Studies in History and Philosophy of Science Part A 44 (2):280-291 (2013)
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As a defender of the fundamental importance of Mendel’s experiments for understanding heredity, the English biologist William Bateson did much to publicize the usefulness of Mendelian science for practical breeders. In the course of his campaigning, he not only secured a reputation among breeders as a scientific expert worth listening to but articulated a vision of the ideal relations between pure and applied science in the modern state. Yet historical writing about Bateson has tended to underplay these utilitarian elements of his program, to the extent of portraying him, notably in still-influential work from the 1960s and 1970s, as a type specimen of the scientist who could not care less about application. This paper offers a corrective view of Bateson himself—including the first detailed account of his role as an expert witness in a courtroom dispute over the identity of a commercial pea variety—and an inquiry into the historiographic fate of his efforts in support of Mendelism’s productivity. For all that a Marxian perspective classically brings applied science to the fore, in Bateson’s case, and for a range of reasons, it did the opposite during the Cold War
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DOI | 10.1016/j.shpsa.2012.11.009 |
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References found in this work BETA
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Citations of this work BETA
Uprooting Narratives: Legacies of Colonialism in the Neoliberal University.Melanie Bowman & María Rebolleda-Gómez - 2020 - Hypatia 35 (1):18-40.
Bruno to Brünn; or the Pasteurization of Mendelian Genetics.Dominic Berry - 2014 - Studies in History and Philosophy of Science Part C: Studies in History and Philosophy of Biological and Biomedical Sciences 48:280-286.
Should “Heredity” and “Inheritance” Be Biological Terms? William Bateson’s Change of Mind as a Historical and Philosophical Problem.Gregory Radick - 2012 - Philosophy of Science 79 (5):714-724.
The Nature of Philosophy and the Philosophy of Nature: Peter Godfrey-Smith: Philosophy of Biology. Princeton, NJ: Princeton University Press, 2014.Tim Lewens - 2015 - Biology and Philosophy 30 (4):587-596.
Heritable Changeability: Epimutation and the Legacy of Negative Definition in Epigenetic Concepts.Anne Le Goff, Patrick Allard & Hannah Landecker - 2021 - Studies in History and Philosophy of Science Part A 86:35-46.
View all 6 citations / Add more citations
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