Sociology of Scientific Knowledge

Please note that the content of this book primarily consists of articles available from Wikipedia or other free sources online.The sociology of scientific knowledge involves the study of science as a social activity, especially dealing "with the social conditions and effects of science, and with the social structures and processes of scientific activity." It consists of studying the development of a scientific field and identfying points of contingency or interpretative flexibility, where at time, ambiguities are present. Having identified such branch points, the researcher then seeks to explain why one interpretation rather than another succeeded. Often such variations may be linked to corporate or economic factors. Practitioners include Barry Barnes, David Bloor, Gaston Bachelard, Paul Feyerabend, Thomas Kuhn, Martin Kusch, Bruno Latour, Anselm Strauss, Lucy Suchman, Harry Collins, and Steve Fuller.

Klappentext

The sociology of scientific knowledge involves the study of science as a social activity, especially dealing "with the social conditions and effects of science, and with the social structures and processes of scientific activity." It consists of studying the development of a scientific field and identfying points of contingency or interpretative flexibility, where at time, ambiguities are present. Having identified such branch points, the researcher then seeks to explain why one interpretation rather than another succeeded. Often such variations may be linked to corporate or economic factors. Practitioners include Barry Barnes, David Bloor, Gaston Bachelard, Paul Feyerabend, Thomas Kuhn, Martin Kusch, Bruno Latour, Anselm Strauss, Lucy Suchman, Harry Collins, and Steve Fuller.