The Social Structure of Science
Merton
Reward system of science: credit for new results. Merton thought that that posed a problem for some the ideals of science. The desire for credit leads to fraud, plagiarism, and libel.
Hull
Hull used the sociology of science in the service of the philosophy of science. He argued that the structure of rewards in science is an important part of leads to the normatively good qualities of science, and therefore the reward system isn't just an accidental feature, like wearing white coats and drinking lots of coffee, but an important part of science itself.
Hull thought that what scientists want is for their work to be used by others and to be credited (that is, they want to see their names mentioned in print by others). This system of credit is part of modern academia in general, and it is why we academics hate plagiarism so much.
This system of credit is fairly new, it dates from the era of Bacon, Boyle. It is well established by Newton's time. And it was not part of the old medieval scholastic universities that Galileo mocked so much.
In England, the institution of credit starts with
Boyle transformed the scholastic question "Can there be a perfect vacuum?" to the scientific question "How can you have fun with a vacuum pump?" This is not just the origin of science, but part of a political transformation.
To do this kind of science, you need to rely on the work of others. How do you make sure you can trust others? The slogan has always been Experiments must be repeatable. That nice, in principle, but who has time to repeat the work of others?
Credit solves this problem: You want others to use your work, so you need to be sure you don't get a reputation for being unreliable. So, people check their own labs very carefully. In addition, scientist want their work to be used, not that of their rivals, and so they try to show their rivals wrong by checking up on them.
- Example: Ampère seems to have faked his experiments, but no one cares. He is still highly respected. Why? I suspect that it is because, by the time the "results" were important enough to be "replicated," the equipment to do so was available.
Kitcher
Kitcher adds that the social structure solves the problem faced by Kuhn and his heirs. The problem is that no research program is ever shown to be correct or incorrect. How do you decide which to keep alive and which to let die?
The answer: Scientists only get credit when they are part of a successful research program, and they get credit in proportion to their contribution.
- Working on a small program is high risk
- Working on a small program has the potential for large rewards.
Naturalism
Naturalism suggests that scientific study of the social systems of science has a contribution to make here, and may even lead to better systems.
-- ShaughanLavine - 26 Oct 2005