This book provides a nontechnical account of the debate concerning human embryo research, concentrating on the British parliamentary debates of 1984-1990. It traces the debates' origins back to conflicts over abortion and moral reform in the 1960s, and examines reactions in the 1990s to sex selection and the use of eggs from human fetuses for research. Michael Mulkay shows how embryo research develops within a complex social environment, writing for anyone interested in the relationship between science-based assisted reproduction and society.

This book provides a nontechnical account of the debate concerning human embryo research, concentrating on the British parliamentary debates of 1984-1990. It traces the debates' origins back to conflicts over abortion and moral reform in the 1960s, and examines reactions in the 1990s to sex selection and the use of eggs from human fetuses for research. Michael Mulkay shows how embryo research develops within a complex social environment, writing for anyone interested in the relationship between science-based assisted reproduction and society.

This book proposes a fresh approach to sociological analysis and, in particular, to the analysis of scientific culture.

M.J. Mulkay traces the development of certain recent versions of functionalism and exchange theory in sociology, with special attention to 'theoretical strategy'. He uses this term to refer to the policies which theorists adopt to ensure that their work contributes to their long range theoretical objectives. Such strategies are important, he believes, because they place limits on the theories with which they are associated. He shows how each of the theorists he studies devised a new strategy to replace the unsuccessful policies of a prior theory in a process of 'strategical dialectic'. This...

How far is scientific knowledge a product of social life? In addressing this question, the major contributors to the sociology of knowledge have agreed that the conclusions of science are dependent on social action only in a very special and limited sense. In Science and the Sociology of Knowledge Michael Mulkay's first aim is to identify the philosophical assumptions which have led to this view of science as special; and to present a systematic critique of the standard philosophical account of science, showing that there are no valid epistemological grounds for excluding scientific knowledge...