Philosophers, historians, and sociologists of science have grown interested in the daily practices of scientists. Recent studies have drawn linkages between scientific innovations and more ordinary procedures, craft skills, and sources of sponsorship. These studies dispute the idea that science is the application of a unified method or the outgrowth of a progressive history of ideas. This book critically reviews arguments and empirical studies in two areas of sociology that have played a significant role in the 'sociological turn' in (...) science studies: ethnomethodology and the sociology of scientific knowledge. In both fields, efforts to study scientific practices have led to intractable difficulties and debates, due in part to scientistic and foundationalist commitments that remain entrenched with social-scientific research policies and descriptive language. The central purpose of this book is to explore the possibility of an empirical approach to the epistemic contents of science that avoids the pitfalls of scientism and foundationalism. (shrink)

The twenty-third volume of RSSSR includes a landmark collection of papers on Theism and Non-Theism in Psychological Science, as well as papers on other key areas in the study of religion such as spirituality and social capital.

It is reported that medical students both in the U.S. and Poland have experience of interacting with pharmaceutical company representatives (pharma reps) during their school years. Studies have warned that the interaction typically initiated by the pharma reps’ general gift-giving eventually leads to the quid pro quo relationship between the pharma company and the future doctors, the result of which is that the doctors will prescribe their patients drugs in favor of the pharma company. Built upon the existing finding, this (...) research engages in analysis with three foci. The first is to compare attitudinal differences of the American and Polish medical students as they interact with pharma reps. Second, it investigates the role of the different economic and cultural elements (respectively in the U.S. and Poland) in the students’ attitudinal differences. Last, it suggests that the medical schools in both countries should have strict policies and effective education curriculum to help their students better prepare to interact ethically with pharma reps. Since there has been no direct comparative cultural analysis of this kind which is known in a published literature or report, the authors believe that the paper will serve as a catalyst for further research in the area. (shrink)

Se realizó una revisión bibliográfica con el objetivo de valorar las implicaciones sociales de la investigación científico-tecnológica en Neurosicología del Adulto Mayor, mediante la caracterización del estado actual del proceso, los condicionantes que favorecen o impiden su desarrollo y los impactos sociales que genera. La investigación científico-tecnológica en esta área está condicionada por necesidades sociales propias del contexto actual. Se han identificado políticas, legislaciones e infraestructuras que la favorecen, aunque, existen algunas limitaciones. La producción tecnológica dirigida a la rehabilitación y (...) estimulación cognitiva continúa en ascenso, utilizando principalmente software y aplicaciones. La investigación del impacto de estas herramientas ha arrojado resultados contradictorios, lo que limita su poder de transformación social. Se pudo concluir que en Cuba es necesario estimular la transferencia de tecnología, la innovación tecnológica y la creación de alternativas de intervención ajustadas a la realidad económico-social de los adultos mayores. A bibliographical review was conducted with the aim of assessing the social implications of scientific-technological research in Senior Citizens' Neurosurgery through the characterization of the current state of the process, the determining factors that favor or stop its development and the social impact it generates. In this field, scientific-technological research is conditioned on social necessities typical of the current context. Policies, legislations and the infrastructures that favor it have been identified. Nevertheless, there are limitations. Technological production directed towards cognitive rehabilitation and stimulation continues to rise using mainly software and applications. The research on the impact of these tools has produced contradictory results, which limit their social transformation power. It was reached the conclusion that in Cuba, there's a need to stimulate technology transfer, technological innovation and the creation of intervention alternatives adapted to senior citizens' social-economic reality. (shrink)

The emergence of the term ‘Plebanski’ as a topic trend in the scientific literature is studied as a significant communication event resulting from its use by authors to refer to the relevant aspects of Jerzy Plebanski scientific work in the area of mathematical physics. We searched the ‘Plebanski’ topic included in the titles, abstracts and key words of the papers registered in five databases: ADS/NASA, MathSciNet, SCOPUS, SPIRES and Web of Science. Our results clearly show the evolution (...) of the JP’s scientific work from a cited reference to a recognized term in the indexes of the published literature, then to a nodal concept in the scientific communication process and finally as an eponym in the Latin American scholar literature. (shrink)

Este trabajo tiene como objetivo valorar la contribución del Centro de Desarrollo de las Ciencias Sociales y Humanísticas en Salud a las Ciencias Sociales y Humanísticas en el sector de la Salud de Camagüey, desde la contextualización de la política científica cubana en la proyección estratégica de la entidad. En el mismo se expone la trayectoria de la gestión de la actividad científico-tecnológica del centro. Se utilizó la revisión de los documentos y resultados generados por la entidad y trabajos publicados (...) acerca de la actividad científica. Se concluye que el centro es una institución pertinente y con sus resultados impacta en la formación integral de los recursos humanos y en el desarrollo del enfoque social de los problemas de salud. The objective of this work is to value the contribution of the Center of development for the Social and Humanity Sciences in Health to the Social and Humanity Sciences in the health area in Camagüey, from the contextualization of the Cuban scientific policy in the strategic projection of this center. Its trajectory on the management of the scientific-technological activity was exposed. It was used the revision of documents and results generated by the institution, and published works about the scientific activity. It is concluded that the center is pertinent and its results have an impact in the integral formation of the human resources and the development of the social viewpoint of health problems. (shrink)

Modern science, whose methodologies give special privilege to using decontextualizing strategies and downplay the role of context-sensitive strategies, have been extraordinarily successful in producing knowledge whose applications have transformed the shape of the lifeworld. Nevertheless, I argue that how the mainstream of the modern scientific tradition interprets the nature and objectives of science is incoherent; and that today there are two competing interpretations of scientific activities that are coherent and that maintain continuity with the success of the tradition: (...) "commercially-oriented technoscience" and "multi-strategy research" . The greater part of this article is devoted to discussing what is involved in MS, by pointing to its positive research program in three areas , and its critical stance towards the innovations of CT, especially insofar as it makes use of the Precautionary Principle. In this way important dimensions of the agenda of science and technology for social justice, democratic participation and sustainability become clear. (shrink)

The attempt to analyze basic concepts of science studies, which make it possible to integrate scientific societies of Ukraine in the late ХІХth - early ХХth centuries the general background of research area, have been carried out in the article. Content of certain definitions ("scientific community", "institutionalization of science", "social institutions", "scientific society") was determined. Explanation of cognitive and socio-institutional research area has been given, the first of which contains the main blocks of (...) class='Hi'>scientific disciplines, and the second represents all the organizational structures that make up the sphere of scientists' activity as the creators of science and those organizations which function as organized structures of scientists' creativity. It is proved that since the late ХІХth - early ХХth centuries social research area is the sphere of institutionalized scientific activity that enables to qualify the groups of scientists in those days as the social institutions within the institualizational process. Functioning of scientific societies of Ukraine in the late ХІХth - early ХХth centuries, their differentiation and integration is proposed to consider in the context of network model of science that means integration of disparate elements in the network of interconnected structures of the system, between which information circulates constantly, and using the methods of synergetics which is an interdisciplinary concept of self-organization of complex systems in the space of their evolution. (shrink)

Social Facts and Collective Intentionality is a combination of terms that refers to a new field of basic research. Written mainly in the mood and by means of analytical philosophy, at the very heart of this new approach is conceptual explication of all the various versions of social facts and collective intentionality and its ramifications. This approach tackles the topics of traditional social philosophy using new conceptual methods, including techniques of formal logic, computer simulations, and artificial intelligence. (...) Such research also addresses careful research relating to ontological, epistemological, normative and--last but not least-- methodological questions. This volume represents the state of the art in this new field. The volume and its contributors tackle a series of vexing issues in the social sciences: (1) the sense of affiliation to large in contrast to small groups, (2) whether collective membership is the same as common knowledge, (3) the worth of information exchange based on faulty data, (4) the difference between standards of information and transfer of information, and (5) whether reliability is grounded in personal experience or as members in epistemic communities or networks. Contributors to this volume have a strong commitment to the social or collective character and mutual interplay of scientific information. "Collective Intentionality" is the term chosen by researchers working in this cross-disciplinary field. The group is currently conducting research in areas such as artificial intelligence, linguistics, logic, and the philosophy of the social sciences. Its work is distinguished by issues of collective behavior such as jointness, groupness, we and us. The present volume covers the state of the art of collective analysis, while fully appreciating that it is a stepping stone, albeit an important one, in redirecting the attention of basic philosophy away from the individual to the collective mode of exact analysis. Georg Meggle is professor for philosophical foundations of anthropology and of cognitive sciences at the University of Leipzig, Germany. He is a key contributor to Realism in Action with a study of Common Belief and Common Knowledge, and author of an earlier study of theoretical foundations of semantics. (shrink)

Evidence of an emerging focus on the role of farmer knowledge in developed countries is highlighted by the debate on the nature of local and scientific knowledge. Less attention has been paid to the interaction of different ways of knowing for sustainable capital-intensive agriculture. This paper explores the relationship between local and scientific knowledge in managing temperate pasture and grazing systems in Australia. The nature of farmer knowledge is firstly examined by describing the experiences of farm families in (...) managing native and introduced perennial grasses in upland areas of the Murray-Darling Basin. The building of knowledge and skills through social learning was explored in group case studies and interviews with stakeholders involved in pasture research and development. The interchange of local and scientific knowledge in groups was shown to have a synergistic effect, whereby local knowledge was broadened and strengthened, and scientific knowledge adapted and molded to specific situations. The effectiveness of social learning was greatest in collaborative programs based on small, local groups involved in monitoring and evaluation of whole farm pasture and grazing systems. (shrink)

Evidence of an emerging focus on the role of farmer knowledge in developed countries is highlighted by the debate on the nature of local and scientific knowledge. Less attention has been paid to the interaction of different ways of knowing for sustainable capital-intensive agriculture. This paper explores the relationship between local and scientific knowledge in managing temperate pasture and grazing systems in Australia. The nature of farmer knowledge is firstly examined by describing the experiences of farm families in (...) managing native and introduced perennial grasses in upland areas of the Murray-Darling Basin. The building of knowledge and skills through social learning was explored in group case studies and interviews with stakeholders involved in pasture research and development. The interchange of local and scientific knowledge in groups was shown to have a synergistic effect, whereby local knowledge was broadened and strengthened, and scientific knowledge adapted and molded to specific situations. The effectiveness of social learning was greatest in collaborative programs based on small, local groups involved in monitoring and evaluation of whole farm pasture and grazing systems. (shrink)

Scientific Inquiry: Readings in the Philosophy of Science features an impressive collection of classical and contemporary readings on a wide range of issues in the philosophy of science. The volume is organized into six sections, each with its own introduction, and includes a general introduction that situates the philosophy of science in relation to other areas of intellectual inquiry. The selections focus on the main issues in the field, including the structure of scientific theories, models of scientific (...) explanation, reductionism, historicist challenges to the objectivity of science, and the dispute over the ontological interpretation of mature scientific theories. Both the positivist model of science and its competitors, including contemporary social constructivist models, are included. Ideal for introductory philosophy of science courses, Scientific Inquiry strives to provide students and other readers with a thorough knowledge of the philosophical complexity of modern science and an appreciation of its authoritative intellectual standing in contemporary life. (shrink)

The social psychology of science is a compelling new area of study whose shape is still emerging. This erudite and innovative book outlines a theoretical and methodological agenda for this new field, and bridges the gap between the individually focused aspects of psychology and the sociological elements of science studies. Presenting a side of social psychology that, until now, has received almost no attention in the social sciences literature, this volume offers the first detailed and comprehensive (...) study of the social psychology of science, complete with a large number of empirical and theoretical examples. The volume's introductory section provides a detailed analysis of how modern social psychology might apply to the study of science. Chapters show how to analyze science in terms of social cognition, attribution theory, attitudes and attitude change, social motivation, social influence and social conformity, and intergroup relations, weaving extensive illustrations from the science studies literature into the theoretical analysis. The nature and role of experimentation are discussed, as are metaanalytic methods for summarizing the results of multiple studies. Ways to facilitate the generalization of causal inferences from experimental work are also examined. The book focuses on such topics as interactions among small groups of scientists, and the impact of social motivation, influence, and conformity on scientific work. Also covered are scientists' responses to ethical issues in research, differences in cognitive style distribution, creativity in research and development, and the sociologists's view of the social psychology of science and technology. In addition, the book provides two annotated bibliographies, one on the philosophy of science and the other on social psychology, to guide readers in both disciplines to salient recent works. Valuable to the entire science studies community, this text will be of special interest to philosophers, sociologists, psychologists, and historians of science interested in the nature of knowledge development in science. Because of its novel application of social psychological theories and methods, this book will be useful as a primary text or a secondary text in courses on science studies in psychology, sociology, or philosophy departments. (shrink)

In this book Mark Bevir and Jason Blakely set out to make the most comprehensive case yet for an 'interpretive' or hermeneutic approach to the social sciences. Interpretive approaches are a major growth area in the social sciences today. This is because they offer a full-blown alternative to the behavioralism, institutionalism, rational choice, and other quasi-scientific approaches that dominate the study of human behavior. In addition to presenting a systematic case for interpretivism and a critique of (...) scientism, Bevir and Blakely also propose their own uniquely 'anti-naturalist 'notion of an interpretive approach. This anti-naturalist framework encompasses the insights of philosophers ranging from Michel Foucault and Hans-Georg Gadamer to Charles Taylor and Ludwig Wittgenstein, while also resolving dilemmas that have plagued rival philosophical defenses of interpretivism. In addition, working social scientists are given detailed discussions of a distinctly interpretive approach to methods and empirical research. The book draws on the latest social science to cover everything from concept formation and empirical inquiry to ethics, democratic theory, and public policy. An anti-naturalist approach to interpretive social science offers nothing short of a sweeping paradigm shift in the study of human beings and society. This book will be of interest to all who seek a humanistic alternative to the scientism that overwhelms the study of human beings today. (shrink)

Despite a long history of debates about the heritability of human traits by researchers and other critical commentators, the possible heterogeneity of genetic and environmental factors that underlie patterns in observed traits has not been recognized as a significant conceptual and methodological issue. This article is structured to stimulate a wide range of readers to pursue diverse implications of underlying heterogeneity and of its absence from previous debates. Section 1, a condensed critique of previous conceptualizations and interpretations of heritability studies, (...) consists of three core propositions centered on heterogeneity and six supplementary propositions. Reference is made to agricultural evaluation trials in which a number of different genetically replicable varieties are raised in multiple replicates in one or more locations. In such analyses, the best case for illuminating genetic and environmental factors can be achieved; analyses in human genetics, in contrast, fall far short of the ideal. Section 2 identifies a wide range of questions that invite philosophical, historical, sociological, and scientific inquiry. These are organized under four headings: debate over the conceptual implications of heterogeneity; history of translation of methods from agriculture and laboratory breeding into human genetic analysis; racialized imaginaries in the analysis of differences among groups; and areas of scientific inquiry that may allow more attention to underlying heterogeneity. (shrink)

The world of disability theory is currently divided between those who insist it reflects a physical fact affecting life quality and those who believe disability is defined by social prejudice. Despite a dialogue spanning bioethical, medical and social scientific literatures the differences between opposing views remains persistent. The result is similar to a figure-ground paradox in which one can see only part of a picture at any moment. This paper attempts to find areas of commonality between the (...) opposing camps, and thus to rearrange the figures of the paradox at a fundamental level. The purpose is first to identify areas in which common ground can be achieved, and secondarily, to clarify the areas in which disagreement continues. While a general and unified theory of physical difference/disability is beyond the scope of this paper the result may advance that general goal. (shrink)

Toward an integrative theory of morality -- The origins of morality -- Perceptual partitioning in human history -- The cognitive and interactional structure of morality -- Subjective morality as an area of social scientific inquiry -- Reiterations.

Volume "Social-Constructionist Epistemology" brings into the readers' attention the most important developments that were made around the transmodernity paradigm. During its eight chapters we intend to emphasize the close connection between areas such as: communication and semiotics, transmodernity, scientific authorship, epistemology, social constructionism, philosophy, ethics, quantum metaphysics, and appreciative inquiry. This paper is based on identifying the cultural models and cognitive patterns that make possible the comprehensive opening, in the meaning of rethinking ethics in terms of transmodern (...) paradigm. The base of this research is represented by a methodology that we called fractal constructionism. This concept is a paradigm taken from the sociology of communication, which tells us that reality is a construct "made by symbolic interacting of maps of the world of various individuals." In this sense, the idea of fractal implies a fundamental structural element and a generating law. The human being is "designed" to succeed and his success is produced thanks to the evolution of world, and most of all, thanks to development, creativity and understanding. (shrink)

While in the beginning of the environmental debate, conflicts over environmental and technological issues had primarily been understood in terms of ‘‘risk’’, over the past two decades the relevance of ignorance, or nonknowledge, was emphasized. Referring to this shift of attention to nonknowledge the article presents two main findings: first, that in debates on what is not known and how to appraise it different and partly conflicting epistemic cultures of nonknowledge can be discerned and, second, that drawing attention to nonknowledge (...) in technology conflicts results in significant institutional effects and new constellations of actors in public debates. To illustrate and substantiate this political dynamics of nonknowledge we draw upon examples from the areas of agri-biotechnology and mobile phoning. In a first step, we develop in greater detail the concept of scientific cultures of nonknowledge and identify three such cultures involved in the social conflicts within the two areas. Subsequently, we analyze the specific dynamics of the politicisation of nonknowledge looking at the variety of actors involved and the pluralisation of perceptions and evaluations of what is not known. Then, we point out some of the institutional reactions to the political and cultural dynamics of scientific nonknowledge. We argue that the equal recognition of the diverse cultures of nonknowledge is a key prerequisite for socially legitimate and ‘‘robust’’ decision-making under conditions of politicised scientific nonknowledge. (shrink)

This paper aims to contribute to the development of tools to support an analysis of Big Data as manifestations of social processes and human behaviour. Such a task demands both an understanding of the epistemological challenge posed by the Big Data phenomenon and a critical assessment of the offers and promises coming from the area of Big Data analytics. This paper draws upon the critical social and data scientists’ view on Big Data as an epistemological challenge that (...) stems not only from the sheer volume of digital data but, predominantly, from the proliferation of the narrow-technological and the positivist views on data. Adoption of the social-scientific epistemological stance presupposes that digital data was conceptualised as manifestations of the social. In order to answer the epistemological challenge, social scientists need to extend the repertoire of social scientific theories and conceptual frameworks that may inform the analysis of the social in the age of Big Data. However, an ‘epistemological revolution’ discourse on Big Data may hinder the integration of the social scientific knowledge into the Big Data analytics. (shrink)

Computer and video games have become nearly ubiquitous among individuals in industrialized nations, and they have received increasing attention from researchers across many areas of scientific study. However, relatively little attention has been given to Massively-Multiplayer Online Games . The unique social context of MMOGs raises ethical questions about how communication occurs and how conflict is managed in the game world. In order to explore these questions, we compare the social context in Blizzard’s World of Warcraft and (...) Disney’s Toontown, focusing on griefing opportunities in each game. We consider ethical questions from the perspectives of players, game companies, and policymakers. (shrink)

It took a very long time before I encountered the systematic study of religious processes and dynamics as a distinctive and expansive area of scholarship. Using an autobiographical account, I trace the development of my scholarship in the social scientific study of religion. I have now experienced a great diversity of approaches to the study of religion. Driven by insatiable curiosity and knowing that no one can capture religion comprehensively, I now am committed to stimulating imaginative, rigorous, (...) and wide-ranging developments in religious scholarship. We require new, inventive, and even incompatible approaches to our study of religion if we ever hope to try adequately grasping the richness of religion. (shrink)

This paper explores the gray area of questionable research practices (QRPs) between responsible conduct of research and severe research misconduct in the form of fabrication, falsification, and plagiarism (Steneck in SEE 12(1): 53–57, 2006). Up until now, we have had very little knowledge of disciplinary similarities and differences in QRPs. The paper is the first systematic account of variances and similarities. It reports on the findings of a comprehensive study comprising 22 focus groups on practices and perceptions of QRPs (...) across main areas of research. The paper supports the relevance of the idea of epistemic cultures (Knorr Cetina in: Epistemic cultures: how the sciences make knowledge, Harvard University Press, Cambridge, 1999), also when it comes to QRPs. It shows which QRPs researchers from different areas of research (humanities, social sciences, medical sciences, natural sciences, and technical sciences) report as the most severe and prevalent within their fields. Furthermore, it shows where in the research process these self-reported QRPs can be found. This is done by using a five-phase analytical model of the research process (idea generation, research design, data collection, data analysis, scientific publication and reporting). The paper shows that QRPs are closely connected to the distinct research practices within the different areas of research. Many QRPs can therefore only be found within one area of research, and QRPs that cut across main areas often cover relatively different practices. In a few cases, QRPs in one area are considered good research practice in another. (shrink)

Feminist science studies scholars have documented the historical and cultural contingency of scientific knowledge production. It follows that political and social activism has impacted the practice of science today; however, little has been done to examine the current cultures of science in light of feminist critiques and activism. In this article, I argue that, although critiques have changed the cultures of science both directly and indirectly, fundamental epistemological questions have largely been ignored and neutralized through these policy reforms. (...) I provide an auto-ethnography of my doctoral work in a neuroscience program to a) demonstrate how the culture of science has incorporated critiques into its practices and b) identify how we might use these changes in scientific practices to advance feminist science agendas. I critically analyze three areas in current scientific practice in which I see obstacles and opportunities: 1) research ethics, 2) diversity of research subjects and scientists, and 3) identification of a project's significance for funding. I argue that an understanding of the complicated and changing cultures of science is necessary for future feminist interventions into the sciences that directly challenge science's claim to epistemic authority. (shrink)

A frequently advanced claim in contemporary science policy is that interdisciplinarity is especially well suited for being ‘transformative’ and for bringing about ‘major breakthroughs’. Thus, it is expected that, in contemporary science, major progress will come primarily from interdisciplinary research (IDR). Often in this dis-course, interdisciplinarity is also expected to integrate the involved disciplines or specialties. This chapter will provide a philosophical qualification of this political discourse by examining how interdisciplinary progress can be characterised. I shall argue that in addition (...) to the categories of incremental and transformative progress that are well known from mono-disciplinary science, IDR can sometimes also offer another category of progress that I shall call quasi-transformative. In examining these three kinds of interdisciplinary progresses I shall argue, first, that interdisciplinary progress does not necessarily require a specific type of integration between the involved disciplines or specialties, second, that social relations between scientists with different areas of expertise may play a crucial role in especially transformative progress, and third, that different disciplinary perspectives on what constitutes progress can draw wedges between scientists from different disciplines. (shrink)

Recently, psychological phenomena have been expanded to new domains, crisscrossing boundaries of organizational levels, with the emergence of areas such as social personality and ecosystem learning. In this contribution, we analyze the ascription of an individual-based concept (personality) to the social level. Although justified boundary crossings can boost new approaches and applications, the indiscriminate misuse of concepts refrains the growth of scientific areas. The concept of social personality is based mainly on the detection of repeated group (...) differences across a population, in a direct transposition of personality concepts from the individual to the social level. We show that this direct transposition is problematic for avowing the nonsensical ascription of personality even to simple electronic devices. To go beyond a metaphoric use of social personality, we apply the organizational approach to a review of social insect communication networks. Our conceptual analysis shows that socially self-organized systems, such as isolated ant trails and bee’s recruitment groups, are too simple to have social personality. The situation is more nuanced when measuring the collective choice between nest sites or foraging patches: some species show positive and negative feedbacks between two or more self-organized social structures so that these co-dependent structures are inter-related by second-order, social information systems, complying with a formal requirement for having social personality: the social closure of constraints. Other requirements include the decoupling between individual and social dynamics, and the self-regulation of collective decision processes. Social personality results to be sometimes a metaphorical transposition of a psychological concept to a social phenomenon. The application of this organizational approach to cases of learning ecosystems, or evolutionary learning, could help to ground theoretically the ascription of psychological properties to levels of analysis beyond the individual, up to meta-populations or ecological communities. (shrink)

This paper provides an argument for a more socially relevant philosophy of science (SRPOS). Our aims in this paper are to characterize this body of work in philosophy of science, to argue for its importance, and to demonstrate that there are significant opportunities for philosophy of science to engage with and support this type of research. The impetus of this project was a keen sense of missed opportunities for philosophy of science to have a broader social impact. We illustrate (...) various ways in which SRPOS can provide social benefits, as well as benefits to scientific practice and philosophy itself. Also, SRPOS is consistent with some historical and contemporary goals of philosophy of science. We’re calling for an expansion of philosophy of science to include more of this type of work. In order to support this expansion, we characterize philosophy of science as an epistemic community and examine the culture and practices of philosophy of science that can help or hinder research in this area. (shrink)

Conference summary. This summary discusses the main issues of the proceedings of the IV International Scientific Conference “Creativity as the National Environment: Media and Social Activity,” which was held from July 2 to July 4, 2018 in Saint Petersburg. The conference was organized by the Department of Philosophy of the Humanities Faculty of the Saint Petersburg State Economic University, the Russian Philosophical Society, the Society of Russian Philosophy at the Ukrainian Philosophical Foundation, and the Department of Philosophy of (...) the Moscow State Institute of International Relations. Being united by interest in the research on social activity in the media space and the national environment of creativity, 63 scholars from Russia, Ukraine, Slovakia and Hungary took part in the conference. The summary considers the ideas discussed at two plenary sessions and at the following sections of the conference: “Metaphysical foundations of the creative process,” “Semantic element of artistic and aesthetic creativity,” “Creativity of a social subject in the field of media space.” The proceedings of the conference contain the results of research carried out in the field of the philosophy of creativity and related research areas, including social philosophy, sociology, cultural studies, political science, journalism, linguistics. (shrink)

Written by a select international group of leading privacy scholars, Social Dimensions of Privacy endorses and develops an innovative approach to privacy. By debating topical privacy cases in their specific research areas, the contributors explore the new privacy-sensitive areas: legal scholars and political theorists discuss the European and American approaches to privacy regulation; sociologists explore new forms of surveillance and privacy on social network sites; and philosophers revisit feminist critiques of privacy, discuss markets in personal data, issues of (...) privacy in health care and democratic politics. The broad interdisciplinary character of the volume will be of interest to readers from a variety of scientific disciplines who are concerned with privacy and data protection issues. (shrink)

The expression “the invisible hand of the market” (from the Adam Smith’s “Wealth of Nations”) sometimes acquires in modern ecomomical and everyday journalism the most unexpected overtones, like “why “the invisible hand of the market» totally disregard writer”? In the area of the scientific economic thinking “the «invisible hand” is interpreted as the objective market mechanism which coordinates the decisions of buyers and sellers. The attempts to analyze the epistemological status of “the invisible hand” are quite rare, especially (...) in the modality of the formation of the Economics as a science. Meanwhile, as it is shown in the article, there is reason to see here the first fundamental step to the origination of the scientific research program of the economic science in the strict sense. The author assumes that phenomena like “the invisible hand of the market” is comparable to what Thomas Kuhn designates as “the metaphysical parts of paradigms”, i. e. basic ontological models, which define peculiar scientific vision of the reality under research. The main difficulty for the scientific rationality in the attempts of generating scientific knowledge about society, was to represent the corresponding processes of human activity in the form of objective reality, which is required by the basic ideological attitude of the science as such. (shrink)

How do scientific innovations spread within and across scientific communities? In this paper, we propose a general account of the diffusion of scientific innovations. This account acknowledges that novel ideas must be elaborated on and conceptually translated before they can be adopted and applied to field-specific problems. We motivate our account by examining an exemplary case of knowledge diffusion, namely, the early spread of theories of rational decision-making. These theories were grounded in a set of novel mathematical (...) tools and concepts that originated in John von Neumann and Oskar Morgenstern's Theory of Games and Economic Behavior and subsequently spread widely across the social and behavioral sciences. Introducing a network-based diffusion measure, we trace the spread of those tools and concepts into distinct research areas. We furthermore present an analytically tractable typology for classifying publications according to their roles in the diffusion process. The proposed framework allows for a systematic examination of the conditions under which scientific innovations spread within and across preexisting and newly emerging scientific communities. (shrink)

Little literature has looked at the role of universities promoting and supporting grassroots social innovations. This paper addresses this gap by examining how universities contribute to social innovation in Colombia. In seeking to develop a good understanding of how universities can contribute to the development of social innovation niches, we draw upon the Strategic Niche Management theory and the three areas of activity which constitute effective niche-building: social networks, expectations and visions and learning. We explore this (...) phenomenon with the Parque Científico de Innovación Social, founded by Uniminuto University in 2012, using video case study research methodology. Findings suggest the important role played by Uniminuto University influencing the current higher education system regime by enhancing the development of social innovation niches. These results have implications for advancing the debate on the role of higher education institutions in contributing to the development of social innovation processes.Poca literatura ha analizado el papel de las universidades promoviendo y apoyando las innovaciones sociales de base. Este documento aborda esta brecha al examinar cómo las universidades contribuyen a la innovación social en Colombia. Al tratar de desarrollar una buena comprensión de cómo las universidades pueden contribuir al desarrollo de nichos de innovación social, recurrimos a la teoría de Gestión Estratégica de Nichos y las tres áreas de actividad que constituyen la creación efectiva de nichos: redes sociales, expectativas y visiones y aprendizaje. Exploramos este fenómeno con el Parque Científico de Innovación Social, fundado por la Universidad de Uniminuto en 2012, utilizando la metodología de investigación de estudios de casos de video. Los hallazgos sugieren el importante papel desempeñado por la Universidad de Uniminuto que influye en el régimen actual del sistema de educación superior al mejorar el desarrollo de nichos de innovación social. Estos resultados tienen implicaciones para avanzar en el debate sobre el papel de las instituciones de educación superior en la contribución al desarrollo de los procesos de innovación social. (shrink)

The social scientific study of ethical-unethical behavior in work organizations is in an early stage of development. This paper discusses some of the problems of conducting social scientific research in this area and explores the potential contribution of experimental research approaches. Both laboratory and field experimentation allow the investigator to test theory-based hypotheses and to study causal relations. Examples are provided of investigations that have applied these methods to the study of business ethics.

Humans continuously delegate and distribute cognitive functions to the environment to lessen their limits. They build models, representations, and other various mediating structures, that are thought to be good to think. The case of scientific innovation is particularly important: the main aim of this paper is to revise and criticize the concept of scientific innovation, reframing it in what I will call an eco-epistemic perspective, taking advantage of recent results coming from the area of distributed cognition (common (...) coding) and abductive cognition (manipulative). Taking advantage of this eco-cognitive perspective the article outlines how innovative scientific modeling activity can be better described taking advantage of the concept of “epistemic warfare”, which sees scientific enterprise as a complicated struggle for rational knowledge in which it is crucial to distinguish epistemic (for example scientific models) from non epistemic (for example fictions, falsities, propaganda) weapons. (shrink)

The power of the scientific enterprise presents multiple avenues for harnessing and increasingly controlling biological phenomena and instituting interventions in different areas of biomedicine (Af...

Members of the Vienna Circle played a pivotal role in defining the work that came to be known as the philosophy of science, yet the Vienna Circle itself is now known to have had much broader concerns and to have been more rooted in philosophical tradition than was once thought. Like current and past philosophers of science, members of the Vienna Circle took science as the object of philosophical reflection but they also endeavored to render philosophy in general compatible with (...) contemporary science and to define and promote a scientific world view. This latter task seems to continue the work of so-called scientific philosophy, a label embraced by many philosophers in the late nineteenth and early twentieth century, such as Helmholtz, Mach, Avenarius, the neo-Kantians, Husserl, Carus, Peirce, and, of course, Russell during the period when he was applying modern logic to philosophical problems. Russell’s program influenced Carnap directly, though the idea of applying modem logic to philosophical problems became a defining feature of analytic philosophy and was applied to many areas of philosophy, not only to the philosophy of science. Scientific philosophy included the promotion of the cultural values of modernity, especially the values embodied in the scientific world conception. By exploring the various meanings ascribed to scientific philosophy in the late nineteenth and early twentieth centuries, I will investigate whether the promotion of scientific philosophy and of the values associated with a scientific world conception is merely part of a transitory social context within which Logical Positivism developed or if it is an enduring part of the philosophy of science. Moreover, the residue of values remaining in the philosophy of science can be brought to light by studying its history. (shrink)

This article offers an overview of the risks related to some representations of epigenetics in the process of making social and medical recommendations. After exploring different representations of epigenetics in popular literature and media discourses, I identify some of the premature conclusions that could emerge from such discourses, stressing issues related to parental responsibility—especially as they relate to women—regarding the transmission of epigenetic marks. I then propose some epistemological considerations regarding developmental biology in order to draw a more nuanced (...) picture of epigenetic responsibility. I argue that such considerations are important to clarify our general understanding of epigenetic research as well as its potential translation outside the scientific area. (shrink)

Ellis shows that realistic theories of quantum mechanics, time, causality and human freedom - all problematic areas for the acceptance of scientific realism - can be developed satisfactorily. In particular, he shows how moral theory can be recast to fit within this comprehensive metaphysical framework by developing a radical moral theory that conceives morals to be social ideals and has implications for key ethical concepts such as moral responsibility, moral powers, moral rights, and moral obligations. The Metaphysics of (...) Scientific Realism is a bold and original development of the scientific characterization of reality by one of the world's leading metaphysicians of science. It marks a significant contribution not only to philosophy of science and metaphysics but also to the search for a first philosophy. (shrink)

Summary 1898 marked a crucial point in the end of the nineteenth-century Spanish crisis. The military defeat ending the Spanish-American War was seen as proof that the country was in terminal decline. With the ideals of regeneration spreading throughout Spanish society, the State became more interested in supporting and sponsoring science and technology, as well as in creating a modern educational system. The resulting reforms reflected this strong interest in scientific education, and consequently, the first decades of the twentieth (...) century saw a turning point in the development of science and technology in Spain. Some recent papers have discussed various initiatives taken by Spanish governments, particularly in the creation of new official institutions. Such institutions played an important role in the development of science and technology, but their activity in the promotion of scientific education was very limited. However, other governmental initiatives were taken in order to develop this area, particularly focusing on the acquisition of scientific instruments. Scientific instruments were needed not only to improve Spanish scientific research but also to improve the teaching of experimental sciences. These instruments were specifically adapted for use by students. This paper aims to present some of the lesser-known individuals and firms who, in the new social and cultural context, provided scientific instruments for educational centres in order to meet the increasing demand for this material in Spanish educational institutions during these years. (shrink)

There has been a great deal of philosophical analysis supporting the position that race is semantically empty, ontologically bankrupt and scientifically meaningless. The conclusion often reached is that race is a social construction. While this position is certainly accepted by the majority of philosophers working within the area of critical race theory, the existentially lived and socially embodied impact of `race' is often left either unexplored or under-theorized. In this article, I provide a philosophical analysis of how `race' (...) operates at the level of the embodied within the context of the quotidian, and how the recognition of instances of racism is grounded within an epistemological community. I demonstrate that race as lived is a powerful experience that emerges within an interstitial space of enduring myths and habituated bodily postures. My elevator example demonstrates that, as a lived reality, race is insidious and negatively impacts the integrity of, in this example, the black body and the white body. The black body is shown to undergo a process of `confiscation' through the phenomenon of the white gaze, which is a form of learned embodied seeing, while the white body elides any responsibility for holding the black body captive. The white gaze is theorized as a cultural achievement, which is productive of a form of ignorance. Instances of anti-racism, then, are not restricted to mere cognitive shifts in one's perspective, but must involve performing the body's racialized interactions with the world differently. (shrink)

Environmental ethics has an identity and public image problem. Unlike the other applied ethics subfields like biomedical or business ethics, environmental ethics is surprisingly devalued and even rejected as a possible contributor to confronting effectively the global environmental crisis by anti-environmental philosophers and public policy analysts. Thus, environmental ethics has many critics, both within and outside of philosophy, who strongly challenge the contemporary, practical social relevance of this academic field.In contrast to this critical viewpoint, this essay argues for the (...) profound significance of environmental ethics to the environmental crisis, and, in that way, seeks to present a successful rebuttal to the misguided critiques of this area of philosophy. The argument aims to demonstrate how environmental ethics can facilitate social criticism of the prevailing modern social values and the social institutions associated with the market or consumer capitalist society built upon them. My approach will center its insights and prescriptions upon the philosophical grounding of the collective movement for ecologically-and ethically-based social criticism and social change.I conclude the essay by emphasizing: 1) the normative nature of environmental problems (as opposed to an exclusive scientific or technological conception of such problems), and 2) environmental ethics and philosophy as powerful catalysts for necessary social change in order to save the world through social criticism of the status quo ecologically unsustainable and unethical (exemplified by unjust) modern social values such as, limitless economic growth. These points support the upshot that much more is at stake in the controversy over the nature and value of environmental ethics than the typical academic debate: nothing less then the fate of our planet. (shrink)

Psychoanalysis: Its Image and Its Public is a perfect illustration of Tarde's claim that ‘beautiful’ should be reserved for ideas that lead to a discovery of more ideas and to an invention that we can judge as fruitful for the future. The article examines the influence of the book in geographical, historical and scientific contexts and traces the development and diffusion of the theory of social representations throughout four periods. The article highlights the difference between the first edition (...) in 1961, and the second one in 1976, and it examines the development of Moscovici's ideas over time. The first edition of Psychoanalysis, based on the criticism of sociology of knowledge, underlines common sense as a new object of study, attempting to capture complex social phenomena. It shows common sense as a legitimate object of study that interweaves social, cultural and individual dimensions in the constitution of social reality. The 1976 edition emphasises that language and communication and its role in the theory of social knowledge. The book has had manifold impact on new areas of study. An overview of international research in social representations shows how this work has inspired scholars all over the world, has lead to creating Schools of research and to innovative proposals not only in terms of domains that have been studied but also in terms of theoretical models and methodological concerns. (shrink)

Environmental ethics has an identity and public image problem. Unlike the other applied ethics subfields like biomedical or business ethics, environmental ethics is surprisingly devalued and even rejected as a possible contributor to confronting effectively the global environmental crisis by anti-environmental philosophers and public policy analysts. Thus, environmental ethics has many critics, both within and outside of philosophy, who strongly challenge the contemporary, practical social relevance of this academic field.In contrast to this critical viewpoint, this essay argues for the (...) profound significance of environmental ethics to the environmental crisis, and, in that way, seeks to present a successful rebuttal to the misguided critiques of this area of philosophy. The argument aims to demonstrate how environmental ethics can facilitate social criticism of the prevailing modern social values and the social institutions associated with the market or consumer capitalist society built upon them. My approach will center its insights and prescriptions upon the philosophical grounding of the collective movement for ecologically-and ethically-based social criticism and social change.I conclude the essay by emphasizing: 1) the normative nature of environmental problems (as opposed to an exclusive scientific or technological conception of such problems), and 2) environmental ethics and philosophy as powerful catalysts for necessary social change in order to save the world through social criticism of the status quo ecologically unsustainable and unethical (exemplified by unjust) modern social values such as, limitless economic growth. These points support the upshot that much more is at stake in the controversy over the nature and value of environmental ethics than the typical academic debate: nothing less then the fate of our planet. (shrink)

This paper examines, from the point of view of a philosopher of science, what it is that introductory science textbooks say and do not say about 'scientific method'. Seventy introductory texts in a variety of natural and social sciences provided the material for this study. The inadequacy of these textbook accounts is apparent in three general areas: (a) the simple empiricist view of science that tends to predominate; (b) the demarcation between scientific and non-scientific inquiry and (...) (c) the avoidance of controversy-in part the consequence of the tendency toward textbook standardization. Most importantly, this study provides some evidence of the gulf that separates philosophy of science from science instruction, and examines some important aspects of the demarcation between science and non-science-an important issue for philosophers, scientists, and science educators. (shrink)

Co-authorship of papers is very common in most areas of science, and it has increased as the complexity of research has strengthened the need for scientific collaboration. But the fact that papers have more than an author tends to complicate the attribution of merit to individual scientists. I argue that collaboration does not necessarily entail co-authorship, but that in many cases the latter is an option that individual authors might not choose, at least in principle: each author might publish (...) in a separate way her own contribution to the collaborative project in which she has taken part, or papers could explicitly state what the contribution of each individual author has been. I ask, hence, why it is that scientists prefer to ‘pool’ their contributions instead of keeping them separate, if what they pursue in their professional careers (besides epistemic goals) is individual recognition. My answer is based on the view of the scientific paper as a piece of argumentation, following an inferentialist approach to scientific knowledge. A few empirical predictions from the model presented here are suggested in the conclusions. (shrink)

Considering the lack of substantive scientific or theoretical studies about ethics in small and medium sized enterprises (SMEs) in Latin America, this paper examines the context of an existent paradox, based upon the perspective of experts and academicians of Latin America and the Caribbean. These countries live different realities, due to their respective European cultural influences, as well as to racial and economic issues. Such facts impact the size and characteristics of their industries. On the other hand, the SMEs (...) face more similarities in the region, so they will be treated as a group in the discussion of ethics and corporate social responsibility (CSR) in Latin American SMEs. As this topic has not been sufficiently investigated in this geographic area, the objective of this exploratory study is to offer a contribution for future research. It raises the main dilemmas and intends to explain how legislation and common practices enable and perhaps lead SMEs to choose unethical strategies to survive and compete in the market. These enterprises are growing in number and in job creation, but do not participate in the Gross National Product in the same proportion. Informality, tax evasion and corruption are gradually caused or erode morality in business, but can contribute to corporate social responsibility in the region. The paper tries to show positive and negative aspects of apparently unethical practices and discusses challenging ways to solve complex problems that are common in most Latin America. (shrink)

This paper has been prepared from the perspective of the ESRC Genomics Policy & Research Forum, which has the particular mandate of linking social science research on genomics with ongoing public and policy debates. It is intended as a contribution to discussions about the future agenda for social scientific analyses of genomics. Given its scope, this paper is necessarily painted with a broad brush. It is presented in the hope that it can serve both as a useful (...) reference for those less familiar with the themes and foci of UK-based social science research about genomics and, for those more engaged in the field, as a foundation for discussions about the future social sciences agenda in this area. This paper has four parts. The first identifies the boundaries of the topic. It is suggested that the boundaries of genomics are properly regarded by social scientists as soft rather than hard, and as encompassing far more than genomics as narrowly understood. In the second part, the UK context for social science research is briefly described before proceeding to part three, which offers a survey of the major areas and patterns of research. This is organised by reference to the themes of globalisation, governance and regulation, and refers to 129 current or recently completed projects (surveyed during the winter of 2005) that address these themes. Part four proposes some appropriate areas for future research, drawing on and advancing what has been achieved thus far. Social scientific analyses of the nature and consequences of genomic science, it is claimed, have been crucially framed by the institutionalising of non-scientific considerations under the heading of ELSA/elsi (Ethical, Legal and Social Aspects/implications). It is suggested that an understanding of the limitations and consequences of this framing provides a vital starting point in considering future research agendas. (shrink)

Social semiotics is now widely regarded as one of the leading research areas. This study is the first attempt to present a holistic overview of social semiotics based on the data in the Web of Science core collection database from 2001 to 2020. The study investigates, among other issues, social semiotics’ publishing tendency, the most productive authors, countries, institutions, and hotspots. The results exhibit a steady rise in its publications and citations. The current analysis verifies the growing (...) quantitative and qualitative research contributions and influences of this field. Furthermore, what the journals focus on are the innovative and contemporary themes, manifested predominantly in sign, multimodality, gender, experimental semiotics, advertising, culture, and social media, which involve a wide range of methodologies to make the research more acceptable and constructive. These results are expected to offer refreshing insights that inspire scholars in formulating scientific agendas and advising their research strategies, thereby facilitating substantial contributions to the domain. (shrink)

The summary reveals various areas of Belarusian-Russian collaboration in philosophy: problems of the methodology of scientific knowledge, transdisciplinary synthesis of philosophy and science, philosophical foundations of physics, scientific realism, theory of harmony and self-organization of complex systems, modern epistemological theories, the sociocultural foundations, risks, and prospects of the digital society, human problems in the context of convergent technologies, anthropological foundations of intercultural communication, the world heritage of philosophical thought, the reception of Russian philosophy in the Belarusian intellectual tradition. (...) Special attential is paid to the content, possibilities, and prospects of the agreement on cooperation in the field of scientific and educational activity between the Institute of Philosophy of the National Academy of Sciences of Belarus and the Institute of Philosophy of the Russian Academy of Sciences. The areas of mutual interest are scientific research activity, academic work, publishing, humanitarian expertise, training of scientific personnel, interaction of young scientists, career guidance work with schoolchildren, popularization of philosophical knowledge. Under current conditions, the Belarusian and Russian philosophers consider important the studies of civilizational dynamics in the light of the formation of a multipolar world, the philosophical and ethical aspects of the transformation of social practices in the post-COVID era, the philosophical problems of developing artificial intelligence, and the praxeological dimension of philosophical knowledge. Emphasis is placed on the importance of scientific and humanitarian partnership in the development of research and educational potential in the post-Soviet space. (shrink)