Review by Choice Review
This is not one of the many books on the ethical, legal, and social implications of human genetics, funded by the human genome research project. The index (and the rest of the scholarly infrastructure) is adequate, but there is no entry for DNA. Kaplan's concerns are, as the subtitle indicates, in the social policy area. To him, social policy is not just governmental but includes our attitudes. He is particularly interested in how genes interact with the environment. Kaplan believes that we do not know nearly as much as we think we do, but that our policies and attitudes have been developed as we have denied this ignorance. Kaplan has chapters on IQ, criminality, homosexuality, depression and obesity, and on what the environment means. One of the mistakes he stresses is the combination of all sorts of things, some of them not harmful, into obesity. Kaplan also claims that homosexuality is largely a social construction, not necessarily a biologically caused condition. He believes that the changeableness of the environment renders most studies on the interaction between heredity and environment meaningless. A fascinating but disturbing book that should be in all academic libraries. All levels. M. LaBar; Southern Wesleyan University
Copyright American Library Association, used with permission.
Review by Choice Review
