Book Reviewed: Galileo's Middle Finger, by Alice Dreger

Book Reviewed: Galileo's Middle Finger, by Alice Dreger

The society in conflict: Handling academic freedom and political correctness

In this book, Northwestern University Professor Alice Dreger tackles an interesting topic of academic freedom and social responsibility. She discusses three cases in particular. First, the work of anthropologist Napoleon Chagnon for his long-term ethnographic field work among the Yanomamö, a society of indigenous tribal Amazonians, in which he used unconventional evolutionary theory and genetics to understand social behavior, especially violence. But he was too quick to offer biological explanations for the propensity to commit violence. Critics said that they were based on some questionable sociobiological methods, and the study was not exhaustive enough to make such key conclusions.

In the case of biologist E. O. Wilson, his views on religion and society were criticized as “right-wing.” Wilson says that he is not an atheist and he believes that faith in God and rituals of religion are products of evolution. He argues that they should not be rejected or dismissed, but further investigated to understand their significance. He suggests that scientists and religious leaders have to work together to understand this evolutionary significance of faith.

The case of another Northwestern University professor, J. Michael Bailey’s work on transgendered women is subjected to wide criticism both within academia and outside. Professor Dreger discusses this case with the “middle of the road” approach in a non-biased manner respecting the academic freedom of Professor Bailey and the rights of transgendered women he interviewed for his research work. She stresses the importance of rigorous truth seeking in research but the media and the activists also struggle under dire economic and political threats to skew their opinions. In this process, the freedom of speech is hurt deeply and the research findings that are going to be unpopular will have to remain within the confines of the academic world with little use for the society. That would a perilous state to be in.