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THE BOOKS
John L. Rudolph, Section Editor
In Pursuit of the Gene: From Darwin to DNA,by James Schwartz.
Harvard University
Press, Cambridge, MA, USA, 2008. xiii + 370 pp. ISBN
978-064-02670-4.
Science writer James Schwartz has written a history of genetics
that constructs a story
that goes from Darwin to the International HapMap Project. His
approach is to identify a
set of key characters and describe their life and work
(including some classic papers and
experiments). The approach is intelligent because anyone who has
lectured on genetics
(particularly to a nonmajor class) knows that the subject is one
that is notoriously difcult
to teach. Focusing on particular individuals allows a human
dimension to emerge, and by
looking at particular experiments or papers the author has the
opportunity to zero in on
especially important concepts.
In Pursuit of the Geneprovides good descriptions of many key
moments in the history
of genetics. The book, however, suffers from a Whiggish
framework that takes the present
as its terminus and attempts to reconstruct a path from the past
to current positions. The
book purports to be a history of the idea of the gene, but it is
not clear exactly what that
means or could mean. In a sense, the book is about the history
of particulate genetics, that
is, the notion that hereditary traits are inherited as discrete
units (as opposed to the idea
that hereditary material somehow blends). And while the history
of particulate genetics isa critical piece of the story of our
understanding of heredity, the authors approach does
great violence to the historical record and reinforces
simplistic notions of the nature of
sciencethe view of history of science as one long staircase of
progress from ignorance to
enlightenment.
Schwartzs history stresses the discovery and formulation of
correct ideas, and he
continually reminds his readers of the erroneous theories and
ideas of many of his
characters. But, ideas are correct or erroneous in particular
contexts, and to castigate
a historical gure for not getting it right can cloud the
historical picture more than it
illuminates. More important, for science educators who are
interested in using history of
science to illustrate the nature of science, this presentist
perspective masks the complexprocess of science that is more than
just discovering the ways things are. In narratives
such as Schwartzs, a small set of actors are identied, arranged
in chronological order,
and a history is constructed. It is, however, as often as not, a
history that misses much of
story, that stresses gures that had minimal impact, and that
ignores or gives little attention
to the central gures who played key roles in the changing
understanding of nature. As
often as not, even the individual vignettes are distorted so as
to make the gures conform
to a narrative that is highly articial.
Schwartz provides well-written and carefully researched
discussions of important ge-
neticists. In particular, he has given considerable attention to
Hermann Muller and Hugo
DeVries, often given minor roles in such histories. But, August
Weismann, perhaps themost important person in popularizing a
particulate genetics, is related to a set of walk
on parts. Weissman was wrong about a lot of things. But, not the
most important one: the
power of particulate genetics.
C2008 Wiley Periodicals, Inc.
