ABSTRACT
The rapid growth of biological knowledge in the last four or five decades has given new form to an old question: Are we self-directed, or are we predestined? This is a major concern when considering the nature of human beings. Our society is being bombarded with volley after volley of new biological information which increasingly defines human beings structurally and functionally in physico-chemical terms, and the rate at which this occurs will mount dramatically as the human genome is deciphered. The self-perception of individuals as beings with meaningful control over their own personality and destiny may be overwhelmed by the dazzling success of reductionist biology in describing human components and their molecular interactions. An impression might well be created that our nature and behavior are predetermined by our genes because they depend on our genes in essential ways.
