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The way in which the results of molecular biology are connected with meaningful images and stories, and how it is socialized, politicized and technologically exploited is deeply cultural. Therefore, molecular biology, even if it is a natural science, can fruitfully be looked at from a hermeneutic point of view. The task of hermeneutics, when we follow one of the most important theorists of hermeneutics, Hans-Georg Gadamer, is not merely to develop a procedure to understand difficult texts, but to discover and explore the very conditions under which human understanding takes place [9, Part 2, II.1.c]. When we apply this to molecular biology, this means that the task of (genetic) hermeneutics is to discover and explore the conditions under which the meanings of genes, genomes, genetic texts and genetic factors in human life and societies can be understood.

I want to explore some aspects of this hermeneutic process that manifest themselves in the practical, cultural sides of genetics, mainly those that are connected to the fact that genetics is a heavily lingual undertaking. Taking the phenomenon of language seriously in such complex inter-textual relationships (genetic information vs. information about genes), we can more clearly see how cultural understandings of biology and biological theory work together. And we can also deduce what ethical implications different understandings may have.