Get Science as a Process: An Evolutionary Account of the Social PDF

By David L. Hull

ISBN-10: 0226360504

ISBN-13: 9780226360508

"Legend is late for alternative, and an sufficient substitute needs to attend to the method of technological know-how as rigorously as Hull has performed. I percentage his imaginative and prescient of a significant account of the social and highbrow dynamics of technology that would stay away from either the rosy blur of Legend and the facile charms of relativism. . . . as a result of [Hull's] deep hindrance with the ways that study is de facto performed, technology as a strategy starts off a major venture within the learn of technological know-how. it really is one in all a exclusive sequence of books, which Hull himself edits."—Philip Kitcher, Nature"In technological know-how as a strategy, [David Hull] argues that the strain among cooperation and festival is strictly what makes science such a success. . . . Hull takes an strange method of his topic. He applies the foundations of evolution in nature to the evolution of technological know-how, arguing that an identical types of forces chargeable for shaping the increase and dying of species additionally act at the improvement of medical ideas."—Natalie Angier, big apple occasions publication Review"By a ways the main specialist and thorough case in favour of an evolutionary philosophy of science ever to were made. It comprises very good brief histories of evolutionary biology and of systematics (the technological know-how of classifying dwelling things); an immense and unique account of recent systematic controversy; a counter-attack opposed to the philosophical critics of evolutionary philosophy; social-psychological facts, amassed by way of Hull himself, to teach that technology does have the nature demanded by way of his philosophy; and a philosophical research of evolution that is basic sufficient to use to either organic and ancient change."—Mark Ridley, instances Literary Supplement"Hull is essentially drawn to how social interactions in the clinical neighborhood can assist or prevent the method through which new theories and methods get permitted. . . . The declare that technology is a approach for choosing out the easiest new rules isn't really a brand new one, yet Hull tells us precisely how scientists move approximately it, and he's ready to simply accept that at the least to a point, the social actions of the scientists selling a brand new inspiration can impact its probabilities of being accepted."—Peter J. Bowler, records of common History"I were doing philosophy of technology now for twenty-five years, and when i might by no means have claimed that I knew every little thing, I felt that I had a very solid deal with at the nature of technological know-how, repeatedly, Hull was once capable of express me simply how incomplete my figuring out was once. . . . additionally, [Science as a strategy] is among the so much compulsively readable books that i've got ever encountered."—Michael Ruse, Biology and Philosophy

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Additional resources for Science as a Process: An Evolutionary Account of the Social and Conceptual Development of Science (Science and Its Conceptual Foundations)

Example text

Evolution, on the other hand, cannot be thought of as an engineer. Although there are constraints beyond which change cannot go and be viable, there are no blueprints of future models. Nor are there tools and materials to be set up in advance for the attainment of a given and predetermined end. Man may do this by invention and artificial selection, but organic evolution can be interpreted only in terms of survival in the present, not in terms of a future of uncertain character. For man to intrude into the evolutionary scene requires a well-developed sense of self and social awareness, a heightened degree of anticipation, and the ability to see one's images projected forward in time to the point of realization.

Such encouragement is essential for one like myself who does not comfortably and lightly enter Page xii a field of endeavor where one's knowledge may well be shallow and one's judgment suspect. The bibliography at the end of this volume is a reflection of my reading and my biases, and an acknowledgment of my further debt to others who have published earlier: for information, ideas, points of view, even disagreements, the latter necessary for the better honing of my own thoughts. Whatever errors of fact, interpretation, and speculation might remainand I have no illusions on this scorethey are my responsibility.

No predetermined direction of the evolutionary process is assumed since the basic events that underlie evolution are unique and unpredictable. Evolution can and does occur at many levels of organization, and it can affect many things and events, from the trivial to the profound, from the micro- to the macrocosmos. Every level has its own peculiarities of variable elements, rates, constraints, accidents, and responses to impinging forces. Since evolution operates within the parameters of time, however long or short the intervals, it is a historical process, and as with any other kind of history, a reasonable understanding of it depends upon the availability of information and ideas ordered into time sequences that link the past with the present.

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Science as a Process: An Evolutionary Account of the Social and Conceptual Development of Science (Science and Its Conceptual Foundations) by David L. Hull


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