Review: Science, Objectivity, and Feminist Values

Reviewed Work(s): Reflections on Gender and Science by Evelyn Fox Keller; Myths of
Gender: Biological Theories about Women and Men by Anne Fausto-Sterling; The Science
Question in Feminism by Sandra Harding
Review by: Helen E. Longino
Source: Feminist Studies, Vol. 14, No. 3 (Autumn, 1988), pp. 561-574
Published by: Feminist Studies, Inc.
Stable URL: http://www.jstor.org/stable/3178065
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 REVIEW ESSAY

SCIENCE, OBJECTIVITY, AND FEMINIST VALUES

HELEN E. LONGINO

Reflections on Gender and Science. By Evelyn Fox Keller. N

Haven: Yale University Press, 1985.
Myths of Gender: Biological Theories about Women and Me
Anne Fausto-Sterling. New York: Basic Books, 1986.
The Science Question in Feminism. By Sandra Harding. Ithaca, N
Cornell University Press, 1986.

The feminist demonstration of masculine partiality and bi

well-established fields of inquiry has shaken our faith in c
ventional knowledge. How deeply must our skepticism reac
rationality itself only an instrument of male domination? Is ob
tivity a masculine illusion? If we answer here affirmatively,
is left as ground for our own feminist claims? These questio
tain their most threatening dimensions when we bring fem
analytic tools to bear on the natural sciences.
The physical, chemical, and life sciences pose a complex su
for feminist inquiry. They are, as professions, bastions of
privilege. Through various science-based technologies, they a
creasingly involved in the transformation of productive
reproductive processes. Most twentieth-century Westerners
in these sciences a source for understanding nature and our
as part of and in relation to nature. They have become mode
any kind of knowledge and most kinds of inquiry. And a ce
vision of these sciences lies at the cool heart of modem Western
culture's self-image. In each of these aspects, the sciences have

Feminist Studies 14, no. 3 (Fall 1988). ? 1988 by Helen E. Longino

561

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 562 Helen E. Longino

been constructed in hos

female. Paradoxically,
resistance to benighted
new modes and bases of
tellectual fulfillment, em
few women admitted.
ameliorate as well as des
Each of the books revie
aspect of the complex f
authors' concerns spill
physicist turned mathem
fascinated by the effec
cesses on the sciences. R
tegrated and expanded
peared in scientific and
Developmental biologist
devastating critiques of
too, has thought about
feminist science, and o
"myths of gender," whi
Harding is one of the bes
dressing "the science ques
on theoretical issues in the social sciences. Her concern in The
Science Question in Feminism is as much with how feminists hav
talked about science as it is with the task of envisioning a new
science. Each book raises and answers differently questions abou
the nature of knowledge and of objectivity and about the relation
of the sciences to their supporting culture. My essay will focus on
these common concerns.
In Reflections on Gender and Science, Keller is most concerned to
subvert the hegemony of certain principal organizing ideas in the
modern natural sciences. The identification of knowledge and
domination has facilitated the development and establishment of
scientific theories informed by one among several possible
philosophies of nature. Keller argues that alternative scientific vi-
sions have nevertheless been a constant, if minority, presence, and
she aims to undo the equation of knowledge and power that keeps
those visions subordinated. Because that equation is, according to
Keller, forged in masculine developmental processes, undoing it
simultaneously reveals the basis of the exclusion of women from

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 Helen E. Longino 563

the sciences. Keller's argu

metaphoric structure of t
science, through psychod
content of key cognitive c
studies in contemporary
As other scholars, like
have shown, sexual and g
central to the ideological f
notes that Francis Bacon,
between knowledge and p
tion in language appropria
the need for a receptive a
listening to and respectin
imposing one's will on it.
in Western science but have resulted in at least two traditions of
inquiry in the sciences-one dominant and another seemingly in
need of constant reinvention. A central goal of Keller's is to under-
stand why the tradition associated with control, with mechanistic
and reductive explanations, has thrived, but explanations em-
phasizing interaction, holism, and the integrity of organisms are
continually cast aside. To this end, she draws on the work of ob-
ject relations theorists and psychoanalytically oriented feminists,
arguing that objectivity, a key characteristic of scientific knowl-
edge, has been misunderstood. Keller traces that misunder-
standing to the sexualization of scientific knowledge described in
the first part of the book: "'The task of explaining the associations
between masculine and scientific thus becomes ... the task of
understanding the emotional substructure that links our ex-
perience of gender with our cognitive experience" (p. 80).
Taking the capacity for objectivity as the capacity for delineating
self from non-self, Keller argues that the psychological develop-
ment of boys accentuates the processes of self-other differentiation
and distorts the achievement of the true autonomy required for
objectivity. Both the dynamic processes of development that re-
quire separation from the mother and cultural definitions of
masculinity as independence reinforce an association of the male
with separateness, pushing him to rigid and exaggerated separa-
tion. Maintenance of this form of individuation is achieved by
domination of the other. Although other theorists have used these
ideas in explanation of male domination of women, Keller sees

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 564 Helen E. Longino

here the forging of the l

the domination of na
understood, it becomes
the rest of the second s
and of objectivity that fr
posed connections with
In the third section, we
bearing on actual scienc
essay on theoretical phy
interpretation of quantum
conceptions of nature an
classical physics. An ess
shows the ideological p
biological processes, a
stimulated self-organizati
Clintock demonstrates
tion of nature leads to t
the discovery of differ
thinking about genetic
organism led her to trans
molecular biologists -wit
information coded in DNA-could conceive of it.
Throughout these essays, Keller is concerned with showing the
effects of an ideology of domination on the practice and content of
science and with articulating an alternative philosophy of nature -
one in which eros reappears, in which nature's order is perceived
as inherent and self-generated rather than construable as law
governed. She endorses a vision of nature and of society that re-
jects the sexual polarities permeating modern conceptions of
science and nature and that would make nature's study as inviting
to women as it is to men.
After encountering Keller's original and provocative ideas, no
one can think in the same way about the sciences again. Whether
one agrees or disagrees with details or with the major claims of her
study, Keller has introduced questions that will preoccupy
scholars (and, one hopes, scientists) for some time to come. Let me
try to outline some of my questions/reservations. One set has to do
with history. How do we explain the transformation in attitudes
toward nature that took place during the sixteenth and seven-
teenth centuries? The sexualized language of the debates between

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 Helen E. Longino 565

mechanicists and hermet

conditions make dominat
Carolyn Merchant's analy
Europe is crucial to this ex
imagery used to describe
have a basis in the actual s
(or any other) historians
this.

A second area of quandary has to do with Keller's pluralistic vi-

sion of both science's past and its possible future. Given the
multiplicity of styles and approaches in actual sciences, why does
the ideological prescription contained in the rhetoric of domina-
tion continue to exercise a controlling influence in the selection of
the scientific community? Keller's answer must lie in an appeal to
the self-perpetuating character of gender relations as analyzed by
feminist object relations theory. But this answer must confront
several problems. First, humans, even modern Europeans, exhibit
greater variety in gender-related matters than object relations
theory seems to allow for. Feminist object relations theory con-
flates what Sandra Harding usefully distinguishes- symbolic and
institutional gender with individual gender. It treats the question
of how individuals become gendered as equivalent to questions
about the sexual division of labor (social or institutional gender)
and about bivalent symbolic systems associated with gender con-
cepts (cultural or symbolic gender). Societies can, however, main-
tain both social and cultural gender systems even though many of
their individual members do not conform to gender stereotypes.
And if object relations theory is used to explain the predominance
of one tradition, to what can the actual variety in explanatory
traditions Keller observes be attributed? Is there an explanation
available within object relations theory or must we postulate
supervening factors? Second, the scope of the theory is problema-
tic. Does it aspire to account for gender difference generally or on-
ly for gender in Western middle-class societies? Harding notes that
in some (African) societies the attributes and values associated
with females in Euro-American are claimed by and for males.
Other scholars have made similar claims about other non-
European cultures. What childrearing practices prevailing in th
cultures provide the context in which the individual pers
develops, and do they vary in the way consistency would requi

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566 Helen E. Longino

Third, can a phenomenon

in modem sciences be exp
ty, or how do features o
trenched? I suspect that t
for the convergence as w
plex interaction of extrap
work.3
My last concerns have to
The positive account of o
Objectivity" suggests tha
the world around us its ind
that remains cognizant o
(p.117)-will provide more
nature than are available t
epilogue Keller seems to be
she takes to be a more acc
sure I understand her pr
cited invites - indeed, de
Traditionally, objectivity
justificatory processes of
subject ideas before accep
seem to be attitudes which
tests. What we need is a w
objectivity.
Anne Fausto-Sterling also
sex composition of the sc
science. Her concern in My
Women and Men is not w
itself as excluding wom
biological ideas about wom
gests, the aim of the boo
understandings of behav
support differential treat
Five chapters take on alle
standardized tests of variou
of gender identity and g
drome and menopause, all
females and males in hum
Sterling presents, in concis
underlying and involved

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 Helen E. Longino 567

sex differences and sex-linked characteristics. This better enables

the reader to understand the scientific aspects of these debates.
Fausto-Sterling's teaching experience is in evidence here. Although
her book is clearly pitched to a "lay" audience, her explanations are
accessible without a trace of condescension. Most of the work
Fausto-Sterling discusses is recent. It is a measure of the lability
and inventive capacity of the fields that there is yet newer work
which she does not cover. This includes work urging a connection
between fetal testosterone levels, greater brain hemisphere asym-
metry, and a variety of behavioral expressions ranging from left-
handedness to allergy proneness to high mathematical ability.
These notions, propounded by the late neurologist Norman
Geschwind and cognitive abilities researcher Camilla Benbow, are
ripe for a feminist treatment.
Fausto-Sterling is not content merely to indicate the scientific
flaws in the work she discusses. Like other feminist scientists
thinking about these issues, she wants to push research in a dif-
ferent direction - away from models that stress control and toward
those that stress complexity and interaction. She also argues that,
for the fields of research with which she is concerned, this is an in-
herently political move. It is not, in certain cases, possible "to
distinguish unequivocably between science well done and science
that is feminist" (p. 212). Fausto-Sterling supports this claim by
discussing the work of another biologist, Randi Koeske. Koeske,
who is developing new theoretical models for menopause
research, criticizes current biomedical and behavioral models for
their failure to take account of both key aspects of and the variety
in women's experience. In addition, these models ignore the com-
plex interactions between physiological and psychological states.
Koeske urges a much more subtle and diverse program of
research, one which begins by taking as primary data women's
own accounts of their experiences and which acknowledges and
attempts to connect the many levels at which the events
associated with menopause occur. Fausto-Sterling is not sug-
gesting that feminism offers a unique window on nature, nor is
she urging that interactionism and respect for complexity replace
all unicausal research programs. She does seem to be saying that
there are certain areas of biological research-those having to do
with women, female biological processes, and gender-in which
politics necessarily affects science. Patriarchal culture has in-

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 568 Helen E. Longino

evitably produced scienc

women; a more adequate
feminism for its emer
feminist context for its
proaches developed by s
broad political change, th
will not prevail .... Qua
science . . . can prevai
mosphere offers it spac
As I interpret Fausto
methodologically flawle
adequate model. The exp
gram require scrutiny o
the use of appropriate c
the statistical analysis o
research pursued within
danger of making no imp
and gender presented
research programs rema
movement for social ch
sink into the seas of Bio
without a trace.
I appreciated Fausto-Sterling's insistence on narrowing the
discussion of the relations between science and politics, objectivi-
ty and values, to specific research questions, her sense of the com-
plexity of these relations, and her grounding of that discussion in
particular instances of work. Of course, far from settling the
issues, these virtues raise further questions. For instance, by what
criteria do "feminist insights concerning the subjective/objective
separation, the validation of a woman's individual health ex-
periences, the highlighting of the fear and dislike of women fre-
quently found in the medical literature, and the complexity and
social contexts of women's lives" (p. 213) constitute good science?
Once we acknowledge the relevance of value-based considera-
tions in the development of scientific theory, how do we weigh the
role of empirical considerations? Koeske's model may indeed be
worth emulating, but the methodological issues need further
development if her work is to serve as more than inspiration.
Just this sort of methodological discussion is promised early in
The Science Question in Feminism when Sandra Harding writes

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Helen E. Longino 569

that "this book examin

tiques of science with
flicts between them,
analyses, unrecognize
programs, and extensio
more powerful tools
Harding's ambitious vo
nists' discussions of scien
ple, the nature-nurtur
sciences accommodat
How must they be tran
women as participants
bitious scope, Harding
discussed. Her discussio
as is, for the most part,
ture of science. The g
natural sciences and th
Harding identifies five
pursued in contempora
social structure of the
of the sciences, (3) crit
in particular research pr
exploration of the met
manifestos), and (5) ep
taining excursions into
Sixteenth- and Seventee
a discussion of these p
them, Harding claims t
by inadequate concepti
standings of science.
I agree with this asses
the triple aspects of the
of science is less succes
of twentieth-century a
a set of sentences and
odology. Instead, we sh
activity." Harding does
this approach for our u
concentrates on show
character of science de

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570 Helen E. Longino

Although The Science Q

variety of topics, the ma
the identified femini
Epistemology is the stud
cepts of knowledge and
constitutes adequate just
is true. Harding distingu
grams-feminist empir
feminist "postmodernism
the projects identified wi
tinue, but she is concer
and among them, which
contributions to the que
Sterling are to be expect
my discussion on them.
Feminist empiricism is
androcentrism are socia
to the existing methodo
empiricism is, thus, not
one or another contemp
nist empiricism underm
that "women (or feminist
more likely to produce
men (or nonfeminists) a
empiricist could reply as
likely to produce unbia
about the correlation of
and producing unbiased
itself subject to test by t
the inconsistency Hardi
to be presented as a con
hood- that it is of the ess
duce more objective or u
has made this claim? As
empiricism would welco
pected to be put forward
gay, women's, and Third
empiricist (or, in Koertg
the right to subject said
Fausto-Sterling, in the

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Helen E. Longino 571

making the claims attrib

doesn't claim that wome
unbiased results, nor is
She does say that new i
in the context of a poli
women's lives seriously
into specific hypotheses
that they be rigorously
necessary to keep the id
grams with one anothe
unified vision. What bo
overlook is our actual w
much is published, th
(especially if done by w
groups) can die of negle
Harding's feminist em
give way to feminist stan
a feminist (or women's
understandings of natu
dividuals-Jane Flax, Hil
sock (I would add Alison
themselves as standpoin
Empiricism to Feminist
best in the book. Hardi
two central issues. If
epistemologies (i.e., theo
making truth claims), t
jectivity increasing" de
was developed by social
the various social scien
earlier chapter that we
inquiry, there is no arg
social sciences are or sh
argument would be nece
theory in The Science Q
methodological issues in
Standpoint theories th
Question in Feminism b
later say that we need b
by the observation, mad

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 572 Helen E. Longino

women nor feminists

which a single world v
postmodernism she en
epistemology, for examp
Haraway's complex essa
knowledge claims only
violation of the foundi
Any violation? Does it
knowledge claims? Hardi
us knowledge that is a
similar questions arise
that "it has been and s
direct the development
tures of science" (p. 25
choosing between Elain
Tanner's On Becoming
counts of human origi
ments, but Morgan's gyn
porary paleontological
and Tanner's book explo
dress the difficult task
among those committe
corporate domination.
If the book fails to articulate a new and coherent account of the
sciences, it does review a fair amount of literature. Its value as a
review is, however, diminished by some careless scholarship (or
poor editing) and idiosyncratic judgments. Some errors are trivial,
such as the overestimated incidence of hermaphroditism (p. 127),
the description of the professional scientific work force as
laboratory technicians and equipment makers (p. 72), the mis-
leading suggestion that evolutionary biology is primarily devoted
to studying human evolution (p. 46), and occasional misattribu-
tions and miscitations. A more serious lapse is Harding's virtual
dismissal of Evelyn Fox Keller's work as "a brief account of the im-
plications of object relations theory for science." Keller's long-
standing engagement with these issues has had such a strong in-
fluence on feminists thinking about the sciences that this descrip-
tion is quite perplexing.
Finally, Harding's criticisms of the philosophy of science (pre-
sented for the most part as the product of an anonymous and

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Helen E. Longino 573

homogeneous fraternity) ar
look current thinking in thi
thinking of science as a un
Even in positivism's hey
science -that were treated
of science think of scienti
practical, everyday reaso
unique methodology. The o
Harding does take on ind
historian and philosopher
Hesse's recent work seems
trary to what Harding sug
the interactions between sc
Because so much of the ar
Feminism is structured as a
quacies in the existing lit
literature is so unreliably r
book, however, is the atte
under the social sciences w
goals, content, and method
ding consequently represen
having thought in only the
objectivity, values, realism
tiques of science. This redu
vents her from going beyon
atics" of science are andro
cated and powerful answer
Reflecting on all three boo
nist scholars writing in and
ly distinguished a critiqu
positivist philosophy of sci
of doing science or of thin
dislodge entrenched philos
critique of those views wil
differently or why it shou
about rationality and object
world, we must distinguish
This is not to say that the
ophers have much to learn ab
ing the practice of feminis

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 574 Helen E. Longino

understand the more ab

tions. And feminist scien
ceptual space that phil
knowledge-although no
producing method - is n
It is pursued for partic
Furthermore, the aims of
are not, or not necessaril
supports such inquiry. W
could be to more fully un
ties of science.

NOTES

I wish to thank Ruth Doell and Elisabeth Lloyd for their helpful comments on earlie
drafts of this essay.

1. Brian Easlea, Witch-Hunting, Magic, and The New Philosophy (Atlantic Highlands,
N.J.: Humanities Press, 1980); and Carolyn Merchant, The Death of Nature: Women
Ecology, and the Scientific Revolution (San Francisco: Harper & Row, 1980).
2. Merchant, 42-68.
3. Roger Gottlieb makes some similar points about feminist object relations theorist
explanations of male domination in "Mothering and the Reproduction of Power,
Socialist Review, no. 77 (September-October 1984): 93-119.
4. Biological Abstracts lists about 15,000 articles in biology per month, and Chemical
Abstracts indicates a similar, if not even higher, publication rate in chemistry.
5. Noretta Koertge, "Methodology, Ideology, and Feminist Critiques of Science," i
PSA, 1980, vol. 2, ed. Peter D. Asquith and Ronald Giere (East Lansing, Mich.
Philosophy of Science Association, 1981), 346-59.
6. Donna Haraway, "A Manifesto for Cyborgs," Socialist Review, no. 80 (March-Apr
1985): 65-107. Harding also cites conversations with Jane Flax as having contributed t
her acceptance of a postmodernist stance.
7. Elaine Morgan, The Descent of Woman (New York: Stein & Day, 1972); and Nanc
Tanner, On Becoming Human (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1981).
8. See the essays in Mary Hesse, Revolutions and Reconstructions in the Philosophy o
Science (Bloomington: Indiana University Press, 1980).

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