Shaping Science with Rhetoric: The Cases of Dobzhansky, Schrodinger, and Wilson
Leah Ceccarelli
Abstract
How do scientists persuade colleagues from diverse fields to cross the disciplinary divide, risking their careers in new interdisciplinary research programs? Why do some attempts to inspire such research win widespread acclaim and support, while others do not? This book addresses such questions through close readings of three scientific monographs in their historical contexts—Theodosius Dobzhansky's Genetics and the Origin of Species (1937), which inspired the “modern synthesis” of evolutionary biology; Erwin Schrödinger's What Is Life? (1944), which catalyzed the field of molecular biology; a ... More
How do scientists persuade colleagues from diverse fields to cross the disciplinary divide, risking their careers in new interdisciplinary research programs? Why do some attempts to inspire such research win widespread acclaim and support, while others do not? This book addresses such questions through close readings of three scientific monographs in their historical contexts—Theodosius Dobzhansky's Genetics and the Origin of Species (1937), which inspired the “modern synthesis” of evolutionary biology; Erwin Schrödinger's What Is Life? (1944), which catalyzed the field of molecular biology; and Edward O. Wilson's Consilience (1998), a so far not entirely successful attempt to unite the social and biological sciences. The book examines the rhetorical strategies used in each book and evaluates which worked best, based on the reviews and scientific papers that followed in their wake.
Keywords:
interdisciplinary research,
Theodosius Dobzhansky,
Erwin Schrödinger,
Edward O. Wilson,
What is Life,
Consilience,
evolutionary biology,
molecular biology
Bibliographic Information
| Print publication date: 2001 |
Print ISBN-13: 9780226099064 |
| Published to Chicago Scholarship Online: March 2013 |
DOI:10.7208/chicago/9780226099088.001.0001 |
