"Globalization, Scientific Lexicons, and the Future of Biology " is an ambitious and radical article in which Professor Keller proposes that biology should introduce a new, verb-based linguistic framework for its research. However, instead of developing such a proposal in detail, Keller turns to searching out a cross-cultural grounding. Based on Nisbett's comparative psycho-linguistics and Lloyd's comparative studies on ancient Greek and Chinese sciences, Keller finds that Chinese science is embodied in a verb. based language. For example, the Huainanzi takes the term shui (水, water) to mean "soaking downward," huo (火, fire) "Naming upward," and the like. As a consequence, Chinese language and science appear significantly different from noun-based Western languages and science. Aware of the pitfalls of an East/West dichotomy, Professor Keller takes the development of feminist theory as an analogue to elaborate her position. Carefully noting that "historians, like feminist scholars, have indeed learned to be immensely cautious about such sweeping categories as East, West, men, and women" and "culture itself has become a problematic category" (9), Keller recommends the following moderate and flexible position: "It is sometimes useful to regard the world as if composed of two kinds of people (or three, or four), sometimes of only one kind, Homo sapiens, and at other times, as composed of six billion kinds of people we call individuals" (10). In her conclusion, therefore, Keller returns to her starting point, outlining a verb-based molecular biology. She suggests:
