Introduction. Science Studies. Probing the Dynamics of Scientific Knowledge

2001 ◽  
pp. 9-54
Keyword(s):  
Scientific Knowledge ◽  
Science Studies

Deliberative Democracy and Science

2018 ◽  
pp. 639-654
Author(s):  
Alfred Moore
Keyword(s):  
Deliberative Democracy ◽  
Scientific Knowledge ◽  
Science Studies ◽  
Public Officials ◽  
Policy Makers ◽  
Consensus Conferences ◽  
Scientific Knowledge Production ◽  
Science And Politics ◽  
Emergence Of Institutions

What might a deliberative politics of science look like? This chapter addresses this question by bringing together science studies and the theories and practices of deliberative democracy. This chapter begins by discussing the importance of considering the role of deliberation within scientific communities and institutions, particularly as it bears on the production of scientific judgments and decisions at the boundary between science and politics. The chapter then discusses the emergence of institutions for communicating scientific knowledge to policy-makers, public officials and citizens, which include not only expert tribunals but also the development of citizen panels, consensus conferences, and other forms of mini-publics. Finally, the chapter considers the role of “uninvited” ’ participation in science, emphasizing the role of social movements and critical civil society in both challenging and informing scientific knowledge production.

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).

scholarly journals STS and the Importance of Being a Collective: Gill Haddow Talks with Barry Barnes

2018 ◽  
Vol 4 ◽  
pp. 267
Author(s):  
Gill Haddow ◽  
Barry Barnes
Keyword(s):  
Scientific Knowledge ◽  
Science Studies ◽  
Feedback Loops ◽  
Thomas Kuhn ◽  
Fertile Period ◽  
Founding Member ◽  
Political Unrest ◽  
Science Wars ◽  
University Of Edinburgh ◽  
The University

Professor Barry Barnes was a key, founding member of the early Science Studies Unit (SSU) at the University of Edinburgh.  In this interview with Gill Haddow he reflects on what is was like to be part of this fertile period of scholarly enterprise with David Bloor and others and describes some of the key influences that effected his thinking such as Thomas Kuhn.  The eighties were a time of political unrest and SSU, was not outwardly political in vision but was not immune.  The Science Wars also had detrimental effects for some.  The origin of the concept of “boot-strapped induction,” or feedback loops was also being brought into existence with the idea that scientific knowledge was both self-referential and self-validating.  At the center lay the most basic and enduring tenets of Barnes’ thought and that was the collective and how people could never truly be independent. A reflection by Gill Haddow follows the interview.

Science Studies Perspectives on Animal Behavior Research: Toward a Deeper Understanding of Gendered Impacts

Hypatia ◽  
2014 ◽  
Vol 29 (4) ◽  
pp. 738-754 ◽  
Author(s):  
J. Kasi Jackson
Keyword(s):  
Sexual Selection ◽  
Animal Behavior ◽  
Scientific Knowledge ◽  
Science Studies ◽  
Feminist Critique ◽  
Research Fields ◽  
Interactive Account ◽  
Ornamental Traits ◽  
The Relationship

This case study examines differences between how the animal‐behavior‐research fields of ethology and sociobiology account for female ornamental traits. I address three questions: 1) Why were female traits noted in early animal‐behavior writings but not systematically studied like male traits? 2) Why did ethology attend to female signals before sexual‐selection studies did? 3) And why didn't sexual‐selection researchers cite the earlier ethological literature when they began studying female traits? To answer these questions, I turn to feminist and other science‐studies scholars and philosophers of science. My main framework is provided by Bruno Latour, whose model I position within relevant feminist critique (Latour 1999). This approach provides an interactive account of how scientific knowledge develops. I argue that this embedded approach provides a more compelling reading of the relationship between gender and science than does focusing on androcentric biases. My overall aim is to counter arguments by some feminist biologists that feminist tools should emphasize the correction and removal of biases, and to address their fears that more rigorous critiques would lead to relativism or otherwise remove science as a tool for feminist use.

scholarly journals Wild Goose Chase: The Displacement of Influenza Research in the Fields of Poyang Lake, China

2015 ◽  
Vol 30 (1) ◽  
pp. 12-35 ◽  
Author(s):  
Lyle Fearnley
Keyword(s):  
Scientific Knowledge ◽  
Science Studies ◽  
Poyang Lake ◽  
Southern China ◽  
Bird Species ◽  
Experimental Practice ◽  
Experimental Systems ◽  
Domestic Bird ◽  
Research Objects ◽  
Set Up

This article follows transnational avian influenza scientists as they move their experimental systems and research objects into what they refer to as the “epicenter” of flu pandemics, southern China. Based on the hypothesis that contact between wild and domestic bird species could produce new pandemic flu viruses, scientists set up a research program into the wild–domestic interface at China’s Poyang Lake. As influenza comes to be understood in terms of multispecies relations and ecologies in addition to the virus proper, the scientific knowledge of influenza is increasingly dependent on research conducted at particular sites, such as Poyang Lake. What does this movement of influenza research from laboratory to field mean for anthropological concepts of scientific knowledge? A widely shared premise among anthropologists is that scientific knowledge is made in experimental practice, but this practice turn in science studies draws largely from fieldwork inside laboratories. In this article, drawing on fieldwork with both influenza scientists and poultry breeders, I show how scientific research objects can be displaced by the practices of poultry breeders rather than by experimental practice itself. For these poultry breeders, refusing to respect the distinction of wild and domestic, were breeding wild birds.

Scientific Progress

Philosophy ◽  
2012 ◽  
Author(s):  
Ilkka Niiniluoto
Keyword(s):  
Philosophy Of Science ◽  
Scientific Knowledge ◽  
Science Studies ◽  
Scientific Progress ◽  
Social Institution ◽  
Research Process ◽  
Social Progress ◽  
Scientific Change ◽  
Professional Status ◽  
Language Of Science

Science is the systematic pursuit of new knowledge by using critical methods of inquiry. Scientists constitute a community of investigators jointly engaged in research to produce knowledge about nature, humanity, culture, and society. The notion of science may thus refer to a social institution, the researchers, the research process, the methods of inquiry, and scientific knowledge. Developments and changes in all of these aspects of science are studied by the history of science. Sociologists of science are especially interested in the professional status of the scientists and their academic institutions, the internal norms of the scientific community, forms of scientific communication, and the economics and funding systems of scientific research. Multidisciplinary science studies illuminate the interaction between science and society, especially the ways scientific advances have brought about social progress by improved technologies, economic prosperity, quality of life, and justice in society. Science education is concerned with the increased skill and expertise of the scientists. Methodology looks at the development of new methods and tools of research, such as the refinement of scientific instruments, techniques of experimentation, and statistical and computational methods. Philosophy of science analyzes science from a cognitive perspective as an attempt to improve and increase scientific knowledge. In particular, axiological studies discuss the aims of scientific inquiry. Logic and epistemology study the proper ways of scientific thinking, argumentation, and inference. The language of science and its relations to reality, observation, and theory; explanation and prediction; and patterns of scientific change belong to the main themes of general philosophy of science. Philosophical studies may also focus on key issues about special scientific disciplines, such as physics, biology, psychology, and economics. While the notion of scientific progress in the broad sense could cover improvements in all of these aspects of science, it is customary to restrict this title to advances of science in terms of its success in knowledge seeking. In this sense, scientific progress is a fundamental issue that has been actively debated within the philosophy of science since the 1960s. The task of philosophical analysis is to consider alternative answers to the conceptual or normative question: What is meant by improvement or progress in science? The definition of progress leads to the methodological question about indicators of progress: How can we recognize progressive developments in science? With these tools one can then study the factual question: To what extent and in which respects has science been progressive?

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.

scholarly journals APPLICATION OF SCIENTOMETRIC ANALYSIS METHODS FOR EVALUATING PUBLICATION ACTIVITY (A CASE OF THE KALININGRAD REGION UNDER STUDY)

2020 ◽  
pp. 43-53
Author(s):  
Irina Yu. Peker ◽  
Keyword(s):  
Scientific Knowledge ◽  
Science Studies ◽  
National Level ◽  
Temporal Distribution ◽  
Scientific Productivity ◽  
Knowledge Generation ◽  
Scientometric Analysis ◽  
Transfer Of Knowledge ◽  
Scientific Publications ◽  
Kaliningrad Region

The spatial aspects of the generation, application and further transfer of knowledge are increasingly attracting the attention of Russian and foreign researchers in social science and the humanities. Taking into account the importance of the geographical factor in the distribution of science and knowledge in general, it should be noted that the methods and tools of spatial analysis, for example, such a field of science studies as scientometrics, appear to be relevant. The research deals with the spatio-temporal distribution of scientific knowledge about the Kaliningrad region. The paper presents the results of the analysis of bibliometric data on the subject ‘Kaliningrad region’ in order to identify the centers of knowledge generation and the most relevant areas of research. The calculations are based on the methods of scientometric analysis of bibliographic data applied to determine the volume and distribution of scientific publications in time and space. Cartographic methods were also used. The bibliographic database of the scientific electronic library eLIBRARY.RU, the largest Russian electronic archive of scientific publications, was taken as a data source. The study has revealed the dynamics of scientific productivity, the main branches of scientific knowledge studying the Kaliningrad region, scientific centers, as well as their spatial distribution at the national level.

scholarly journals Skepticism and defiance: Assessing credibility and representations of science

PLoS ONE ◽  
2021 ◽  
Vol 16 (9) ◽  
pp. e0250823
Author(s):  
Jean Louis Tavani ◽  
Anthony Piermattéo ◽  
Grégory Lo Monaco ◽  
Sylvain Delouvée
Keyword(s):  
Scientific Knowledge ◽  
Science Studies ◽  
Social Representations ◽  
Empirical Studies ◽  
Temporal Stability ◽  
Social Representation ◽  
Social Consequences ◽  
French Version ◽  
Societal Issues ◽  
The Social

Since the 1970s, there has been a growing interest in how individuals appropriate scientific knowledge, which has recently been reinforced by societal issues such as vaccine releases and skepticism about global warming. Faced with the health and social consequences of the mistrust of scientific knowledge, there is an urgent need for tools to measure the acceptance or rejection of scientific knowledge, while at the same time gaining a more detailed understanding of the processes involved. This is the purpose of this article. Thus, we conducted 4 empirical studies to provide a validation of the Credibility of Science Scale from the perspective of a French population, which aims to assess the credibility that individuals attribute to science and to empirically evaluate the link that may exist between the different levels of credibility attributed to science and the social representations of science. Studies 1a and 1b demonstrated good structural validity, the good fidelity (homogeneity and temporal stability), and the good criterion validity of the French version of the scale. In Study 2, we observed the same psychometric qualities of the French version of the scale. We also noted a structuring of the social representation of science based on age (Factor 1) and on the credibility attributed to science (Factor 2). Our results also raise the question of possible means of intervention to promote a better perception of science.

Sign in / Sign up

Export Citation Format

Share Document