In this chapter, I use the lens of integrative promise to offer an explanation of a fact that is often noted in passing but rarely considered explicitly in the literature: while, in recent years, essentially every scientific discipline has turned to textual analysis of the journal literature as a tool, such uses are far more prominent in the life sciences than in other scientific fields. Why might this be? I argue here that this results from the way in which textual analysis of the scientific literature can contribute to the discovery of promising explanations in biology. Such a connection is not necessary—textual analysis can certainly be used for other purposes as well—but the importance of integrative promise in the life sciences can thus help us understand why textual analysis would have so quickly become such an important tool in this context.