2000 HSS/PSA Program 1 - History of Science Society

HSS Abstracts
grasped as a whole, disclosing the existential core of a person. After the
publication of Heidegger’s Sein und Zeit in 1927, Binswanger shifted his
phenomenological approach to assess not only the individual consciousness but
the inextricably linked complex of the individual situated in his/her world, or
“Being-in-the-World” (In-der-Welt-sein). Binswanger’s first phenomenological
case studies appeared in 1931, in which manic utterances and writings were
found to reveal the presence of a manic “world,” charted by its spatial, temporal,
and material dimensions. Despite Heidegger’s repudiation of the empirical use
of his insights, and the skepticism of some clinical psychiatrists, Binswanger’s
focus on the extremes of psychopathological experience helped to illuminate
phenomenological “worlds,” and phenomenological methods “normalized”
psychosis insofar as they demonstrated the structural similarities between
psychotic and normal experience.
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Mark␣ A. Largent Oregon State University
Biological Justifications for Progressive Reforms
Historians and historians of science have emphasized the importance to
evolutionary theory, particularly Darwinism, to the American progressive
movement. They have asserted that Darwinism provided progressive reformers
with scientific legitimacy and it reinforced their belief in progress. What specific
role did American biologists themselves play in progressive reform
movements? Moreover, how did biologists participation in the progressive
movement impact them and their profession? By examining several early
twentieth-century progressive causes in which natural scientists like William
Ritter, David Starr Jordan, Vernon Kellogg, and Charles Davenport participated,
this paper will explore the reciprocal relationship between American biologists
and progressivism. They provided scientific justifications for progressive
initiatives like increased education, the political enfranchisement of women,
eugenics, and the international peace movement. At the same time, their
participation in social and political causes enhanced their professional status
and gave them the opportunity to demonstrate possible applications for
evolutionary science that could better the human condition.
Manfred␣ D. Laubichler Princeton University
From a Developmental Point of View:
Theories of Development in the Conception of Theoretical Biology
During the early decades of the 20th century theoretical biology emerged as a
discourse among experimental biologists and philosophers. Even though
scientists from a variety of different experimental disciplines contributed to these
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