Sociobiology - Criticism

Criticism

Many critics draw an intellectual link between sociobiology and biological determinism, the belief that most human differences can be traced to specific genes rather than differences in culture or social environments. Critics also see parallels between sociobiology and biological determinism as a philosophy underlying the social Darwinian and eugenics movements of the early 20th century, and controversies in the history of intelligence testing. Steven Pinker argues that critics have been overly swayed by politics (many of them are Marxists) and a fear of biological determinism. However, all these critics have claimed that sociobiology fails on scientific grounds, independent of their political critiques. In particular, Lewontin, Rose & Kamin drew a detailed distinction between the politics and history of an idea and its scientific validity, as has Stephen Jay Gould.

Wilson and his supporters counter the intellectual link by denying that Wilson had a political agenda, still less a right-wing one. They pointed out that Wilson had personally adopted a number of liberal political stances and had attracted progressive sympathy for his outspoken environmentalism. They argued that as scientists they had a duty to uncover the truth whether that was politically correct or not. They argued that sociobiology does not necessarily lead to any particular political ideology, as many critics implied. Many subsequent sociobiologists, including Robert Wright, Anne Campbell, Frans de Waal and Sarah Blaffer Hrdy, have used sociobiology to argue quite separate points. Noam Chomsky roundly criticized sociobiology and many of its proponents, saying "Even if we grant every factual conclusion for which some shred of evidence is claimed, nothing of interest follows, except on assumptions that reflect ideological fanaticism, not science." He also noted that the anarchist Peter Kropotkin had touched on the ideas of sociobiology (he claims that Kropotkin rather than E.O. Wilson had actually founded the field) in his book Mutual Aid: A Factor of Evolution, although focusing more on altruism than aggression, suggesting that anarchist societies were feasible because of an innate human tendency to cooperate.

Wilson's claims that he had never meant to imply what ought to be, only what is the case are supported by his writings, which are descriptive, not prescriptive. However, some critics have argued that the language of sociobiology sometimes slips from "is" to "ought", leading sociobiologists to make arguments against social reform on the basis that socially progressive societies are at odds with our innermost nature. Views such as this, however, are often criticized as examples of the naturalistic fallacy, when reasoning jumps from descriptions about what is to prescriptions about what ought to be. (A common example is the justification of militarism if scientific evidence showed warfare was part of human nature.) It has also been argued that opposition to stances considered anti-social, such as ethnic nepotism, are based on moral assumptions, not bioscientific assumptions, meaning that it is not vulnerable to being disproved by bioscientific advances. The history of this debate, and others related to it, are covered in detail by Cronin (1992), Segerstråle (2000), Alcock (2001), and most recently by Griffith (2011).