9/24/08ESPP-781 Science as Representation (of Nature and Society) Two meanings of representation: –Make a picture, image, diagram, or model –Speak for, stand in for Questions about scientific representation –How do we know what we (think we) know? –How do we tell true from false (scientific) knowledge? –How, in cases of doubt and uncertainty, do we tell better knowledge from worse knowledge?

9/24/08ESPP-782 The Illusion(s) of Empiricism: Knowing and Seeing

9/24/08ESPP-783 Interpretive Flexibility The Rashomon effect (based on 1950 Kurasawa film) Same signals are interpreted in different ways by different viewers Reasons: –Standpoint (e.g., social position) –Prior framings (e.g., historical experience) –Strategic interests (e.g., political motives)

9/24/08ESPP-784 Social Construction of Science What does it mean to say that scientific knowledge is “(socially) constructed”? –Science is a human, social, political activity –Science tries to reduce the interpretive flexibility of nature –Science is carried out according to conventions about: What questions are important (health, ecology) What can be feasibly investigated (low doses, synergies) How should these questions be investigated (methods) What counts as valid knowledge and what does not (use of simulations and scenarios, historical data, lay knowledge)

9/24/08ESPP-785 Where does evidence of “construction” come from? Histories of science –Ideas of Ludwik Fleck and Thomas Kuhn –Thought collectives; paradigms Sociology and anthropology of science –The “strong programme” of David Bloor: see what scientists do, not what they say; don’t take truth for granted; use “symmetrical” explanations Events in the world –controversies, accidents, surprises, failed predictions

9/24/08ESPP-786 Reducing Interpretive Flexibility When Science Meets Policy How is interpretive flexibility reduced in policy environments? –What is speeding, and how do we know it? –What is pollution and how do we know it? –What is climate change, and how do we know it? –What is anthropogenic climate change, and how do we know it?

9/24/08ESPP-787 Mauna Loa Measurements: An Unambiguous Signal?

9/24/08ESPP-788 Frame Shift: The Hockey Stick

9/24/08ESPP-789 Complicating the Curve: More Data, Less Clarity?

9/24/08ESPP-7810 Common Misunderstandings about Social Construction Relativist fallacies: –“Anything goes”: no; all scientific accounts have to accommodate observed phenomena –“There is no external reality”: no; rather, our perceptions of reality are socially mediated –“Any knowledge as good as any other”: no; there are conventions about goodness in science –“All science is political”: maybe; but how?

9/24/08ESPP-7811 How Models Construct the World What causal understandings are built into a model? –E.g., Climate change is anthropogenic, not caused by sunspots or random temperature fluctuations Which parameters are important? –E.g., Climate variation is related to carbon emissions from human activities such as car use, deforestation What methods are used to test those parameters? –E.g., Instruments, simulations, “ground truthing” of satellite data, historical records, lay experience