Sociobiology: Debate Goes On

To the Editors of The Crimson:

In his recent editorial on Irven DeVore's Science Center lecture on human evolution, J. Wyatt Emmerich raises the spectre of Victorian Social Darwinism at Harvard, headquartered in the anthropology department. He accuses DeVore of being "out of his league." He wonders at the paradox of a talk on human evolution focusing on the behavior of Homo sapiens' predecessors; where is the paradox? He sagely asserts that DeVore "fails to understand that human beings are qualitatively unique organisms"; all animal species are "qualitatively unique." He links DeVore's studies to those of "sociobiology" in an apparent attempt to discredit DeVore through the controversial nature of that new field; DeVore's views are those of traditional biological anthropology. I guess Emmerich just dislikes the study of human evolution, or perhaps he is "out of his league" in discussing it. Anyway, in his final paragraph he changes DeVore's scientific theories to political ones. Only Emmerich, not DeVore, suggests that laws and civil rights might be based on man's evolutionary past, which though helpful--like history--in understanding how he does behave, does not determine how he should behave as a citizen. I sympathize with Emmerich's search for political issues, but he should look elsewhere, not in the Anthropology Department. --Charles Everson '81