The scientific study of sexuality - unsurprisingly, perhaps, a flourishing academic field - aims to help us sort out what we might want from what we can have. Given how widespread sexual curiosity tends to be, it's always interesting to see what science can get up to when it researches sex; what calling this particular area of research 'scientific' adds to, or takes away from, this common pursuit. At its most minimal the so-called science of sex makes us wonder what sex would be if it wasn't embarrassing, and if there was no more to expose than the facts of life.

LRB 19 June 2008 | PDF Download