In 1975 E. O. Wilson he published the book “Sociobiology: The New Synthesis” and, in his attempt of unification, provided a prediction on the future of ethology and comparative psychology.
“The conventional wisdom also speaks of ethology, which is the naturalistic
study of whole patterns of animal behavior, and its companion enterprise, comparative psychology, as the central, unifying fields of behavioral biology. They are not; both are destined to be cannibalized by neurophysiology and sensory physiology from one end and sociobiology and behavioral ecology from the other. I hope not too many scholars in ethology and psychology will be offended by this vision of the future of behavioral biology. It seems to be indicated both by the extrapolation of current events and by consideration of the logical relationship behavioral biology holds with the remainder of science. The future, it seems clear, cannot lie with the ad hoc terminology, crude models, and curve fitting that characterize most of contemporary ethology and comparative psychology. Whole patterns of animal behavior will
inevitably be explained within the framework, first, of integrative neurophysiology neurons and reconstructs their circuitry, and, second, of sensory physiology, which seeks to characterize the cellular transducers at the molecular level . Endocrinology will continue to play a peripheral role, since it is concerned with the cruder tuning devices of nervous activity.”
I am interested in both opinions and references on this claim, and to explore the current position of the scientific community
Dear Andrea Gazzola
I think that there are still scientists who have devoted research to this topic. I have a book though it is in Russian Book СОЦИОБИОЛОГИЯ Конспект лекций [Sociobiology]
If you have questions write.
Best regards, Sergey
Dear Sergey,
I am very interested in the topic, thank you for the suggestion. I am also interested in your opinion about this quote.
Best , Andrea
Dear Andrea Gazzola
It is not others (other than E.O. Wilson) that are ad hoc -- AT LEAST WHEN COMPARED TO THE GREAT AD HOC-ness OF HE HIMSELF. Examples: " Integrative neurophysiology:" and some imaginative role of Endocrinology .
This man is making such statements ON THE BASES OF WHO KNOWS WHAT (but: NOT on the basis of real concrete behavior PATTERNS). I have always greatly disliked E.O Wilson (for 4 decades)(as long as I have been an ethologist). Wilson is no kind of ethologist and is rather much, much more like an armchair philosopher. We don't need such "great thought", BUT, RATHER we need GREAT DISCOVERIES (and that will be plenty AND THE RIGHT STUFF, to think about).
Now, about ethology in general over the last 3+ decades; it has become greatly diminished by the PURE MYTH that it explains more in innate terms (and, presumably/persumptively explains less in terms of learning) and no one likes that (in short, the myth is believed by those with a shallow education in behavioral science).
[ (In fact, the more classical ethology one does (finding more and more behavior patterns and THEIR patterning, etc.), ONE CAN BETTER SEE DIFFERENT TYPES OF LEARNING -- instead of the ubiquitous myth that there are basically a few simple sorts (and, ironically, SOME OF THOSE sorts of 'learning' ARE IN A VERY REAL SENSE MADE UP! : Example: "social learning", which loses tract of the unit of analysis: the individual human; they may not know this because the thinking of these psychologists is so crude).)]
Even a person as great as Frans de Waal has replaced "ethology" using the "term" ecology INSTEAD (and NOT using the term, ethology). In one of his latest books he explicitly SAID (wrote) saying just THIS is what he is doing. And, you can find the clear switch of "ethology" TO "ecology" MANY PLACES (pure substitutions). ( Two other examples are: Ethology and Sociobiology became Evolution and Human Behavior in 1997 ; the Journal of Social and Biological Structures was renamed Journal of Social and Evolutionary Structures, the latter renaming, I believe, occurred even before the name shift of that first journal.)
AND:
NOT BY COINCIDENCE: Since the 70s and 80s, stage theories of child development are eschewed, eschewed by the prevalent, foolish, modern psychology theorists and researchers. These "folks", again (AND THIS IS THE LINKAGE), want to believe that there is NO innately-related behavior patterns emerging after infancy or baby-hood (BUT this is just a PRESUMPTION, and less justified than the OPPOSITE, from the perspective of Biology and as seen in phenomena exhibited by other complex organisms). Hey, also note: Behavior Patterns (and their patterning, etc.) are themselves BIOLOGY: I.E. 'behaviors' PER SE (" just ' behaviors' ") must show the characteristics of Biology (e.g. homeostasis) JUST LIKE ANY ORGAN, being biological (organismic) as it functions and adapts.
So in summary, what has been lost: the ability to discover and think in terms of behavior PATTERNS (with ethology and with me, these patterns always clearly founded or grounded, at least in there inception, ON directly observable OVERT 'behavior' (actually: BEHAVIOR __PATTERNS__ (
Please pardon me for editing the second-to-the-last paragraph, in my answer directly above. I edited just that for almost a whole day. (It sometimes get difficult to always be one's own editor.)
AND, now, a bit more information has been added just this Thursday morning.
Dear Brad,
Thank you for your detailed answer.
I am aware Wilson is a towering figure for biology and I truly appreciate his writings; however, I think ethological research is more important now than it had ever been before. Despite the incredible explicative potential of reductionism, it seem we still cannot use it as we expected, we need to observe the whole animal, this perspective is not getting old
Dear Andrea Gazzola
I basically forgot E.O. Wilson's work with ants; that undoubtedly was good and important (so, I know "where you are coming from"). Unfortunately, very soon after that ant work he moved on to books, writing of Sociobiology -- an area I see as always without sufficient grounding and thus highly speculative (AND at least in certain regards "just speculation" may well not be all there is to do; there is most certainly better grounding for behavior patterns). The way an ethologist looks at things, behavior patterns so greatly provide the context for other behavior patterns (or, in some certain cases, emerging behavior patterns) that behavior patterns are greatly and for the most part, and in effect, defined by surrounding behavior patterns at the point(s) of proximate causation.
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