Life in the laboratory: public responses to experimental biology

Public Understanding of Science
J Turney

Abstract

Present-day public attitudes to biological manipulation are ambivalent, many surveys show. This paper explores evidence of earlier attitudes to experimental biology, before survey data exists, by examining published responses in the press to the idea that biologists would 'create life'. This remarkable claim achieved wide currency in the early years of this century, particularly linked to the work of two prototypical 'visible scientists': Jacques Loeb and Alexis Carrel. Analysis of press responses to accounts of their work reveals deep disquiet about its possible implications, at a time when science and technology in general were regarded very positively. The evidence is augmented by studying commentary on a Presidential Address by Edward Schafer to the British Association meeting of 1912. It is concluded that feelings of ambivalence toward the manipulative power of biology are apparent at a very early stage in the development of modern biology, and that this makes it implausible that more recent manifestations of such ambivalence can be ascribed to some generalized 'anti-science' sentiment which has gathered strength in recent years.

References

Jul 1, 1979·Medical History·J A Witkowski
Jan 1, 1969·Isis; an International Review Devoted to the History of Science and Its Cultural Influences·G L Geison
Apr 1, 1980·Medical History·J A Witkowski
Oct 21, 1927·Science·B E Livingston
Sep 15, 1928·The Journal of General Physiology·W J Osterhout

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Citations

Dec 3, 2016·Journal of Molecular Evolution·Juli Peretó
Oct 17, 2009·Social Studies of Science·Heiner Fangerau

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