Rewilding biology may certainly involve more transects, ID keys, multisensory exploration, and outdoor time. However, I argue a much more pervasive transformation is needed. In a nutshell, the problem is that while the living world as directly experienced might seem wild, classroom explanations hardly acknowledge the role that wildness plays throughout biological processes. With the exception of “genetic mutations” in natural selection and antibodies in the immune system, the overall lesson students learn about the biological world is that it is fundamentally composed of functional and dysfunctional mechanisms. This is out of step with what scientists observe a multiple biological levels of organisation, where in each case, the capricious and the coordinated combine.
Consider that it is now known that most proteins are “intrinsically disordered”, constantly fluctuating between indefinite ranges of configurations, and disrupting the notion that enzymes and signalling molecules are predictable mechanisms. However, in the Scottish (as elsewhere) high school biology classroom, proteins are described as having fixed structures altered only by external factors. Proteins are hardly unique. Scientists also know that most genes are sometimes (when?) ‘alternatively spliced,’ with some genes capable of producing thousands of different protein variants. An indefinite number of proteins, each which can produce an indefinite number of structural conformations. (And even between transcription and protein synthesis, there are several other wilding processes (such as post-translational modifications), which I will ignore here). I will also ignore the synergistic interaction between these various processes (Niklas et al. 2015).
The point is that from genes, to cells, tissues, organs, organisms and ecologies, within and between each level arises both new structures and regularities, and new kinds of indeterminacy. Such open-endedness not only enables more diverse functionality, but also the possibility of new functions to accommodate unpredicted situations, and is key to the resilience, creativity, and evolvability of life. This is not only happening in the long, slow and invisible timeline of Darwinian evolution. It is happening right now as each organism around you (and you, as well) is engaging with a specific situation that, in significant or nuanced ways, has never occurred before. We all need a repertoire of possibilities up our sleeves.
Common-sense intuitions are right, life is wild. When in the forest or the field, we see themes, like “oak” or “squirrel” or “inkcap mushroom.” A biology student may come to believe that the oak tree is merely the expression of a genetic programme modulated by ‘the environment’, or the squirrel simply performing preset instincts to pass on its genes. But in direct experience we can feel each particular being’s uniqueness, and sense its freedom. One reason why field studies is important is that it provides direct encounter with a wildness that is pervasive, yet occluded in the presentation biological process at other levels in the curriculum. It can teach us about the nature and role of the capricious, and give us clues for what to look for as we rewild our various mechanistic explanations.
There is no pedagogical or ethical justification not to foreground wildness in biology curricula, but students exit Scottish (and other) education system believing “properly functioning” biology is fundamentally mechanical. I can think of two main reasons why mechanistic explanations persist despite much evidence. The first is habit. In the 20th Century, much of biology tried to achieve rigorous scientific status by producing causal explanations modelled on a Newtonian worldview. The momentum of this aspiration is still felt in vestigial biological metaphors, textbooks, and modes of reasoning. The second is economical and practical. Industries benefit from finding more or less reliable mechanisms, because they can be harnessed or manipulated in various ways. I think these two reasons co-conspire in ways that are not to the ultimate benefit of students, nor society and nature. Mechanistic presumptions unhelpfully distort how people approach diverse contemporary issues, from ecological management to biotechnology. Our pedagogies too become mechanistic.
And yet, even here we should expect life to be rewilding our efforts. The mechanistic conservation scheme will give rise to unanticipated ecological developments, the biotechnological intervention to unconceived side effects, and the classroom dynamic will quickly show us that our mechanistic approaches are hardly performing the functions they were intended for.