  Behind philosophical attempts to seek objective, nonevaluative foundations for designations of diseases as “genetic” or “environmental” lie positivist assumptions that theoretical understanding furnishes the basis for rational action. One concern with geneticization and the trend to label an increasing number of diseases and conditions “genetic” is that this provides normative support for directing future research and therapeutic interventions in particular ways, that is, at the level of the genome (Cranor 1994). Watson's (1992) colorful metaphor makes this normative support explicit: “Ignoring genes is like trying to solve a murder without finding the murderer. All we have are victims” (p. 167). But this is fallacious reasoning, as the context-dependence of genetic explanations shows. We might instead understand geneticization to be the consequence of an increased capacity to manipulate DNA in the laboratory and (potentially) the clinic and not an advancement in theoretical understanding. Genetic explanations, on such a view, are pragmatic: there is a practical context in which genes are singled out as causes not only because they are amenable to technological control but because they are increasingly perceived to be more tractable than their nongenetic counterparts and therefore the best means to a variety of ends (Gannett 1999).