ABSTRACT
The interaction of biology and the social sciences shows both the potential for advance as well as illustrating the difficulties involved. If man is a social animal, biology is obviously relevant to social science. While man is a social animal, biological reductionists, who ignore the adjective, miss too much, as do their social science colleagues who forget the noun. There are two basic models of human behavior, the traditional social science model based on social environments and rational behavior, and the biological model which stresses the animal side of man while ignoring cognition. One early flow from linguistics to biology proved to be extraordinarily important for both the life sciences and the social sciences. The life sciences and the social sciences may impact the physical sciences. Some areas of medicine and biology are expanding towards the social sciences and creating true hybrid fields, in which the social science makes significant contributions.
