Sociology of Scientific Knowledge (Sociology)

Die Wirklichkeit des Wissens!? Zur Kritik der instrumentellen Vernunft in der Wissensgesellschaft

by Torsten Heinemann

Published in: Salon des Interdépendants. 2007. 1(1).

Knowing cases: biomedicine in Edinburgh, 1887-1920

by Steve Sturdy

Social Studies of Science, 37 (2007), 659-689

This paper examines the scientific work of the Laboratory of the Royal College of Physicians of Edinburgh from its... more This paper examines the scientific work of the Laboratory of the Royal College of Physicians of Edinburgh from its foundation in 1887 to 1920. It looks in particular at the pivotal role of clinical cases in the work of the Laboratory, using the concept of ‘triangulation’ to analyse how cases served both as objects of scientific knowledge and as sites for articulating and aligning the concerns of medical practitioners and career scientists. It goes on to propose a general model for thinking about the role of cases in scientific knowledge production, based on a rereading of Kuhn as seen through the lens of the sociology of scientific knowledge. It concludes with some general reflections on how this analysis of the work of the Laboratory helps us to rethink the relations between basic and applied medical science in the period before the emergence of modern biomedicine.

Can science tell us what's objectively true?

by Brian Earp

Earp, B. D. (2011). Can science tell us what’s objectively true? The New Collection, Vol. 6., No. 1, 1-9. Featured article in the graduate journal of New College, Oxford.

Can science tell us what’s objectively true? Or is it merely a clever way to cure doubt – to give us something to... more Can science tell us what’s objectively true? Or is it merely a clever way to cure doubt – to give us something to believe in, whether it’s true or not? In this essay, I look at the pragmatist account of science expounded by Charles Sanders Peirce in his 1877 essay, ‘The Fixation of Belief’. Against Peirce, I argue that science does not come naturally to our species, nor does the doubting open-mindedness upon which its practice relies. To the extent that science is successful in ‘curing’ doubt, it’s because it tracks the real state of the world; and I argue that Peirce himself – his pragmatist narrative notwithstanding – is implicitly committed to this view as well.

2010: Designed for Travel: Communicating Facts Through Images

by Martina Merz

In: P. Howlett & M.S. Morgan (eds.), How Well Do Facts Travel? The Dissemination of Reliable Knowledge. (Cambridge UK: Cambridge University Press, 2010), 349-375

A related paper is available from www2.lse.ac.uk/economicHistory/Research/facts/annualreport09.pdf

Working... more A related paper is available from www2.lse.ac.uk/economicHistory/Research/facts/annualreport09.pdf

Working Papers on The Nature of Evidence: How Well Do ‘Facts’ Travel? No. 38/10 (June 2010). Department of Economic History, London School of Economics: London UK

2006: The Topicality of the Difference Thesis: Revisiting Constructivism and the Laboratory

by Martina Merz

Science, Technology & Innovation Studies, Vol. (2006), Special Issue No 1, pp. 11-24

Within science and technology studies, constructivism has never existed as a single variant but under alternative... more Within science and technology studies, constructivism has never existed as a single variant but under alternative interpretations. In this article it is argued that the different variants have maintained their topicality in unequal measure. It focuses on two variants of constructivism: The first emphasizes the isomorphism of scientific and other practices and insists that there are no epistemic particularities in scientific knowledge production (“analogy approach”); the second accounts for the success of contemporary science by relating it to the specifics of scientific laboratories (“difference approach”). In this paper it is argued that the second variant can provide a set of challenging research problems that have not, to date, been sufficiently addressed in the literature. The problems center on the relation between laboratories and contexts of application, as well as on the concept of the laboratory and its possible extensions. In contrast, the issues associated with the analogy approach have been well explored in previous bodies of work. This article develops a research agenda for a constructivist account of knowledge production that may be employed within other discourses in the social sciences.

1997: Floundering or Frolicking-How Does Ethnography Fare In Theoretical Physics? (And What Sort of Ethnography?): A Reply to Gale and Pinnick

by Martina Merz

Co-authored with Karin Knorr Cetina
Social Studies of Science 27:1 (Feb 1997), 123-131 doi:10.1177/030631297027001006

1997: Deconstruction In a 'Thinking' Science: Theoretical Physicists at Work

by Martina Merz

Co-authored with Karin Knorr Cetina
Social Studies of Science 27: 1 (1997), 73-111

In this paper we apply the laboratory study approach of the new sociology of scientific practice to a `thinking... more In this paper we apply the laboratory study approach of the new sociology of scientific practice to a `thinking science': theoretical physics. To specify the work and accomplishments of theoretical physicists we choose the notion of `deconstruction'. Deconstruction involves the expansion of a concrete object, such as an equation, into a series of other objects upon which the `hardness' of a problem can be shifted and distributed. In solving an equation, however, the determinate path of a deconstruction method needs to be supplemented by the exploration of clues and guesses, trials and tricks. We trace a series of devices, and iterations thereof, which physicists mobilize in dealing with hard problems: formal deconstructions, detours and tricks to identify a working deconstruction, variation, `doing examples', modelling and, finally, thought alliances between subjects.

Estrategias cientificistas en la literatura argentina de fines del siglo XIX

by Graciela Salto

Tesis de Doctorado en Letras
Directora: María Teresa Gramuglio
Autora: Graciela Nélida Salto
Buenos Aires: Facultad de Filosofía y Letras, Universidad de Buenos Aires, 1999.

Índice

1. Un aspecto del movimiento intelectual argentino en las últimas décadas del siglo XIX
... more Índice

1. Un aspecto del movimiento intelectual argentino en las últimas décadas del siglo XIX

2. Las fantasías científicas

2.1. El curioso juguete darwinista
2.2. del traumatismo a los autómatas
2.3. La sugestión del policial
2.3.1. Son fenómenos de la misma familia
2.3.2. Una infeliz neurótica
2.3.3. Un caso de histerismo telepático

3. Del caso clínico a la novela de tesis
3.1. De informes, pericias y ficciones
3.2. Anécdotas y casos
3.3. Curiosas observaciones de hermafrodismo
3.4. Higiene, etnia y ficción
3.4.1. Un caso de enfermedad moral

4. Un libro extraño
4.1. Extraño y raro es el libro que acabo de leer
4.2. Era por lo menos un genialoide
4.3. Cuatro familias de psicópatas
4.4. Médicos, apóstoles y escritores
4.5. Los materiales de la lectura:
4.5.1. Letras sanas, fuertes y viriles
4.5.2. La transmutación poética de lo natural
4.5.3. Lecturas degenerativas
4.5.4. La lengua de la literatura nacional

5. Ficciones cientificistas

Bibliography on the History of Science & the Origins of Race (2007)

by B. Ricardo Brown

For students in the course History of Science and the Origins of Race, Department of Social Science and Cultural Studies, Pratt Institute

Bibliography of works in the area from which the readings for the course are drawn as well as having been sources for... more Bibliography of works in the area from which the readings for the course are drawn as well as having been sources for Until Darwin: Science, Human Variety and the Origins of Race