Review of 'Biology under the influence' on 'Goodreads'
3 stars
Yay: A dialectical, marxist view on biology and science in general. In principle that's a great and interesting topic, even if I feel that some of the attacks against modeling are a bit cheap. Duh, models do not reflect reality? Well, maybe that's why they are called models and not reality? And I yet have to met a modeler who wouldn't sign 'all models are wrong, but some are useful'. But nevertheless I found the general ideas presented pretty interesting and there is a good amount of valid criticism in those essays as well.
Nay: Unfortunately one notices pretty quickly that this is a collection of essays that have been published previously, because there are absurd amounts of repetition. You can only read so often about the insulin-blood-sugar-feedback-loop and the possible reasons for the failure of post-WW2-epidemiology before you go insane and this book really tries to take your sanity. …
Yay: A dialectical, marxist view on biology and science in general. In principle that's a great and interesting topic, even if I feel that some of the attacks against modeling are a bit cheap. Duh, models do not reflect reality? Well, maybe that's why they are called models and not reality? And I yet have to met a modeler who wouldn't sign 'all models are wrong, but some are useful'. But nevertheless I found the general ideas presented pretty interesting and there is a good amount of valid criticism in those essays as well.
Nay: Unfortunately one notices pretty quickly that this is a collection of essays that have been published previously, because there are absurd amounts of repetition. You can only read so often about the insulin-blood-sugar-feedback-loop and the possible reasons for the failure of post-WW2-epidemiology before you go insane and this book really tries to take your sanity.
If you are interested in the topic I'd recommend you only read 2-3 random essays out of Parts 1 and 2, that should give you basically all the info you need and then proceed with the much more diverse (and more interesting) Part 3.