1. Theoretical Issues in Psychology
Philosophy of science
and
Philosophy of Mind
for
Psychologists
space for cover
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2. Sociology and psychology of science
Chapter 5
Sociology and psychology of science
Science as a human activity
Ideology and ‘critical theory’
Social history of science
Social nature of knowledge and the strong programme
Sociology of scientific practice
The ‘science wars’
Psychology of science
The social and psychological nature of knowledge
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3. Sociology of science
Point of departure is the social relativity of scientific knowledge: to what extent do social processes contribute to the development of knowledge?
How social factors help to explain:
the content of scientific knowledge;
the organization (infrastructure) of science;
the allocation of means.
These studies are also called:
Science Studies or Science of Science
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4. Sociology of science
Context of Discovery: scientist is situated in a historical and social context.
Marx: ‘ideology’.
Mannheim: ‘sociology of knowledge’.
Frankfurter Schule – Habermas.
After Kuhn: sociology of science in full bloom.
Barnes and Bloor (Edinburgh): ‘The Strong Programme’.
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5. Context of discovery The historical origins of theories.
The social and historical context.
The subjective side of research.
The social influence on theories.
Historiography: sometimes called ‘Externalism’ or ‘Contextualism’.
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6. Ideology: historical background
Karl Marx (1845):
false consciousness of the socio-economic dominant class, justifying the status quo
i.e. the ideas of capitalism.
Karl Mannheim (1936):
sociology of knowledge:
all knowledge is determined by social-economic factors.
Frankfurter Schule – JürgenHabermas (1968) :
science & technology as ideology:
critique on existing science & technology.
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7. Science and Technology as Ideology Jürgen Habermas
Science and technology have become ideologies they have led to technical-instrumental rationality and objectivism;
s&t serve interests, are instruments for control;
they legitimate the system of domination;
instrumental rationality is ‘half’ rationality;
this criticism of ideology constitutes its unmasking.
The liberating force is communicative rationality, domination-free communication.
The way to truth is not objectivism (correspondence) but consensus.
This means a shift from the Marxian primacy of production to the primacy of communication.
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8. ‘The Strong Programme’
(Bloor and Barnes)
The 4 tenets for the sociology of knowledge (1976)
Causality: be aware that all sciences are
caused by social (economic, political, cultural,
psychological) factors.
Keep up impartiality with respect to truth and
falsity, rationality or irrationality, succes or failure.
Symmetricality (equivalence): invoke the
same causes for success and for error in science.
Reflexivity: these patterns of explanation
should also be applicable to sociology itself.
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9. Sociology of science from macro-research: broad social influences;
classical Sociology of Sc.
(Merton)
to micro-research:
‘anthropological’ research
in the scientific laboratory
(Latour and Woolgar)
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10. The constructivist perspective
Beliefs are created and adopted in a group’s thinking processs.
Facts are socially constructed, are products of negotiation.
The ‘laboratory’ as a social organisation.
Scientists operate in a preconstructed artifactual reality.
Social processes as constitutive of the production and acceptance of knowledge claims.
Therefore:
anthropological method: sharing the daily life of scientists;
Latour & Woolgar(1979): Laboratory Life.
Knorr-Cetina (1983).
discourse analysis: systematic investigation of the social production of scientific discourse;
Mulkay et al. (1983).
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11. Represention and object: a fallacy
Steve Woolgar (1988)
A traditional fallacy: distinction between representation and object, between knowledge and facts.
On the contrary, there is an intimate interdependence between them.
The representation precedes the represented object.
There is no object out there and beyond us qua observers, and separate from our practice.
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12. Scientific practice a.o. Pickering, Hacking
Shift from knowing to practice, from representation to intervention (Hacking).
Data are not so much theory-laden, but are material artifacts.
The practical scientist tunes his theory to data, to the instruments, to the interpretations.
Theory, data, instruments, interpretations are interdependent.
Once again, it means that objectivity is constructed.
Hacking: realism not about theories, but about practice.
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13. Science Wars Science Wars: scientists contra social-constructionists
‘Deconstruction’, unmasking of authoritative and classical texts, routine in american arts faculties (‘lit crit’), French philosophy.
Gross and Levitt, Higher Superstition (1994): ‘deconstruc- tionists dislike science’.
Sokal Hoax (practical joke)
Nonsense physics accepted as ‘serious’ deconstruction by journal.
Ridicules social constructionism.
(A. Sokal, ‘Transgressing the boundaries. Toward a transformative hermeneutics of quantum gravity’, Social Text, 1996)
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14. Psychology of science
Social-psychological studies of science as a societal enterprise: e.g., infrastructure and laboratories; political influences; allocation of means.
Social-psychological studies of knowledge-acquisition: social factors of scientific cognition; the social nature of ‘discoveries’; networking.
Cognitive-psychological studies of scientific thinking and reasoning; creativity; the genius; discovery.
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