Lecture Kallinen

8/14/2019 Lecture Kallinen

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History of Science andTechnology

Maija Kallinen: 31.10.2006VTT

Histories of

Science

Technology

Medicine

the Humanities

Oulu: History of Science and Ideas

Torus network: http://torus.oulu.fi


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The traditional view of science

Objectivity

Rationality

Intellectuality

Misunderstandings,simplifications, half-

truths

Whewell in search for

method

Sarton and Singer:history of scienceimportant only in

relation to modern

science

History of Science

describes and explains the birth, growth, andpossible decay of its subjects of study

this is done with the help of historicalsources,

and by using various explanatory factors


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What does HoS study? theories and concepts

inventions and innovation processes

scientific methods and procedures instruments

scientific institutions, science policy From local to global knowledge Identities of institutions and individual researchers

Communication, retoric of science

science and society failed inventions, frauds

Controversies

biographies

..and History of Technology

machine history

The influence of technology on society

Technology as an agent of change in world

history

Which factors have shaped development oftechnology?

Cultural, political, economical


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Sources1

Published

Monographies, articles,scientific journals

Reports, travel accounts

Memoires

Newspapers, journals,popular publications

Unpublished

Manuscripts

Notebooks

correspondence,personal archives,diaries

Records and minutes of

institutions, societies etc.

1) Kragh 1987, Ch. 11.

Explanatory factors in HoS

Internalist vs. externalist factors

Personal factors

Social, cultural and political factors

Ideologies and religious factors

Economic factors, material resources


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Explanation

Which aspects do need explanations?

Which explanatory factors are the mostimportant ones?

How do we know which factors to count with?

The Dangers of Anachronism

Evaluation from the present point of view

The Whig history

Formalisation, modernisation

Coherence

Anticipation

There is no perfect diachronism!


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New Perspectives in STS

STS = Science and Technology studies

Gender

Constructivism

Science as a construction historiography as

construction

The Classical Sociology ofScience

1950-1960s

Robert K. Merton 1938: Science, Technologyand Society in Swenteenth-Centuey England

Career structues, reward systems, researchcommunities

The correspondence theory of truth, realisticview of science

Against the view: Thomas Kuhn, PaulFeyerabend


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The new Sociology of

Science

From 1970s on

Social History of Science

SSK (Sociology of Scientific Knowledge)

From texts to actions

From validity to credibility

The Strong Programme

David Bloor 1976: Knowledge and SocialImagery

Causality

Impartiality

Symmetry

Reflectivity


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Sosiological History of

Science

Steven Shapin & Simon Schaffer: Leviathanand the Air-Pump 1985

Theory dependance of observations

interests

Underdetermination of facts

Controversies, closure mechanisms of

The cycle of credibility

Network models (Latours actor-network theory)

SCOT

Scot = the Social Construction of Technology

Thomas P. Hughes: building of technologicalsystems


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History of Scienceand Technology

what to make of it?

Further readings

Mika Kiikeri & Petri Ylikoski: Tiede tutkimuskohteena,Gaudeamus 2004

Helge Kragh: An Introduction to the Historiography of Science,Cambridge UP 1987

R.C.Olby, G.N.Cantor, e.a.(eds.): Companion to the History ofModern Science, Routledge 1990

S. Jasanoff, G.E. Markle, e.a.(eds.): Handbook of Science andTechnology Studies, SAGE 1995

Jan Golinski: Making Natural Knowledge. Constructivism and theHistory of Science, CUP 1998

Wiebe E. Bijker, Of Bicycles, Bakelites and Bulbs:Toward aTheory of Socio-Technical Change, MIT 1994??

Thomas P.Hughes: Networks of Power. Electrification in WesternSociety 1880-1930, Baltimore1983

Lecture Kallinen

Documents

Transcript of Lecture Kallinen