There was a time, not so long ago, when the various academic disciplines sat comfortably side-by-side, each with its distinctive literature and personality. The dramatic proliferation of scientific knowledge, not to mention the considerable shifts in social attitudes brought about by the international traumas of modern life, have altered even the entrenched workways of university teaching and research. Multidisciplinary agendas are taking root and departmental walls are crumbling. Consider the three seemingly disparate fields of political science, psychology, and biology. In decades past, political scientists excelled in studying the institutional dynamics of government; psychologists probed the human psyche employing Freudian and Pavlovian tools; biologists considered the workings of the cell a cutting-edge specialty. Today, political scientists have commenced investigations of human social behavior as an artifact of genetic activity; psychologists employ the technologies of neuroscience to characterize the function of various brain centers in decision making; biologists extract candidate DNA from the genomes of sundry species in the search for commonalities in performance and adaptation. Slowly but surely they are engaging in common cause. A first-ever national meeting of political scientists, psychologists, and biologists, young and old, for the purpose of mounting a concerted drive toward formalized dialogue and a hopeful pooling of theories and methods will be organized. Put succinctly, the scholars involved in this confrence share a common vision: genes appear to play a role in orchestrating the software and chemistry of human behavior; environmental and heritable regulation of gene activity may be an important factor in influencing our politics; long-term, the world of politics could well be a significant force in determining which genes will spread their numbers and which will prove wanting. At this conference, participants shall read and critique one another''s papers and take the first steps toward a new world view of human behavior. By including young scholars in this undertaking, a new generation will be prepared to conduct research in the nexus of these fields.
