Animal Behavior, Population Biology and the Modern Synthesis (1955-1985).

This paper examines the history of animal behavior studies after the synthesis period. Three episodes are considered: the adoption of the theory of natural selection, the mathematization of ideas, and the spread of molecular methods in behavior studies. In these three episodes, students of behavior adopted practices and standards developed in population ecology and population genetics. While they borrowed tools and methods from these fields, they made distinct uses (inclusive fitness method, evolutionary theory of games, emphasis on individual selection) that set them relatively apart and led them to contribute, in their own way, to evolutionary theory. These episodes also highlight some limitations of "conjunction narratives" centered on the relation between a discipline and the modern synthesis. A trend in conjunction narratives is to interpret any development related to evolution in a discipline as an "extension," an "integration," or as a "delayed" synthesis. I here suggest that this can lead to underestimate discontinuities in the history of evolutionary biology.

The Development of Sociobiology in Relation to Animal Behavior Studies, 1946-1975.

This paper aims at bridging a gap between the history of American animal behavior studies and the history of sociobiology. In the post-war period, ecology, comparative psychology and ethology were all investigating animal societies, using different approaches ranging from fieldwork to laboratory studies. We argue that this disunity in "practices of place" (Kohler, Robert E. Landscapes & Labscapes: Exploring the Lab-Field Border in Biology. Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 2002) explains the attempts of dialogue between those three fields and early calls for unity through "sociobiology" by J. Paul Scott. In turn, tensions between the naturalist tradition and the rising reductionist approach in biology provide an original background for a history of Edward Wilson's own version of sociobiology, much beyond the William Hamilton's papers (Journal of Theoretical Biology 7: 1-16, 17-52, 1964) usually considered as its key antecedent. Naturalists were in a defensive position in the geography of the fields studying animal behavior, and in reaction were a driving force behind the various projects of synthesis called "sociobiology".

Understanding Societies from Inside the Organisms. Leo Pardi's Work on Social Dominance in Polistes Wasps (1937-1952).

Leo Pardi (1915-1990) was the initiator of ethological research in Italy. During more than 50 years of active scientific career, he gave groundbreaking contributions to the understanding of social life in insects, especially in Polistes wasps, an important model organism in sociobiology. In the 1940s, Pardi showed that Polistes societies are organized in a linear social hierarchy that relies on reproductive dominance and on the physiological and developmental mechanisms that regulate it, i.e. on the status of ovarian development of single wasps. Pardi's work set the stage for further research on the regulatory mechanisms governing social life in primitively eusocial organisms both in wasps and in other insect species. This article reconstructs Pardi's investigative pathway between 1937 and 1952 in the context of European ethology and American animal sociology. This reconstruction focuses on the development of Pardi's physiological approach and presents a new perspective on the interacting development of these two fields at the origins of our current understanding of animal social behavior.

'Morals can not be drawn from facts but guidance may be': the early life of W.D. Hamilton's theory of inclusive fitness.

W.D. Hamilton's theory of inclusive fitness saw the evolution of altruism from the point of view of the gene. It was at heart a theory of limits, redefining altruistic behaviours as ultimately selfish. This theory inspired two controversial texts published almost in tandem, E.O. Wilson's Sociobiology: The New Synthesis (1975) and Richard Dawkins's The Selfish Gene (1976). When Wilson and Dawkins were attacked for their evolutionary interpretations of human societies, they claimed a distinction between reporting what is and declaring what ought to be. Can the history of sociobiological theories be so easily separated from its sociopolitical context? This paper draws upon unpublished materials from the 1960s and early 1970s and documents some of the ways in which Hamilton saw his research as contributing to contemporary concerns. It pays special attention to the 1969 Man and Beast Smithsonian Institution symposium in order to explore the extent to which Hamilton intended his theory to be merely descriptive versus prescriptive. From this, we may see that Hamilton was deeply concerned about the political chaos he perceived in the world around him, and hoped to arrive at a level of self-understanding through science that could inform a new social order.

["Human races": history of a dangerous illusion]. / Les "races humaines": histoire d'une illusion dangereuse.

The multiplication of offences prompted by racism and the increase of complaints for racism leads us to consider the illusory concept of "human races". This idea crossed the history, and was reinforced by the discovery of remote tribes and human fossils, and by the development of sociobiology and quantitative psychology. Deprived of scientific base, the theory of the "races" must bow before the notions of genetic variation and unicity of mankind.

Koch's postulates, carnivorous cows, and tuberculosis today.

With Koch's announcement in 1882 of his work with the tubercle bacillus, his famous postulates launched the rational world of infectious disease and an abrupt social change--strict patient isolation. The postulates, so successful at their inception, soon began to show some problems, particularly with cholera, which clearly violated some of Koch's requirements. Subsequent studies of other diseases and the discovery of entirely new ones have so altered and expanded the original postulates that they now are little but a precious touch of history. The present additions and replacements of the original concepts are skillful changes that several authors have devised to introduce new order into understanding complex viral and prion diseases. In 1988, this knowledge, with the totally rational response of the British population and its cattle industry, was critical in promptly blocking the threatened epidemic of human prion disease. In contrast, the recent upsurge of tuberculosis (TB) in the worldwide AIDS epidemic in developing countries, and the sudden increase in metabolic syndrome in wealthy ones, suggests the need for focused sociobiologic research seeking ways to affect the damaging lifestyle behavior of many less educated populations in both settings. The world awaits an equivalent of Koch's Postulates in sociobiology to explain and possibly avert large self-destructive behaviors.

[Notes on the historical evolution of the work of Pedro Ortiz Cabanillas and his sociobiological informational theory]. / Apuntes sobre la evolución histórica de la obra de Pedro Ortiz Cabanillas y su teoría sociobiológica informacional.

The Informational Sociobiological Theory proposes a radically-different definition of living systems and, therefore, is the only existing neurological theory that evades the mind-brain problem and explains the nature of human consciousness. It was developed by Pedro Ortiz Cabanillas between 1984 and 2011. In this document we are presenting a listing of his main works. We include, additionally, unpublished material of the years 1998, 1999, 2006, and 2009.

La Teoría Sociobiológica Informacional propone una definición radicalmente distinta de los sistemas vivos, y con lo mismo es la única teoría neurológica existente que evade el problema mente-cerebro y que explica la naturaleza de la conciencia humana. Fue desarrollada por Pedro Ortiz Cabanillas entre 1984 y 2011. En este documento vamos a realizar un recuento de todas sus obras más importantes. Incluimos, adicionalmente, material inédito de los años 1998, 1999, 2006, y 2009.

Wilson and the unification of science.

This article analyzes the thought and intellectual contribution of Edward O. Wilson, among the most prominent and influential convergenists. It concentrates on the deep ambition going as a bright thread through Wilson's whole scientific output: the unification of science and knowledge. It traces the background of this ambition in Wilson's personal history and follows its various articulations throughout his career.

Human dignity in the Nazi era: implications for contemporary bioethics.

BACKGROUND: The justification for Nazi programs involving involuntary euthanasia, forced sterilisation, eugenics and human experimentation were strongly influenced by views about human dignity. The historical development of these views should be examined today because discussions of human worth and value are integral to medical ethics and bioethics. We should learn lessons from how human dignity came to be so distorted to avoid repetition of similar distortions. DISCUSSION: Social Darwinism was foremost amongst the philosophies impacting views of human dignity in the decades leading up to Nazi power in Germany. Charles Darwin's evolutionary theory was quickly applied to human beings and social structure. The term 'survival of the fittest' was coined and seen to be applicable to humans. Belief in the inherent dignity of all humans was rejected by social Darwinists. Influential authors of the day proclaimed that an individual's worth and value were to be determined functionally and materialistically. The popularity of such views ideologically prepared German doctors and nurses to accept Nazi social policies promoting survival of only the fittest humans.A historical survey reveals five general presuppositions that strongly impacted medical ethics in the Nazi era. These same five beliefs are being promoted in different ways in contemporary bioethical discourse. Ethical controversies surrounding human embryos revolve around determinations of their moral status. Economic pressures force individuals and societies to examine whether some people's lives are no longer worth living. Human dignity is again being seen as a relative trait found in certain humans, not something inherent. These views strongly impact what is taken to be acceptable within medical ethics. SUMMARY: Five beliefs central to social Darwinism will be examined in light of their influence on current discussions in medical ethics and bioethics. Acceptance of these during the Nazi era proved destructive to many humans. Their widespread acceptance today would similarly lead to much human death and suffering. A different ethic is needed which views human dignity as inherent to all human individuals.

[The evolutionist fallacy of early visitors. Analogies between 'primitive peoples' and prehistoric man in medical historiography]. / Der evolutionistische Fehlschluss vom Fremden auf das Frühe. Die Analogie zwischen "Naturvilkern" und Urmensch in der Medizingeschichtsschreibung.

Accounts of 'prehistoric medicine' and 'ethnomedicine' have sometimes led to conclusions by analogy in medical historiography that are seen as highly problematic in modern cultural anthropology. However, this review of medical historical writings of the last three centuries shows that evolutionist identifications of early with foreign medicine were not a permanent trait of medical historiography. This approach flourished mainly in the climate of certain movements or periods that were characterised by fanatical belief in progress and by social utopias: the French Revolution, Darwinism and the period of industrial expansion in Germany, and National Socialism. Medical historiography shared this problematic approach with contemporary (social and cultural) anthropology, and - despite this methodological misuse - both acknowledged the legitimacy or even requirement of studying also similarities in the development of different periods and cultures.

Popular evolutionary psychology in the UK: an unusual case of science in the media?

This paper presents findings from quantitative analyses of UK press and print media coverage of evolutionary psychology during the 1990s. It argues that evolutionary psychology presents an interesting case for studies of science in the media in several different ways. First, press coverage of evolutionary psychology was found to be closely linked with the publications of popular books on the subject. Secondly, when compared to coverage of other subjects, a higher proportion of academics and authors wrote about evolutionary psychology in the press, contributing to the development of a scientific controversy in the public domain. Finally, it was found that evolutionary psychology coverage appeared in different areas of the daily press, and was rarely written about by specialist science journalists. The possible reason for these features are then explored, including the boom in popular science publishing during the 1990s, evolutionary psychology's status as a new subject of study and discussion, and the nature of the subject its as theoretically based and with a human, "everyday" subject matter.

The rise, fall and resurrection of group selection.

The changing fate of group selection theory illustrates nicely the importance of studying the history of science. It was Charles Darwin that first used something like group selection to explain how natural selection could give rise to altruistic behavior and moral instinct. These instincts could be accommodated by his theory of evolution, he argued, if they had evolved 'for the good of the community'. By the 1960s, group selection had a new and vocal advocate in V.C. Wynne-Edwards. But this gave critics of the theory that selection might act on groups, rather than at the level of individuals or genes, a definable target, and from the mid-1960s to the 1980s group selection was considered the archetypal example of flawed evolutionary thinking. However, at the end of the 20th century ideas of group selection re-emerged as an important component of a multilevel theory of evolution.

Revisiting the left-wing response to sociobiology: the case of Finland in a European context.

This article revisits the left-wing response to sociobiology in the 1970s and 1980s by examining the sociobiology debate in Finland in a larger European context. It argues that the Finnish academic left's response to sociobiology represents a "third way" alongside the purely negative, often Marxist denial of biology's relevance, which characterized the left's response to sociobiology in many European countries such as Hungary and Sweden, and alongside the disregard that sociobiology confronted in most parts of Eastern Europe, as well as in Germany. In the context of the last great political conflict of the Cold War in Europe, the controversy over the American "Euromissiles" (Pershing II and Tomahawk) in 1979-1983, the Finnish academic left challenged the allegedly fatalistic sociobiological aggression and war theories with an alternative biological language, turning the increasing enthusiasm over evolutionary ideas into a pacifist cause. Using leftist and pacifist forums to inform citizens and politicians of such biologically evolved human characteristics as mutual care and sociability, the Finnish critics of sociobiology wished to boost the public spirit, and to rationalize the pacifist ideal of the European-wide popular movement against nuclear weapons and militarism. As a result, the academic leftists in Finland revived the early twentieth-century tradition of "peace biology." A proper understanding of this development calls for an analysis that acknowledges Finland's special geopolitical and cultural position in the Cold War world between East and West.

Aproximación biográfica a Pedro Ortiz Cabanillas (1933-2011) y su teoría sociobiológica informacional en el contexto de la neurología científica peruana / Biographical approach to Pedro Ortiz Cabanillas (1933-2011) and his informational sociobiological theory in the context of Peruvian scientific neurology

El desarrollo histórico inicial de la neurología peruana tiene como figura a Oscar Trelles quien funda las bases de su progreso. Sin embargo, aún no se ha descrito los hitos ni las personalidades notables de la neurología peruana en la segunda mitad del siglo XX en adelante. El objetivo de este trabajo fue escribir la etapa científica de la neurología en el Perú durante la segunda mitad del siglo XX, proponiendo la obra de Pedro Ortiz Cabanillas como una propuesta disruptiva e innovadora en la neurología. Durante la segunda mitad del siglo XX, se diverjo las escuelas formadoras de neurología en la Universidad Nacional Mayor de San Marcos y la Universidad Peruana Cayetano Heredia, sendas representada por Honorio Delgado y Oscar Trelles. Durante la segunda mitad del siglo XX, Pedro Ortiz da forma a la información como la materia que organiza a los sistemas vivos, en su Teoría Sociobiológica Informacional. En esta plantea que la información se a complejizado en cinco niveles organizativos de sistemas vivos. Conforme las consideraciones de desarrollo de la neurología en la segunda mitad del siglo XX en el Perú, resaltamos a Pedro Ortiz como un pionero que propone una redefinición del entendimiento de la información en los sistemas vivos.

The initial historical development of Peruvian neurology includes Oscar Trelles who is the founder of the groundwork and its progress. However, the milestones of noteworthy individuals in Peruvian neurology work, during the second half of the 20th century and beyond, have not yet been described. The objective of this work was to address the scientific stage of neurology in Peru during the second half of the 20th century, proposing the work of Pedro Ortiz Cabanillas as a disruptive and innovative proposal in neurology. During the second half of the 20th century, the neurology training schools were divided into the National University of San Marcos and the Universidad Peruana Cayetano Heredia, represented by Honorio Delgado and Oscar Trelles. During the second half of the twentieth century, Pedro Ortiz relates information as the material that organizes living systems, in his Informational Sociobiological Theory. In this work it is stated that information becomes more complex in five organizational levels of living systems. According to the development considerations of neurology in the second half of the 20th century in Peru, we highlight Pedro Ortiz as a pioneer who proposes a redefinition of the understanding of information in living systems.

Apuntes sobre la evolución histórica de la obra de Pedro Ortiz Cabanillas y su teoría sociobiológica informacional / Notes on the historical evolution of the work of Pedro Ortiz Cabanillas and his sociobiological informational theory

RESUMEN La Teoría Sociobiológica Informacional propone una definición radicalmente distinta de los sistemas vivos, y con lo mismo es la única teoría neurológica existente que evade el problema mente-cerebro y que explica la naturaleza de la conciencia humana. Fue desarrollada por Pedro Ortiz Cabanillas entre 1984 y 2011. En este documento vamos a realizar un recuento de todas sus obras más importantes. Incluimos, adicionalmente, material inédito de los años 1998, 1999, 2006, y 2009.

ABSTRACT The Informational Sociobiological Theory proposes a radically-different definition of living systems and, therefore, is the only existing neurological theory that evades the mind-brain problem and explains the nature of human consciousness. It was developed by Pedro Ortiz Cabanillas between 1984 and 2011. In this document we are presenting a listing of his main works. We include, additionally, unpublished material of the years 1998, 1999, 2006, and 2009.

Social Darwinism: from reality to myth and from myth to reality.

Considering the variety of contradictory definitions which have been attributed to the term in the course of more than a century, one may be tempted to admit that 'Social Darwinism' can be reduced to a social myth. But it seems nevertheless necessary to answer the question: what has been called 'Social Darwinism' for more than one century and why was the expression used in a negative way to express contradictory opinions which sometimes have nothing to do with Darwin's theory. What we still call 'Social Darwinism' is the result of a misunderstanding: the theories expressed under that phrase have little to do with the Darwinian concepts of natural selection or descent with modification. They have their origin in a pre-darwinian conception of the struggle for existence, which Darwin used in a metaphorical sense. This confusion will then appear to refer clearly to the relationship we establish between biology and society, whether biological laws are directly prolonged in society, or more or less intermingle in a close network. The issue of the definition of Social Darwinism depends obviously on the possible answers to this question, and so does the issue of redefining Darwinism at large.

It takes two: sexual strategies and game theory.

David Buss's Sexual Strategies Theory is one of the major evolutionary psychological research programmes, but, as I try to show in this paper, its theoretical and empirical foundations cannot yet be seen to be fully compelling. This lack of cogency comes about due to Buss's failure to attend to the interactive nature of his subject matter, which leads him to overlook two classic and well known issues of game theoretic and evolutionary biological analysis. Firstly, Buss pays insufficient attention to the fact that, since mate choice is a cooperative decision, what is adaptive for the two sexes individually is irrelevant to the evolutionary explanation of our sexual strategies; instead, all that matters is what is adaptive given the choices made by the other sex. Secondly, Buss does not pay enough attention to the difference between polymorphic and monomorphic evolutionarily stable states in his attempt to empirically confirm his theory. Because of this, the data he presents and analyses are unable to show that natural selection is the most important element in the explanation of the origins of our sexual strategies. In this way, I try to make clear that, at least as things stand now, Buss has failed to provide compelling grounds for thinking that Sexual Strategies Theory can make a major contribution to human psychology.

Darwin and sexual selection: One hundred years of misunderstanding.

Darwin's book on the Descent of Man and Selection in Relation to Sex (1871) is often viewed as the continuation of The Origin of Species published 12 years earlier (1859), both because of the implicit parallelism between natural selection and sexual selection, and because Darwin himself presents the book as developing a subject (man) which he intentionally omitted in the Origin. But the Descent can also be viewed as the continuation of his book on Variation published three years earlier (1868). Firstly because Darwin's hypothesis of pangenesis links the selection process to the origin of variation through use and disuse, an idea underlying his speculations on the origin of moral sense in humans. Second because like the action of the horticulturist on his domestic crops, sexual selection exerted by one sex on the other sex can develop fancy traits that are not easily accounted for by their utility to the selected organism itself, such as artistic taste, pride, courage, and the morphological differences between human populations. These traits are difficult to reconcile with pangenesis. They add up to other contradictions of the book possibly resulting from Darwin's erroneous inference about the mechanism of inheritance, like those on the determination of sex-ratio, or the confusion between individual adaptation and the advantage to the species. These inconsistencies inaugurate a weakening of the Darwinian message, which will last 50 years after his death. They contributed to the neglect of sexual selection for a century. Darwin however maintained a logical distinction between evolutionary mechanisms and hereditary mechanisms, and an epistemological distinction between evolutionary theory and Pangenesis hypothesis. In the modern context of Mendelian genetics, Darwin's sexual selection retrospectively appears as luminous an idea in its pure principle as natural selection, even though the mechanisms governing the evolution of sexual choice in animals remain largely unresolved.