History and Philosophy of Technoscience
About the Book Series
Even though technoscientific research is as old as alchemy and pharmacy, agricultural research and synthetic chemistry, philosophers of science had little to say about it until recently. This book series is the first to explicitly accept the challenge to study not just technical aspects of theory development and hypothesis testing but the specific ways in which knowledge is produced in a technological setting. When one seeks to achieve basic capabilities of manipulation, visualization, or predictive control, how are problems defined and research fields established, what kinds of explanations are sought, how are findings validated, what are the contributions of different kinds of expertise, how do epistemic and social values enter into the research process? And most importantly for civic observers of contemporary research: how is robustness and reliability achieved even in the absence of complete scientific understanding?
Editorial Board: Hanne Andersen (University of Copenhagen), Bernadette Bensaude-Vincent (University of Paris, Sorbonne), Martin Carrier (University of Bielefeld), Graeme Gooday (University of Leeds), Don Howard (University of Notre Dame), Ann Johnson (Cornell University), Cyrus Mody (Maastricht University), Maureen O'Malley (University of Sydney), Roger Strand (University of Bergen), Nancy Tuana (Pennsylvania State University).
Direct inquiries to Alfred Nordmann [e-mail link: [email protected]] or Robert Langham [e-mail link: [email protected]].
Visual Representations in Science: Concept and Epistemology
1st Edition
By Nicola Mößner
December 18, 2020
Visual representations (photographs, diagrams, etc.) play crucial roles in scientific processes. They help, for example, to communicate research results and hypotheses to scientific peers as well as to the lay audience. In genuine research activities they are used as evidence or as surrogates for ...
The Reform of the International System of Units (SI): Philosophical, Historical and Sociological Issues
1st Edition
Edited
By Nadine de Courtenay, Olivier Darrigol, Oliver Schlaudt
September 30, 2020
Systems of units still fail to attract the philosophical attention they deserve, but this could change with the current reform of the International System of Units (SI). Most of the SI base units will henceforth be based on certain laws of nature and a choice of fundamental constants whose values ...
From Models to Simulations
1st Edition
By Franck Varenne
June 30, 2020
This book analyses the impact computerization has had on contemporary science and explains the origins, technical nature and epistemological consequences of the current decisive interplay between technology and science: an intertwining of formalism, computation, data acquisition, data and ...
Scientists' Expertise as Performance: Between State and Society, 1860–1960
1st Edition
Edited
By Joris Vandendriessche, Evert Peeters, Kaat Wils
June 30, 2020
The essays in this collection explore our reliance on experts within a historical context and across a wide range of fields, including agriculture, engineering, health sciences and labour management. Contributors argue that experts were highly aware of their audiences and used performance to gain ...
Standardization in Measurement: Philosophical, Historical and Sociological Issues
1st Edition
Edited
By Oliver Schlaudt, Lara Huber
June 30, 2020
The application of standard measurement is a cornerstone of modern science. In this collection of essays, standardization of procedure, units of measurement and the epistemology of standardization are addressed by specialists from sociology, history and the philosophy of science....
A History of Technoscience: Erasing the Boundaries between Science and Technology
1st Edition
By David F. Channell
May 07, 2019
Are science and technology independent of one another? Is technology dependent upon science, and if so, how is it dependent? Is science dependent upon technology, and if so how is it dependent? Or, are science and technology becoming so interdependent that the line dividing them has become totally ...
Environments of Intelligence: From natural information to artificial interaction
1st Edition
By Hajo Greif
May 07, 2019
What is the role of the environment, and of the information it provides, in cognition? More specifically, may there be a role for certain artefacts to play in this context? These are questions that motivate "4E" theories of cognition (as being embodied, embedded, extended, enactive). In his take on...
Reasoning in Measurement
1st Edition
Edited
By Nicola Mößner, Alfred Nordmann
August 14, 2018
This collection offers a new understanding of the epistemology of measurement. The interdisciplinary volume explores how measurements are produced, for example, in astronomy and seismology, in studies of human sexuality and ecology, in brain imaging and intelligence testing. It considers ...
Research Objects in their Technological Setting
1st Edition
Edited
By Bernadette Bensaude Vincent, Sacha Loeve, Alfred Nordmann, Astrid Schwarz
August 14, 2018
What kind of stuff is the world made of? What is the nature or substance of things? These are ontological questions, and they are usually answered with respect to the objects of science. The objects of technoscience tell a different story that concerns the power, promise and potential of things – ...
Experiments in Practice
1st Edition
By Astrid Schwarz
February 01, 2017
Traditionally experimentation has been understood as an activity performed within the laboratory, but in the twenty-first century this view is being challenged. Schwarz uses ecological and environmental case studies to show how scientific experiments can transcend the laboratory....
Philosophy, Computing and Information Science
1st Edition
Edited
By Ruth Hagengruber, Uwe Riss
January 06, 2017
Over the last four decades computers and the internet have become an intrinsic part of all our lives, but this speed of development has left related philosophical enquiry behind. Featuring the work of computer scientists and philosophers, these essays provide an overview of an exciting new area of ...
Spaceship Earth in the Environmental Age, 1960–1990
1st Edition
By Sabine Höhler
January 06, 2017
The idea of the earth as a vessel in space came of age in an era shaped by space travel and the Cold War. Höhler’s study brings together technology, science and ecology to explore the way this latter-day ark was invoked by politicians, environmentalists, cultural historians, writers of science ...