Science is exciting because it provides powerful tools to explain phenomena in the natural world. However, we need to use care when applying scientific analyses to examine social practices because the two, nature and society, differ substantially. Ms. Gustafson's article from week 58 interests me because of its feminism, providing concrete evidence to valorize women's work of parenting. However, I want to broaden its point of view in order to look at both the nature and social practice of parenting.

Biology claims to be a field of inquiry where data leads to theories, but plenty of scientists write about the inverse, how particular theories or metaphors influence the questions scientists ask and the data they collect. "Parenting with Oxytocin" gathers data in order to answer questions about how mothers' and babies' bodies react to physical closeness. It uses the analogy of woman as mother to explain the data, and therefore draws attention away from other roles that women fill, or are denied, in society. Attachment Parenting values mothers as competent and uniquely capable caregivers, but it does so at the expense of women's capacities to participate in politics, work outside the home, or choose sexual roles other than mother. The article's narrow focus matches with the controlled methods of Biology, but prevents it from explaining other essential influences on the relationships between children and parents. The cultural work of raising children is too complex to be evaluated on a single scale. Selecting biological metrics alone is inadequate.

Ms. Gustafson argues that AP practices are "founded in biology" and "historically grounded." I agree, with a twist. The study of Biology has an inseparable connection to the history of controlling women. In 17th century England, midwives and scholars developed elaborate systems of correlations between birth defects and particular maternal behaviors. Missing digits, for example, were a sure sign of marital infidelity and just cause for punishing the mother. In the 19th century craniometrists cataloged a low brain mass in women, inferred from it female biological inferiority, and then justified women's low economic standing. Early 20th century psychiatrists definitively proved that women were of weak mind and prone to hysteria. Attachment Parenting and its justification are related to the long and overlapping histories of imperfect science and oppression of women.

Evaluating the utility of AP gets complicated when we look at the social outcomes as well as the biological benefits. Everyone will agree that increased pleasurable hormone levels, hours of sleep, and immune system function in mothers and babies are super. However, if the only best way to raise children is to wear the infant at all times and breast feed regularly it becomes difficult for women to participate in society as anything other than mothers. I imagine it would be rather awkward to manage an auto plant or give a quarterly report to the board with a baby strapped to your chest. It follows then that men are left with the trying responsibility of running government and doing work that pays money. These rigid gender roles are unacceptable.

As we continue working to develop new social models that include flexible roles for women and men to participate in the raising of their children, the work force, and the public sphere we need to ask flexible and open questions about natural phenomena and social practices. It is not enough to ask about the biology of women as mothers when we decide how to raise children. Women's access to public spaces and to opportunities simultaneously to work and to mother, or not to mother, hinge on our choices, so it is important we think about power relationships and gender roles as well as molecular biology and sleep cycles. We can do better than the narrow feminism and singular celebration of women as mothers that Attachment Parenting suggests.

Admittedly my article about Attachment Parenting was limited to some fundamental biological issues in regards to raising children, not to the larger social context of gender restrictions and the roles of women in raising children.

Science has been abused by virtually every oppressive system to justify and validate the existence of the oppression. This is certainly the case with gender roles. To talk about scientific proof in relation to women can be very tricky. This is no doubt due to the many egregious examples history has provided of its misapplications (as Mr. Krakow detailed quite well in his response).

This, however, is no reason to ignore that there are some biological realities. One very basic reality being the propensity for women to bear and feed young, and men's inability to do so. Simply because science has been used in the past to validate male supremacy is no reason to conclude that in all cases the application of science in explaining a woman's propensity for a certain task is unwarranted.

It would be a mistake to look at the model of AP and conclude that women should not have a choice in what they do with their time simply because of the possibility that they be mothers. Mr. Krakow is critical of AP because some of its principles would limit the possibility of being, for example, a manager. Our current workplaces puts any one who is a primary caregiver, be they male or female, follower of AP or not, at a distinct disadvantage. Our society puts a higher financial premium on jobs that do not allow for a relaxed style of parenting. The reasons women, in particular, mothers, have limited potential in the modern workplace would not be AP, but archaic workplace standards that were established for men in a society that has historically not held men to the role of parenting.

There are numerous ways for allowing parent and child to receive the benefits of AP without relegating all women to a narrow caste. One could be to make the workplace breast pump friendly. If a female exec had the option of pumping in a location that allowed her to continue her work, her productivity would not be diminished. When places do provide breast pump rooms they are usually out of the way (due to breastfeeding in public being a taboo) and inconvenient.

Workplaces could be more flexible with regard to the presence of children. On site day cares that provided adequate number of caregivers to the worker's children could greatly increased the contact of parent and child during the day with out limiting a parents presence in a company.

Another practice that could be changed is maternity leave. Right now using maternity leave weakens the chance for a parent to be promoted or to get a raise. Over all the work place is extremely hostile to women who have children, and changing that would do a great deal more to enhance women's presence in society than ignoring the fact that their bodies release hormones when they hold their child.

The point of my article on attachment parenting was by no means meant as an exhaustive, fully complete look at all of the roles that women do and are capable of filling in society. Nor was it intended to be a complete look at the practice of Attachment Parenting. As Mr. Krakow establishes, humans are social and historical beings, not just biological. Many of our social practices evolved from biological realities, and therefore it behooves us to understand our biological realities in order to make informed decisions for our culture and our children.

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