Evolution's Eye: A Systems View of the Biology-Culture Divide

Science and Cultural Theory

by Susan Oyama

In recent decades, Susan Oyama and her colleagues in the burgeoning field of developmental systems theory have rejected the determinism inherent in the nature/nurture debate, arguing that behavior cannot be reduced to distinct biological or environmental causes. In Evolution’s Eye Oyama elaborates on her pioneering work on developmental systems by spelling out that work’s implications for the fields of evolutionary theory, developmental and social psychology, feminism, and epistemology. Her approach profoundly alters our understanding of the biological processes of development and evolution and the interrelationships between them.
While acknowledging that, in an uncertain world, it is easy to “blame it on the genes,” Oyama claims that the renewed trend toward genetic determinism colors the way we think about everything from human evolution to sexual orientation and personal responsibility. She presents instead a view that focuses on how a wide variety of developmental factors interact in the multileveled developmental systems that give rise to organisms. Shifting attention away from genes and the environment as causes for behavior, she convincingly shows the benefits that come from thinking about life processes in terms of developmental systems that produce, sustain, and change living beings over both developmental and evolutionary time.
Providing a genuine alternative to genetic and environmental determinism, as well as to unsuccessful compromises with which others have tried to replace them, Evolution’s Eye will fascinate students and scholars who work in the fields of evolution, psychology, human biology, and philosophy of science. Feminists and others who seek a more complex view of human nature will find her work especially congenial.

Genres: Biology, Nonfiction, Evolution, Science, Psychology

288 pages, Paperback

First published April 12, 2000

Reviews

[heptagrammaton · Rating 5 out of 5]

Brilliant. Of specific note: Oyama's persistent stress on the contiuty and persistence of dualism–metaphysical, theological, Platonic– and dualistic thinking in Western thought, the mind-body distinction being homologous (and perhaps genealogically related) to the nature-nurture distinction and ways of thinking about fixity, and innates, and moral judgement.

I would generally recommend Ch. 7, Essentialism, Women, and War, to anyone still having to do with deploying or suffering through political arguments and strategies rooted in biology.

____________________
{The essays in Evolution's Eye represent pieces previously published by Oyama, with some edits made for this edition. For my future reference – and to, hopefully, provide a bit of crossreferential utility for someone else out there eventually – I am compiling and referencing those original publications (with DOI hyperlinks wherever those are available) with their corresponding chapters here:

1. Transmission and Construction: Levels and the Problem of Heredity
   Originally a talk at Schneirla Conference, 1985. Publ. in G. Greenberg, E. Tobach (Eds.), Levels of social behavior (1992).

2. What Does the Phenocopy Copy? Originals and Fakes in Biology
   Orig. publ. in Psychological Reports, 48(2) (1981).

3. Ontogeny and the Central Dogma: Do We Need the Concept of Genetic Programming?
   Orig. talk at 22nd Minnesota Symposium on Child Psychology (1987). Publ. in M.R.Gunnar, E. Thelen (Eds.), Systems and development: Minnesota Symposia on Child Psychology, Vol. 22 (1989).

4. Stasis, Development, and Heredity: Models of Stability and Change
   Orig. remarks at Liberty Fund Conference, 1986. Publ. in M.-W. Ho, S.W.Fox (Eds.), Evolutionary processes and metaphors (1988).

5. Ontogeny and Phylogeny: A Case of Meta-Recapitulation?
   Orig. talk at Philosophivcal Problems in Evolutionary Biology conference, Dunedin, NZ, 1990. Published in P. E. Griffiths (Ed.), Trees of life: Essays in philosophy of biology (1992).

6. The Accidental Chordate: Contingency in Developmental Systems
   Orig. talk at meeting of Int. Society for the History, Philosopy, and Social Studies of Biology, Braneis University, 1993. Publ. in South Atlantic Quarterly 94(2) (1994). Also in Mathemaics, science, and postclassical theory (1997).

7. Essentialism, Women, and War: Protesting Too Much, Protesting Too Little
   Orig. a talk at Genes & Gender conference, NYC, 1986. Reprinted a bunch, and I am too lazy a bitch to be exhaustive. Among others, this (1997) might be available through your research institution.

8. The Conceptualization of Nature: Nature as Design
   Orig. talk at "Biology as a Basis for Design" conference, Perugia, 1988. Publ. in W.I. Thompson (Ed.) Gaia 2: Emergence: The New Science of Becoming (1991).

9. Bodies and Minds: Dualism in Evolutionary Theory
   Orig. publ. in Journal of Social Issues, 47(3) (1991).

10. How Shall I Name Thee? The Construction of Natural Selves
   Orig. publ. in Theory & Psychology, 3(4) (1993).

11. Evolutionary and Developmental Formation: Politics of the Boundary
   Orig. publ. in P. Koslowski (Ed.) Sociobiology and Bioeconomics: Studies in Economic Ethics and Philosophy (1999).
}

[Sadig · Rating 3 out of 5]

A beautiful idea and quite timely too. Alas, the language chosen is so vague for and so far from general audience. The book does give a strong message to the scientific/academic community, while being, probably, quite inaccessible to the general audience. Regardless, a really good read!

[Gregory · Rating 5 out of 5]

A wonderful and classic collection of essays from the founder of Developmental Systems Theory.