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Michael Ruse Sociobiology: Sense or Nonsense? (Boston: Kluwer 1979)

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Michael Ruse Sociobiology: Sense or Nonsense? (Boston: Kluwer 1979)

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  01 January 2020

Paul Thagard
Paul Thagard*
Affiliation:
University of Michigan-Dearborn
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Abstract

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Type
Critical Notice
Information
Canadian Journal of Philosophy , Volume 11 , Issue 4 , December 1981 , pp. 751 - 759
Copyright
Copyright © The Authors 1981

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References

1 See Wilson, E.O. Sociobiology, the New Synthesis (Cambridge, Mass.: Belknap Press 1975);Google Scholar Wilson, On Human Nature (Cambridge, Mass.: Harvard U.P. 1978);Google ScholarPubMed Caplan, Arthur L. ed., The Sociobiology Debate (New York: Harper and Row 1978).Google Scholar My concern in this review is with human sociobiology.

2 See the articles ‘Against “Sociobiology’” and “Sociobiology — Another Biological Determinism,’ reprinted in Caplan, op. cit.

3 Lewontin, R.C. ‘Sociobiology — A Caricature of Darwinism’ in Suppe, F. and Asquith, P.D. eds., PSA 1976, vol. 2 (East Lansing, Mich.: Philosophy of Science Association, 1977) 22–31.Google Scholar

4 Gould, Stephen Jay ‘Sociobiology: The Art of Storytelling,’ New Scientist 80 (16 November, 1978) 530–3.Google Scholar

5 See the discussion of simplicity in Thagard, Paul ‘The Best Explanation: Criteria for Theory Choice,’ Journal of Philosophy 75 (1978) 76–92.CrossRefGoogle Scholar

6 Cf. Richard M. Burian, ‘A Methodological Critique of Sociobiology,’ in Caplan, op. cit., 378, and Lewontin.

7 Ruse, Michael The Philosophy of Biology (London: Hutchinson 1973).Google Scholar

8 See Suppe, F. ed., The Structure of Scientific Theories, 2nd edn., (Urbana, Ill.: U. of Illinois Press, 1977).Google Scholar

9 Kuhn, T.S. The Structure of Scientific Revolutions, 2nd edn., (Chicago: U. of Chicago Press 1970).Google Scholar

10 Business Week, April 10, 1978; Playboy, August, 1978; Spearhead, March, 1979.

11 Popper, Karl Objective Knowledge (Oxford: Clarendon Press 1972).Google Scholar

12 Rudner, Richard ‘Value Judgements in the Acceptance of Theories’ in Frank, Philip G. ed., The Validation of Scientific Theories (New York: Collier 1961) 33.Google Scholar

13 A comprehensive survey of recent work in the philosophy of science only mentions the political philosophy of science in the chapter, ‘Continental Philosophy of Science,’ by Gary Gutting, which discusses Habermas. See Asquith, P. and Kyburg, H. eds., Current Research in the Philosophy of Science, (East Lansing, Mich.: Philosophy of Science Association 1979).Google Scholar

14 I am grateful to Daniel Hausman and Douglas Boucher for helpful comments.