1.2.1 Our collective ethical responsibility
It is human nature to use knowledge of the past to guide
actions in the present. This places an ethical responsibility
upon those who seek to explore the past to do all they can
to ensure that their work is not misused. This is not just a
theoretical possibility: history is rife with the misuse of
anthropological research to justify regimes that have cost the
lives and livelihoods of many innocent people. So much
damage has been caused that some have even questioned
whether work to reconstruct our evolutionary past should be
undertaken at all. We believe that the potential intellectual
and medical benefits of this work outweigh the potential
dangers, but only when researchers take responsibility for the
accurate popularization and public dissemination of this
research, including active opposition to misinterpretation.
Having said that, we must acknowledge that much of this
work (including this book) is published by an
unrepresentative subset of our species, namely men in
developed countries, and that this cultural framework
undoubtedly has an influence on interpretation.
As scientists, we should recognize that our work rightly
depends upon the approval of wider society; indeed, most
funding for evolutionary studies around the world comes
from the public purse. Irrespective of the source of funding,
public concerns about the wider implications of our work
must be addressed. Although the most notorious historical
misuse of anthropology has been the justification of
genocide, public anxiety is currently more focused on issues
of ownership, commercialization and privacy. When work is
being conducted in the public interest, the perception of
misuse can be as important as the reality of misuse. Steps must
be actively taken to ensure both that such misuse does not
occur, and that misuse is seen not to occur. It is for these
reasons that research projects on human subjects, whether
they are medical patients or volunteers contributing a few
cheek cells, should be scrutinized and approved by ethical
committees prior to their initiation.