props to Judith Goodstein, who suggested it to him at a party. This serendipity gives me hope for my own titles. Maybe I should go to more parties…

[Mark · Rating 4 out of 5]

This is an excellent book that outlines the research program and laboratory dynamics of the Cambridge Fly group in the early decades of the 1900s. I am particularly impressed by Kholer's discussion experimental animals (ok, flies) as technological tools, and the moral economy of scientific research groups. Certainly not for everyone, this book is an excellent study of how science progresses on a daily basis.

[Lena Webb · Rating 5 out of 5]

Scientists began using Drosophila melanogaster as a model organism around 1910, long before the advent of modern molecular biology techniques. My big question was "HOW on Earth were they able?" and this book does a good job of answering that question, while also addressing the personalities of the men [and maybe like, two women] involved in the endeavor.

[Nick Black]

Hah, this looks like it could be great!