You are cordially invited to attend the next Sarton Centre Seminar. Please find all the relevant information below.
Date: 17 March, 14:00
Speaker: Hugh Desmond (IHPST (CNRS/Paris I) and University of Antwerp)
Location: Faculteitszaal, Blandijnberg 2, 9000 Ghent OR online
Zoom link: https://ugent-be.zoom.us/j/99797429582?pwd=WnlXY3B2bzJTZ1dha3NOQnoyVWRHdz09 (Meeting ID: 997 9742 9582; Passcode: 1L8iEa18)
Title: “Questioning the politics-free ideal of science”
Abstract: While the value-free ideal of science is increasingly viewed as untenable in analytic philosophy of science (e.g. Douglas 2009; Resnik & Elliott, 2016; Wilholt and Bennett 2022), what can be called the “politics-free ideal of science” is arguably still upheld as the normative standard. Science can be used or misused for political ends, but in itself is not viewed as having political import. In fact, the confusion of science and politics is associated with various historical instances of pseudoscience (eugenics after 1930; Lysenkoism). However, in this paper I argue that the true picture is more complicated and that science, especially when applied to human affairs, has an intrinsic political dimension.
I first argue for this thesis by situating it in the history and sociology of science. Early advocates of science (Bacon, Descartes, Hobbes) saw the potential for science to have broad societal repercussions, and sociologists (esp. Abbott 1988) have illustrated how professions, starting in the 19th century, in fact started to appropriate scientific knowledge in battles for jurisdictions.
This intrinsic politicization of science refers, on the whole, to a benign form of expertise, but it is not without risk. To this end, I then modify Douglas’ argument from inductive risk to show how increased prestige of a science can lower the required evidential standard to advance a claim. This has in fact occurred in science, where I argue, drawing on historians such as (Shapin 2008), that the prestige of contemporary science historically originated with the spectacular successes of physics. The resulting prestige for other sciences concerning human affairs would allow them – in principle – to advance precise but insufficiently supported predictions where instead democratic deliberation would have been more appropriate.