Ever since Greek antiquity "disembodied knowledge" has often been taken as synonymous with "objective truth." Yet we also have very specific mental images of the kinds of bodies that house great minds-the ascetic philosopher versus the hearty surgeon, for example. Does truth have anything to do with the belly? What difference does it make to the pursuit of knowledge whether Einstein rode a bicycle, Russell was randy, or Darwin flatulent? Bringing body and knowledge into such intimate contact is occasionally seen as funny, sometimes as enraging, and more often just as pointless. Vividly...
Ever since Greek antiquity "disembodied knowledge" has often been taken as synonymous with "objective truth." Yet we also have very specific mental im...
Who are scientists? What kind of people are they? What capacities and virtues are thought to stand behind their considerable authority? They are experts indeed, highly respected experts authorized to describe and interpret the natural world and widely trusted to help transform knowledge into power and profit. But are they morally different from other people? "The Scientific Life" is historian Steven Shapin s story about who scientists are, who we think they are, and why our sensibilities about such things matter. Conventional wisdom has long held that scientists are neither better nor...
Who are scientists? What kind of people are they? What capacities and virtues are thought to stand behind their considerable authority? They are exper...
Who are scientists? What kind of people are they? What capacities and virtues are thought to stand behind their considerable authority? "The Scientific Life" is historian Steven Shapin s story about who scientists are, who we think they are, and why our sensibilities about such things matter. From the early twentieth-century origins of corporate research laboratories to the high-flying scientific entrepreneurship of the present, Shapin argues that the radical uncertainties of much contemporary science have made personal virtues" more" central to its practice than ever before, and he also...
Who are scientists? What kind of people are they? What capacities and virtues are thought to stand behind their considerable authority? "The Scient...
