Lever and Science

Science, Life, Politics
by Haesoo Park
History of Science and Medicine, Yale University

The biological has never really been about the "biological." The heart, the cells, the blood, and the hormones are always already embedded in a network of scientists, politicians, laborers, parents, patients, the economy, the laboratory, etc. In other words, what one calls the biological is co-constructed along the historical path where different interests, materials, and desires intersect. For example, the "cell" and its components, both as a concept and a biological identity, underwent transformations in the question of what it is in relation to the changing discipline of biology before and after the rise of the the thing called gene. Scientists thought of the protein as the elemental structure of life before the rediscovery of the gene as the source of life through Mendel's works. Now, there is a more complex view of how components of the cells, including proteins and genes, work as the bases of life. 

Moreover, to say that the "cell" exists outside the domains of politics, discourse, and interests is to pose an impossible question. If a brilliant scientist had observed the cell as including the interstitial fluid surrounding a plasma membrane, then the "cell" as it is known today would be something quite different. So it is not a matter of saying that certain biological materials do exist: yes, the "Golgi Apparatus" is there and so is the "Mitochondria." It is a matter of saying that biology is a complex negotiation between those biological entities, the particular understandings of those entities at certain points in time, and the desires of people such as interested scientists, engineers, politicians, mothers, doctors, and medical students in making those biological entities take certain forms. In other words, to talk about biology is to talk about ways that boundaries are reworked at all levels through time: from molecules, evolution and adaptation to various technologies, politics and discourse. They exist together.

In short, it is a question of history. It is about a change over time in the way infrastructures, politics, materials, and interests shift.

Thus, the "biological"  becomes something that is fluid and amorphous. A biology student needs only to take a look at the effort that bioengineers are putting on growing human tissues through the use of protein scaffolding that can be transplanted onto burn patients. In this instance, the biological is literally constructed. Therefore, the origins of biology become contested: it does not exist before the man, before new technologies, or before ideas of what biology is and can do.

So to talk and think about the history of biological sciences - and more broadly, the life sciences - is to simultaneously ask about our human condition: where were we, where are we, and where are we going. It is to look at how politics, interests, peoples and histories create a society that have and may alter this human condition since life science is about life. To grapple with the history of the life sciences, then, is to ponder and act in ways that will provide the tools to both understand and critique the powers, violence, interests and desires that coalesce in a particular locus: life itself.

So, to study the history of the life and the many sciences linked to it is to do many things. On the one hand, of course, it is to look at its history. On the other hand, it is about a critique of the tendencies that give rise to an unequal distribution of power that produce so much violence affecting different peoples. Only then can one ponder upon the human condition, on the question of, What is Life? Thus, there is much at stake from the insights gleaned from such studies. As such, it becomes important to find novel ways to ensure conversations between experts and non-experts at the level of the individual, the community, and institutions are happening constantly. There is much here that will interests undergraduate students in evolutionary biology, movie-goers, organizations dealing with issues of biotechnology, and those yearning for the production of a better society. After all, politics deals with governance of life and to understand its history allows one to do so better. For some, it may be a tool for democracy.

It is therefore one of the aims of the posts here to analyze popular works such as movies and art through the lens of the history of science. By doing so, it becomes a way for those beyond the walls of the academia to look at the world with a critical eye provided by such history. It will be a source of information for the public as they ponder and debate on important decisions affecting their collective future. These posts will make the reader's environment hyper-visible. For instance, what sorts of questions have been raised about women and men carrying an AI device all the time without even thinking about it? (Smartphones). Added to such posts, I will also provide more analyses of academic works that one might find interesting as they search for answers about the history of the life sciences and what it means to them. Or perhaps, answers to deeper questions about life itself.

As one thinker once taught us: Thinking is an activity. It produces change. Hence, it becomes appropriate that these works are posted under the title "Lever and Science" as it is a reference to the Greek thinker Archimedes via the more historian and theorist of science Bruno Latour. Archimedes, known for his knowledge on levers and pulleys, is thought to have said, "Give me a lever and I will move the world." These series of critiques and historical insights, then, are made in hopes that they activate a different form of thinking to be used as a lever to change the world into a more better home.