My undergraduate degree was in human biology. Several years after graduation and looking for lecturer jobs, I saw an advertisement for a human biologist. At last! I applied and got it. When I arrived, I said how glad I was to finally have a job as a human biologist. “Oh”, the head of department replied, “that was just a term we used as a catch-all.” (Sadly, she was not somebody known to inspire her staff.)
That story is not isolated. Once when I said to somebody that I was a human biologist, they said, “We did that at school. It’s to do with sewage, isn’t it?” The label human biology can be used very loosely. Anything biological that happens to involve humans in some way can find itself labeled ‘Human Biology’.
So I include here something that was more carefully considered.
Of human biology, Sir Peter Medawar (1915-1987) wrote that “it is not so much a discipline as a certain attitude of mind towards the most interesting and important of animals. Human Biology portrays mankind on the canvas that serves also for other living things. It is about men rather than man: about their origin, evolution, and geographical deployment; about the growth of human populations and their structure in space and time; about human development and all that it entails of change in size and shape. Human Biology deals with human heredity, the human genetical system, and the nature and import of the inborn differences between individuals; with human ecology and physiology, and with the devices by which men have met the challenges of enemies and of hostile environments. Human Biology deals also with human behaviour - not with its wayward variations from one individual to another, but rather with the history and significance of, for example, family life; of love, play, showing off, and real or sham aggression. Finally, and most important - because most distinctively human - it must expound and explain the nature, origin and development of communication between human beings and the non-genetical system of heredity founded upon it.”
This Medawar wrote in the Foreword to Human Biology edited by Harrison GA, Weiner JS, Tanner JM, & Barnicot NA. 1964. Oxford: Clarendon Press.
This book may be viewed at the Internet Archive (login required for the whole book, but the full version of Medawar’s Foreword can be viewed without needing to do so).
What stands out for me is how Medawar considers human biology to be ‘a certain attitude of mind’. It is something much more than simply lumping certain things together and giving a catch-all name because humans are involved in some way. It is not so much about the type of data collected but its meaning and relevance to the understanding of humankind. That makes a considerably broad sweep of data of potential value.
There is another, much shorter quotation, perhaps in a similar vein, that I found. This time it is about physiology.
"Physiology is not a science or a profession but a point of view."
Ralph W. Gerard, Mirror to Physiology: A Self-Survey of Physiological Science Washington, D.C.: American Physiology Society. 1958.
