Steven Rose - Research and Scientific Controversies

Research and Scientific Controversies

With Richard Lewontin and Leon Kamin, Rose championed the "radical science movement." The three criticized sociobiology, evolutionary psychology, and adaptationism, most prominently in the book Not in Our Genes (1984), laying out their opposition to Sociobiology (E. O. Wilson, 1975), The Selfish Gene (Richard Dawkins, 1976), and other works promoting an evolutionary explanation for human social behaviour. Not in Our Genes described Dawkins as "the most reductionist of sociobiologists". In retort, Dawkins wrote that the book practices reductionism by distorting arguments in terms of genetics to "an idiotic travesty (that the properties of a complex whole are simply the sum of those same properties in the parts)", and accused the authors of giving "ideology priority over truth". Rose replied in the 2nd edition of his book Lifelines. Rose wrote further works in this area; in 2000 he jointly edited with the sociologist Hilary Rose, a critique of evolutionary psychology: Alas, Poor Darwin: Arguments Against Evolutionary Psychology, although this work has been criticized as "utterly unconcerned with accuracy". In 2006 he wrote a paper dismissing classical heritability estimates as useful scientific measures in respect of human populations especially in the context of IQ.

Rose was for several years a regular panelist on BBC Radio 4's ethics debating series The Moral Maze. Rose is a Distinguished Supporter of the British Humanist Association. He is presently a member of the Nuffield Council on Bioethics Working Party on Novel Neurotechnologies.