Putting a Spin on Circulating Reference, or How to Rediscover the Scientific Subject

Studies in History and Philosophy of Science Part A 49:103-107 (2015)
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Abstract

Bruno Latour claims to have shown that a Kantian model of knowledge, which he describes as seeking to unite a disembodied transcendental subject with an inaccessible thing-in-itself, is dramatically falsified by empirical studies of science in action. Instead, Latour puts central emphasis on scientific practice, and replaces this Kantian model with a model of “circulating reference.” Unfortunately, Latour's alternative schematic leaves out the scientific subject. I repair this oversight through a simple mechanical procedure. By putting a slight spin on Latour's diagrammatic representation of his theory, I discover a new space for a post-Kantian scientific subject, a subject brilliantly described by Ludwik Fleck. The neglected subjectivities and ceaseless practices of science are thus re-united.

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Jeff Kochan
Universität Konstanz

Citations of this work

Objective Styles in Northern Field Science.Jeff Kochan - 2015 - Studies in History and Philosophy of Science Part A 52:1-12.
Disassembling the System: A Reply to Paolo Palladino and Adam Riggio.Jeff Kochan - 2018 - Social Epistemology Review and Reply Collective 7 (12):29-38.
Suppressed Subjectivity and Truncated Tradition: A Reply to Pablo Schyfter.Jeff Kochan - 2018 - Social Epistemology Review and Reply Collective 7 (12):15-21.

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References found in this work

Objectivity.Lorraine Daston & Peter Galison - 2007 - Cambridge, Mass.: Zone Books. Edited by Peter Galison.
Personal Knowledge: Towards a Post-Critical Philosophy.Michael Polanyi - 1958 - Chicago: University of Chicago Press. Edited by Mary Jo Nye.
Genesis and development of a scientific fact.Ludwik Fleck - 1979 - Chicago: University of Chicago Press. Edited by T. J. Trenn & R. K. Merton.

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