The Scientific Life: A Moral History of a Late Modern VocationUniversity of Chicago Press, 1 août 2009 - 486 pages 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 worse than anyone else, that personal virtue does not necessarily accompany technical expertise, and that scientific practice is profoundly impersonal. Shapin, however, here shows how the uncertainties attending scientific research make the virtues of individual researchers intrinsic to scientific work. 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 reveals how radically novel aspects of late modern science have unexpectedly deep historical roots. His elegantly conceived history of the scientific career and character ultimately encourages us to reconsider the very nature of the technical and moral worlds in which we now live. Building on the insights of Shapin’s last three influential books, featuring an utterly fascinating cast of characters, and brimming with bold and original claims, The Scientific Life is essential reading for anyone wanting to reflect on late modern American culture and how it has been shaped. |
Table des matières
1 | |
Nature Truth Method and Vocation from the Seventeenth to the Nineteenth Centuries | 21 |
A History of the Very Idea | 47 |
4 Who Is the Industrial Scientist? The View from the Tower | 93 |
5 Who Is the Industrial Scientist? The View from the Managers | 127 |
The Moral Life of Organized Science | 165 |
Money Motives and the Place of Virtue | 209 |
Uncertainty and Virtue in the World of HighTech and Venture Capital | 269 |
Epilogue | 305 |
Notes | 315 |
Bibliography | 401 |
441 | |
Autres éditions - Tout afficher
The Scientific Life: A Moral History of a Late Modern Vocation Steven Shapin Aucun aperçu disponible - 2010 |
The Scientific Life: A Moral History of a Late Modern Vocation Steven Shapin Aucun aperçu disponible - 2008 |
Expressions et termes fréquents
academia academic scientists angel investor Atomic Bell Labs Big Science biotech C. E. Kenneth C. P. Snow Cambridge career Charles Chicago Press Cold War commercial corporate Craig Venter creative cultural David Development early Eastman Kodak Einstein entrepreneurs Feynman Genome Harvard human idea idem individual Industrial Laboratories industrial research managers Industrial Scientific Research industrial scientists inquiry insisted institutional intellectual investment investors John Kenneth Mees late modern Max Weber Merton moral equivalence motives National natural Oppenheimer Organization of Industrial orig Personnel philosopher physicist practical Princeton problems production professional publ quoted Research in Industry research workers Richard Robert Robert Oppenheimer role Science n.s. scientific knowledge Scientific Monthly scientists and engineers Silicon Valley social Society Sociology sort Steven Shapin teamwork technoscience things tion Truth twentieth century UCSD CONNECT University of Chicago University Press Venture Capital virtues vocation York