Human Evolution as Narrative

Abstract

Have hero myths and folktales influenced our interpretations of the evolutionary past? Scientists are generally aware of the influence of theory on observation. Seldom do they recognize, however, that many scientific theories are essentially narratives. The growth of a plant, the progress of a disease, the formation of a beach, the evolution of an organism – any set of events that can be arranged in a sequence and related can also be narrated. This is true even of a scientific experiment. Indeed, many laboratory reports, with their sections labeled “methods, ” "results, " and “conclusions, ” bear at least a superficial resemblance to a typical narrative, that is, an organized sequence of events with a beginning, a middle, and an end. Whether or not scientists follow such a narrative structure in their work, they do not often recognize the extent to which they use narrative in their thinking and in communicating their ideas. Consequently, they may be unaware of the narrative presuppositions which inform their science. Students of literature, on the other hand, are so conscious of narrative that some have argued it is storytelling which makes us human. As the poet Matthew Arnold declared in his famous debate with Thomas Henry Huxley, even man's remote