Scientists may be awesome, but they're still human beings - and they fall prey to the same
cognitive biases as everyone else. Now, a group of researchers say they've discovered that the bias known as
anthropocentrism is holding back genetic research and severely limiting our discoveries.
© Nassula by Gerd A. GuentherImage of the protist.
Anthropocentrism is the idea that humanity is the most important form of life in the universe.
It becomes a cognitive bias when we project human motivations or values onto other life forms - or even onto the universe itself. We fall prey to the anthropocentric bias quite a bit when describing animals, because it's tempting to
go all Richard Attenborough and treat their lives as scarier, cuter, or more rascally versions of our own.
But this bias can also show up in more subtle ways, such as shaping which life forms we think are worthy of study.
A group of genetic researchers at the University of British Columbia undertook a massive study to investigate what life forms scientists have chosen for DNA sequencing.
Published in
Cell last month, their work reveals that the vast majority are animals similar to humans. More broadly, scientists tend to favor studying eukaryotes, or life forms that have nuclei in their cells.
This includes animals and plants, but not bacteria - despite the fact that bacteria have been proven time and again to be crucial in medicine and genetic discovery.