Craig H. Kennedy (2004).
Facts, interpretations, and explanations: A review of Evelyn Fox Keller's Making Sense of Life.
Journal of Applied Behavior Analysis,
37, 539-553.
The job of a researcher is to explain the phenomenon
that he or she is seeking to understand. To
do this requires the accumulation of facts. These
facts are then interpreted to arrive at
explanations. However, individual researchers
often interpret facts in different ways and arrive
at disparate explanations. In her book, Making Sense
of Life, Evelyn Fox Keller (2002) outlines
various approaches used by developmental biologists
to understand the animate systems we call
life. In this review, I note several parallels between
biology and behavior analysis in how facts
are discovered, what is an acceptable interpretation
of data, and how explanations are arrived at.
DESCRIPTORS: behavior analysis, biology, book review, experimental analysis, explanation, fact, interpretation