Scientists and 'anti-scientists' alike need a more realistic image of science. The traditional mode of research, academic science, is not just a 'method': it is a distinctive culture, whose members win esteem and employment by making public their findings. Fierce competition for credibility is strictly regulated by established practices such as peer review. Highly specialized international communities of independent experts form spontaneously and generate the type of knowledge we call 'scientific' - systematic, theoretical, empirically-tested, quantitative, and so on. Ziman shows that these familiar 'philosophical' features of scientific knowledge are inseparable from the ordinary cognitive capabilities and peculiar social relationships of its producers. This wide-angled close-up of the natural and human sciences recognizes their unique value, whilst revealing the limits of their rationality, reliability, and universal applicability. It also shows how, for better or worse, the new 'post-academic' research culture of teamwork, accountability, etc. is changing these supposedly eternal philosophical characteristics.
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This non-technical analysis of the nature and significance of scientific knowledge opens the way to reconciliation in the 'science wars'. By describing how academic scientists actually undertake research and communicate their findings, it shows that the philosophy, psychology and sociology of science are inextricably entwined.
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Preface; 1. A peculiar institution; 2. Basically, it's purely academic; 3. Academic science; 4. New modes of knowledge production; 5. Community and communication; 6. Universalism and unification; 7. Disinterestedness and objectivity; 8. Originality and novelty; 9. Scepticism and the growth of knowledge; 10. What then, can we believe?; Bibliography; Index.
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'… an excellent insight into the social and 'political' structure of the scientific world. Real Science makes interesting reading because it shows that scientific knowledge, rather than providing the idealized, clear and concise description of the world around us, is all too much an evolving product of the human mind.' Peter L. Hordijk and Eloise C. Anthony, Nature Cell Biology
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A systematic, carefully reasoned, but non-technical analysis of the nature and significance of scientific knowledge.
Produktdetaljer
ISBN
9780521893107
Publisert
2002-06-24
Utgiver
Vendor
Cambridge University Press
Vekt
600 gr
Høyde
225 mm
Bredde
152 mm
Dybde
26 mm
Aldersnivå
G, P, 01, 06
Språk
Product language
Engelsk
Format
Product format
Heftet
Antall sider
412
Forfatter