Review: The Triple Helix by Richard Lewontin

The Dialectical Biologist (1985) is a tour de force, compellingly arguing simultaneously for the need to overthrow the capitalist system as well as the need to overthrow dated scientific approaches. That book has rightly earned its place as one of the key texts on the relationship between science and Marxism. However, despite its name, biology plays more of a supporting role, with the collected essays centering on philosophy, society, and the history of biology. The examples of dialectics in nature are discussed at a high level, primarily drawing from evolutionary biology. The book, being a collection of articles and book chapters published elsewhere, lacks some cohesion, and the arguments repeat.

The Triple Helix (2002) addresses both these weaknesses. The book presents the dialectics of living things as a three stranded system: genes, organism, environment. The argument is well structured, examining first the gene-organism relationship, then the organism-environment relationship, then drawing all three together with a critique of reductionist approaches in science that try to view things in isolation. The work finally concludes with a section putting forward a positive plan for how biologists should conduct their research to avoid such pitfalls. After all, 

It is easy to be a critic. All one needs to do is to think very hard about any complex aspect of the world and it quickly becomes apparent why this or that approach to its study is defective in some way. It is rather more difficult to suggest how we can, in practice, do better.

Lewontin fills in these arguments with a variety of well-chosen examples (the 17 years between this work and the earlier effort were important ones for biology, and although already decades old, the discussion of molecular biology feels considerably more current). His narrative unfolds satisfyingly, flowing from one problem to the next, teaching the controversies and their resolutions. It is a wonderful work of science communication.

Despite the skilled writing on display here, I found it to be a less impactful read than his earlier book. Though the argument was delivered more sharply, the main ideas of The Triple Helix will be familiar to any reader of The Dialectical Biologist. Furthermore, while the author gestures towards the societal implications of the dialectical world view, the lines are never as explicitly drawn, and I missed some of the political fire of The Dialectical Biologist (a favourite example: “But whether the cause of tuberculosis is said to be a bacillus or the capitalist exploitation of workers, whether the death rate from cancer is best reduced by studying oncogenes or by seizing control of factories—these questions can be decided objectively only within the framework of certain sociopolitical assumptions”). 

I’d recommend The Triple Helix for any young scientist, or for any reader interested in the big ideas of biology. I’d recommend The Dialectical Biologist for scientists with an interest in political philosophy.