Discourses of Molecular Biology in France: A Philosophy of Life, Knowledge and Information

The 1950s and 1960s were the so-called 'golden age' of molecular biology and, in becoming molecular, biology staked a claim to be the definitive life science. This book looks at the emergence of molecular biology in the context of a set of closely linked scientific and philosophical discourses in post-war France, particularly focussing on the work and influence of the French molecular biologists François Jacob and Jacques Monod. Jacob and Monod made significant scientific breakthroughs in molecular biology in the post-war period, winning the Nobel Prize for their work on gene regulation in 1965. They were also both active in instigating much of the philosophical speculation that arose from this scientific work. Their work was enthusiastically received by the generation of French philosophers that included Michel Foucault, Michel Serres and Gilles Deleuze. These thinkers explored a number of connections between the functioning of the genetic code and structuralist analyses of language and knowledge. Situating the rise of molecular biology in France in the context of its key intellectual trends in the 1950s and 1960s, most notably structuralism, this book is a valuable and much needed undertaking.

1950年代和1960年代被稱為分子生物學的「黃金時代」，並且在成為分子生物學後，生物學宣稱自己是最具代表性的生命科學。本書探討了分子生物學在戰後法國一系列緊密相關的科學和哲學論述的背景下的出現，特別關注法國分子生物學家François Jacob和Jacques Monod的工作和影響。Jacob和Monod在戰後的分子生物學領域取得了重大的科學突破，並於1965年因其在基因調控方面的工作而獲得諾貝爾獎。他們也積極參與了從這項科學工作中產生的許多哲學思考。他們的工作受到了包括米歇爾·福柯、米歇爾·塞爾斯和吉爾·德勒茲在內的法國哲學家一代的熱烈歡迎。這些思想家探索了基因密碼的運作方式與結構主義對語言和知識的分析之間的許多聯繫。將分子生物學在法國的崛起置於1950年代和1960年代的主要知識趨勢，尤其是結構主義的背景下，本書是一項有價值且迫切需要的工作。