Stephen Jay Gould Quote
Errors of reductionism and biodeterminism take over in such silly statements as Intelligence is 60 percent genetic and 40 percent environmental. A 60 percent (or whatever) heritability for intelligence means no such thing. We shall not get this issue straight until we realize that the interactionism we all accept does not permit such statements as Trait x is 29 percent environmental and 71 percent genetic. When causative factors (more than two, by the way) interact so complexly, and throughout growth, to produce an intricate adult being, we cannot, in principle, parse that being’s behavior into quantitative percentages of remote root causes. The adult being is an emergent entity who must be understood at his own level and in his own totality. The truly salient issues are malleability and flexibility, not fallacious parsing by percentages. A trait may be 90 percent heritable, yet entirely malleable.
Errors of reductionism and biodeterminism take over in such silly statements as Intelligence is 60 percent genetic and 40 percent environmental. A 60 percent (or whatever) heritability for intelligence means no such thing. We shall not get this issue straight until we realize that the interactionism we all accept does not permit such statements as Trait x is 29 percent environmental and 71 percent genetic. When causative factors (more than two, by the way) interact so complexly, and throughout growth, to produce an intricate adult being, we cannot, in principle, parse that being’s behavior into quantitative percentages of remote root causes. The adult being is an emergent entity who must be understood at his own level and in his own totality. The truly salient issues are malleability and flexibility, not fallacious parsing by percentages. A trait may be 90 percent heritable, yet entirely malleable.
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About Stephen Jay Gould
Gould's most significant contribution to evolutionary biology was the theory of punctuated equilibrium developed with Niles Eldredge in 1972. The theory proposes that most evolution is characterized by long periods of evolutionary stability, infrequently punctuated by swift periods of branching speciation. The theory was contrasted against phyletic gradualism, the popular idea that evolutionary change is marked by a pattern of smooth and continuous change in the fossil record.
Most of Gould's empirical research was based on the land snail genera Poecilozonites and Cerion. He also made important contributions to evolutionary developmental biology, receiving broad professional recognition for his book Ontogeny and Phylogeny. In evolutionary theory he opposed strict selectionism, sociobiology as applied to humans, and evolutionary psychology. He campaigned against creationism and proposed that science and religion should be considered two distinct fields (or "non-overlapping magisteria") whose authorities do not overlap.
Gould was known by the general public mainly for his 300 popular essays in Natural History magazine, and his numerous books written for both the specialist and non-specialist.
In April 2000, the US Library of Congress named him a "Living Legend".