Sociology and the mirror of nature: Robert Brandom and the strong programme

2016 ◽  
Vol 53 (1) ◽  
pp. 245-263
Author(s):  
Duncan Law ◽  
Nicole Pepperell
Keyword(s):  
Scientific Knowledge ◽  
Science Studies ◽  
Scientific Practice ◽  
Empirical Science ◽  
Objective Knowledge ◽  
Sociological Analysis ◽  
Sociology Of Scientific Knowledge ◽  
Robert Brandom ◽  
Strong Programme ◽  
Epistemological Relativism

The ‘strong programme’ in the sociology of scientific knowledge has both exerted enormous influence on science studies, and been widely criticised for its apparent commitment to epistemological relativism. In this article we argue that the recent work of the pragmatist philosopher Robert Brandom provides a potential resolution to these debates. Brandom’s work, we argue, meets the key commitments of the strong programme, including particularly commitments to symmetry and reflexivity, while also demonstrating how these commitments are compatible with a robust – but non-dogmatic, pragmatist – concept of objective knowledge. In so doing, it provides a theoretically developed account of why the traditions of empirical science studies that emerged from the strong programme need not be seen as undermining scientific objectivity, while it also supports a reflexive, critical sociological analysis of scientific practice.

The Sociology of Scientific Knowledge

Entanglements ◽  
2016 ◽  
Author(s):  
Simone Tosoni ◽  
Trevor Pinch
Keyword(s):  
Tacit Knowledge ◽  
Scientific Knowledge ◽  
Empirical Work ◽  
Specific Form ◽  
Early Years ◽  
Sociology Of Scientific Knowledge ◽  
Scientific Controversies ◽  
Strong Programme ◽  
Epistemological Relativism ◽  
Harry Collins

The chapter presents the early years and the subsequent developments of the Sociology of Scientific Knowledge (SSK), starting from the School of Edinburgh and the Edinburgh Strong Programme advanced by David Bloor, introducing its four tenets: symmetry, impartiality, causality, and reflexivity. After presenting the main works done in Laboratory Studies, it extensively presents the Bath School and its focus on scientific controversies and tacit knowledge. In particular, it discusses in depth Harry Collins’ concept of “experimenter’s regress” and Trevor Pinch’s “externality of observation”, presenting the empirical work these concepts are based on. The chapter then clarifies the specific form of relativism (methodological relativism) adopted by the Bath School, pointing out its differences from epistemological relativism, and finally discusses the issue of reflexivity as addressed with SSK.

THE THIRD WAVE OF SCIENCE STUDIES AS A PHILOSOPHICAL JUSTIFICATION FOR STS

2018 ◽  
Vol 28 (5) ◽  
pp. 31-52
Keyword(s):  
Scientific Knowledge ◽  
Science Studies ◽  
Expert Knowledge ◽  
Sociology Of Science ◽  
Third Wave ◽  
Interactional Expertise ◽  
Sociology Of Scientific Knowledge ◽  
The Third ◽  
Philosophical Ontology ◽  
Empirical Sociology

The principle of reflexivity is a stumbling block for David Bloor’s “strong program” in the sociology of scientific knowledge — the program that gave rise to alternative projects in the field called science and technology studies (STS). The principle of reflexivity would require that the empirical sociology of scientific knowledge must itself be subject to the same kind of causal, impartial, and symmetrical investigation that empirical sociology applies to the natural sciences. However, applying reflexivity to empirical sociology would mean that sociologists of science fall into the trap of the “interpretive flexibility of facts” just as natural scientists do when they try to build theories upon facts, as the empirical sociology of scientific knowledge has discovered. Is there a way to overcome this regression in the empirical sociology of knowledge? Yes, but it lies in the philosophical rather than the empirical plane. However, the philosophical “plane” is not flat, because philosophy is accustomed to inquiring into its own foundations. In the case of STS, this inquiry takes us back to the empirical “plane,” which is also not flat because it requires philosophical reflection and philosophical ontology. This article considers the attempt by Harry Collins to bypass the principle of reflexivity by turning to philosophical ontology, a manoeuver that the empirical sociology of science would deem “illegal.” The “third wave of science studies” proposed by Collins is interpreted as a philosophical justification for STS. It is argued that Collins formulates an ontology of nature and society, which underlies his proposed concepts of “interactional expertise” and “tacit knowledge” — keys to understanding the methodology of third-wave STS. Collins’ ontology begins by questioning the reality of expert knowledge and ends (to date) with a “social Cartesianism” that asserts a dualism between the physical and the mental (or social).

Understanding science from the perspective of the sociology of scientific knowledge: an overview

1994 ◽  
Vol 3 (3) ◽  
pp. 245-258 ◽  
Author(s):  
Steven Yearley
Keyword(s):  
Scientific Knowledge ◽  
Scientific Practice ◽  
Public Understanding Of Science ◽  
Public Understanding ◽  
Mutual Benefit ◽  
Public Controversy ◽  
The Public ◽  
Sociology Of Scientific Knowledge ◽  
Understanding Of Science ◽  
Understanding Science

In this paper I argue that the analytic perspective known as the `sociology of scientific knowledge' (SSK) provides an appropriate platform for examining issues in the public understanding of science. In particular. I suggest that three pervasive features of academic scientific practice identified by SSK—trust, judgement and long-termism—are central to interpreting difficulties with the `public understanding of science' in many situations of public controversy. The paper concludes by identifying areas where studies in SSK and the public understanding of science would be of mutual benefit.

scholarly journals Extensionalism and intensionalism in the realist-SSK 'debate'

2010 ◽  
Vol 3 (2) ◽  
pp. 26
Author(s):  
Edward Mariyani-Squire
Keyword(s):  
Scientific Knowledge ◽  
Sociology Of Scientific Knowledge ◽  
Strong Programme ◽  
Basic Level

The 'strong programme' in the sociology of scientific knowledge (SSK) is based upon finitism and extensionalism. This article examines a critique of these bases. It is argued that David Tyfield's (2008; 2009) realist critique and his alternative intensionalist account of meaning face problems at least as serious as those he identifies in the strong programme’s finitism. This is not to say that the strong programme is problem-free: it fails to give sufficient acknowledgement to non-conventional constraints on meaning formation and change. It is also suggested that, as they are currently conceived, realism's intensionalism and the strong programme's extensionalism are irreconcilably incompatible at such a basic level that the 'debate' between them reduces to an exchange of 'assurances'.

scholarly journals Sociologia da ciência: realismo, idealismo e construtivismo

1969 ◽  
Vol 1 (2) ◽  
pp. 292-320
Author(s):  
Vicente De Paula Gomes
Keyword(s):  
Scientific Knowledge ◽  
Sociological Analysis ◽  
Strong Programme

A virada neopragmática, crítica avassaladora da função fundante dos saberes autodefendida pela filosofia, radical ao ponto de incluir a própria vertente analítica de onde se originou, é, inexoravelmente, a fronteira atual do conhecimento filosófico, o golpe do movimento neopragmático à filosofia e à razão; contudo, deve ser avaliado como positivo. Ele possibilitou o retorno à consciência das matrizes conceituais genuínas desse saber ao apontar as propostas de superação do impasse: naturalismo estrito (QUINE, 1969), naturalismo fraco (HABERMAS, 2004), idealismo objetivo (HÖSLE, 1987), contextualismo (RORTY, 1994). Contribuíram, inquestionavelmente, para esse desfecho, os estudos históricos e sociológicos da ciência pós-kuhnianos, inspirados em sua filosofia da ciência. Inserindo-se tangencialmente nesse debate, o objeto de reflexão deste estudo é contrapor o ponto de vista da sociologia da ciência ao realismo e ao idealismo. Nosso intuito é demonstrar que o construtivismo que caracteriza seu modelo de inquirição não nega, como ingênua ou maliciosamente entendem seus críticos, a função determinante da natureza na construção da ciência. A força do nosso argumento emergirá da análise realizada pelos expoentes do strong programme em sociologia da ciência, Barry Barnes, David Bloor e John Henry (1996), no livro “Scientific Knowledge: a sociological analysis”, de um estudo de caso controverso da história da física: os experimentos que o físico norte-americano Robert Millikan realizou para estabelecer a carga do elétron.

Contingency, Nature and Hermeneutics in History of Science

2014 ◽  
Vol 8 (2) ◽  
pp. 291-310
Author(s):  
Jeroen Bouterse
Keyword(s):  
History Of Science ◽  
Scientific Knowledge ◽  
Network Theory ◽  
Actor Network Theory ◽  
Natural World ◽  
Scientific Development ◽  
Sociology Of Scientific Knowledge ◽  
History Of ◽  
Strong Programme

When, as historians, we want to explain developments in the history of natural science, how are we to do justice to the role of the natural world – the thing scientists investigate – in our explanations? The idea that the structure of the natural world renders the development of science inevitable seems to be inadequate, but so does the idea that we should explain the history of science without any reference to nature, as if what scientists study made no difference at all to what they believe. Is ‘nature’ even a feasible category, however? To what extent is it a problem that in referring to the result of scientific development in our explanation of scientific development, we are assuming the authority of science? Does this undermine the possibility of critical and independent historiography? This article deals with several possible solutions to these problems, and outlines an alternative to rationalism as well as to the Strong Programme in the Sociology of Scientific Knowledge and Latour’s Actor-Network Theory.

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