When the world attains an academically perfect and ideal future, there will be neither academic subjects nor disciplines, as all education will be merged into one major unit. Mathematics, for instance, will have so much philosophy and Biology will have so much theology that all subjects will simply merge into one. This reality has commenced in the form of academic euphemisms where disciplines and subjects are so much intertwined that they are now considered as one. The instant term paper evaluates two disciplines in a scientific study that have very different roots and histories but as their respective studies continue, extreme congruency continues to be noted between them. This congruency has resulted in them being referred to interchangeably, albeit euphemistically since they are still two very different scientific disciplines. The first is sociobiology, which according to E. O. Wilson is an extension of the theory of evolution and population biology. On the other hand, there is the evolutionary psychology, which views psychological structures through the eyes of modern perspectives on evolution. The statement Why "Sociobiology" is now "Evolutionary Psychology" means that sociobiology as a discipline is gradually mimicking evolutionary biology in nature, scope, perspective and conclusions hence this is a reality and not a euphemism.
Background
Traditionally, science focused on material aspects that are mainly physical in nature. With regard to humans, the scientific study focused on the tangible aspects of human nature such as physiology and physiobiology. When humans aspired to understand their origins and were not satisfied with creation stories, they were still only investigating concept relating to the physical nature of the human being (Cartwright, 2016). This eventually led to the scientific theory of evolution, which began as extremely controversial, but has come to be accepted even by many religious circles. As more and more of the human and animal physical features began to be connected to evolutionary concepts, a deeper understanding of the human body developed. This has inter alia contributed to the modern advancement in the field of curative medicine.
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Human health, however, was within the 20th century given a definition and meaning that rises beyond just the physical. This gave rise to the subject of human health being advanced into a broader perspective dubbed human wellbeing. The man was found to be a social being with social interaction being an integral part of well-being. When science sought to understand social interactions on human beings, this led to a discipline that closely relates to biology referred to as sociobiology (Cartwright, 2016). The study incorporated in sociobiology was not novel. The scientist who ventured into looking at human interaction from a biological perspective can be said to have trespassed into another area of science that was already in existence. This branch of science focused on the human mind, and is referred to a psychologist. Traditionally, psychology was not considered as science per se especially by the scientists who focused on physiological elements of the human being. Gradually, psychology experts began to realize that it is impossible to study the mind, without also studying the body itself (Buss, 2015). This gave rise to the interest of psychologists in biology, which would eventually lead to the discipline of psychiatry. It was only a matter of time before the study of biology would bring scientists to the concept of evolution leading to the development of the discipline known as evolutionary psychology. As the biologists studied sociobiology and the psychologists studied evolutionary psychology, their paths began to merge.
Sociobiology as a Discipline
One of the most curious zoological concepts relates to the African lioness, one of the most ferocious animals on the planet and one of the greatest hunters. Yet, lionesses would always be found formed together into social groups complete with a leader. Animals being social is not a new phenomenon but the joining together of a group of females which would remain together whether or not there was a male in the group and even when the males changed was quite curious. Further, the females would always chase away males that came off-age and retain the females (Main, 2013). The reason for this concept was finally realized and forms part of the primary basis for sociobiology. It was realized that females ganged together to protect their cubs from male lions who would always kill cubs who did not belong to them biologically. Even mere suspicion that a cub was not sired by a male lion was reason enough for the male to kill it. With males being exponentially stronger than females, the females joined in groups to protect their cubs from the males.
How did the males learn how to kill young ones of their own species to protect their bloodlines? And how did lionesses learn to join together in groups to counter this behavior in males? The only plausible answer to these questions is, just as members of the animal kingdom evolved lungs to live out of the water and birds evolved wings to fly, lionesses developed the behavior of female pride who chase away males to protect cubs and by extension the entire species. The discipline of sociobiology is entirely based on the understanding that behavioral characteristics that are social in nature can be based on nature which is inherited and can thus evolve, and not just nurture that is acquired and cannot be passed on through genetics (Cartwright, 2016).
Edward Osborne Wilson versus Stephen Jay Gould
The culmination of the development of sociobiology including the coining of the name ‘sociobiology’ would only come in the 1970s through the genius of biologist and naturalist E.N. Osborne. This led to a major controversy spearheaded inter alia by Stephen Gould through, among another means, an open letter to Osborne on the concept of sociobiology. The high level of acrimony between the two great scholars was exacerbated by the fact that both were attached to the prestigious Harvard University where they lectured, researched, and published (Barnes, 2014). Osborne was and still is one of the greatest ant experts in the world and his sociobiological theories were based on applying his understanding of ants to human behavior. On the other hand, Gould was a snails expert and based his argument on the understanding of snails, which he applied to human evolution.
Subsequent research, study, and publications eventually vindicated Osborne and to some extent, Gould would eventually come to agree with him. This agreement would mainly be because Gould had studied the world of Charles Darwin extensively and to some extent, the theories of Osborne agreed with those of Darwin (Barnes, 2014). This consensus mainly lies when it comes to the relationship between be evolution and social behavior. It must also be admitted that whether or not Osborne was mostly right is secondary to the fact that in the 1970s, his allegations would have been considered as extremely controversial with or without scientific evidence. Osborne argued that free-will did not exist and all behavior was predetermined. A man could not choose to be social or anti-social. Being good or bad in relationships did not come out of personal effort or even proper upbringing but rather genetics. As indicated in the treatise Sociobiology: The New Synthesis, 1975 , human and animal behavior is determined by a combination of genetics, environmental factors, and past experiences (Barnes, 2014). How an individual reacts to a certain set of life’s circumstances is, therefore, predetermined.
Through a letter dubbed "Against 'Sociobiology', addressed to The New York Review of Books but openly published, Gould and a few colleagues carefully castigated the concept that human behavior was predetermined and based on evolutionary prerequisites. They made a strong case for nurture as opposed to nature being the main bearing factor on human and animal behavior. Horgan, (2015) gives a plausible explanation about Gould’s opposition of sociobiology. Gould believed in the Marxist hypothesis that it is cultures that evolve and not people. This hypothesis could not auger well with a theory where it is people who evolve socially and not cultures. The latter is based on nature while the former is based purely on nurture as the premise for social behavior. This is perhaps the ground for Gould’s opposition of Osborne. To the extent that Sociobiology was based on Darwinism, Gould would eventually acquiesce to the fact that sociobiology was based on sound science. Eventually, other scientists got convinced on the soundness of Sociobiology enabling it to gradually earn a mainstream status.
Evolutionary Psychology
To understand the relationship between the Sociobiology and evolutionary psychology, it would be important to have an understanding of what the latter is. The main basis for evolutionary psychology is the concept of modularity of mind. This is the belief that the mind, at the very least to some extent, results from innate neural structures or modules which have developed through evolution (Buss, 2015). Greif, for example, is a purely emotional issue and falls under the purview of psychology, rather than biology. Yet, almost all over the world, when there is a death in the family, the women will be affected more than the men. The mother will also be attached to a child more than the father in many species but in some like the Ostrich, mothers have no relationship with their young, leaving all the parental obligations to the fathers. This led to the hypothesis that biological factors are a major bearing factor on emotional and psychological issues (Buss, 2015). With biological factors being mainly based on evolution, the study of psychology from a biological perspective would eventually lead to a connection between psychological behavior and evolution. This is the basis for modularity of mind and by extension evolutionary psychology.
Conclusion: Reality or Euphemism?
The culmination of this term paper is a discussion that leads to the conclusion on the question on why "Sociobiology" is now "Evolutionary Psychology". Is it a wrong statement, a euphemism, or a statement of fact? From a general perspective, Sociobiology is now Evolutionary Psychology because the two academic disciplines are based on the same premise, investigate the same hypothesis, and arrive at the same set of conclusion. The only difference between them is their advent and the paths that they have followed. Sociobiology began with biology then crossed over to investigate the psychological subject of social relationships. It eventually landed at the conclusion that social conduct is highly influenced by genetics and by extension evolution. Evolutionally psychology began from the study of the mind then crossed over to study how the body influences the mind. This eventually led to the conclusion that genetics act as a strong bearing factor on the human mind thus affecting the human character. This leads to the conclusion that there is a clear correlation between Sociobiology and Evolutionary Psychology. Further, the correlation is so strong that it is possible to mistake one discipline for the other. A biologist who is researching on sociobiology can easily be mistaken for a psychologist studying Evolutionary Psychology. This goes beyond mere euphemism into a seeming coalition of scientific disciplines. It is on this basis that "Sociobiology" is actually now "Evolutionary Psychology."
References
Barnes, M. E. (2014). Stephen Jay Gould (1941-2002). Embryo Project Encyclopedia
Buss, D. (2015). Evolutionary psychology: The new science of the mind . Hove, United Kingdom: Psychology Press
Cartwright, J. (2016). Evolution and Human Behaviour: Darwinian Perspectives on the Human Condition . New York: Palgrave Macmillan
Horgan, J. (2015, November 02). Stephen Jay Gould on Marx, Kuhn and Punk Meek . Retrieved November 20, 2017, from https://blogs.scientificamerican.com/cross-check/stephen-jay-gould-on-marx-kuhn-and-punk-meek/
Main, D. (2013, November 27). Becoming king: Why so few male lions survive to adulthood. Retrieved November 20, 2017, from https://www.livescience.com/41572-male-lion-survival.html
