快猫短视频

It is the duty of all good students to annoy their teachers, especially those
who treat the knowledge in textbooks at face value. You, as a student interested
in science, have a unique range of opportunities to be interestingly
annoying鈥攕o long as you鈥檙e prepared to do some extracurricular homework
and bend your brain with philosophy.

Quantum theory provides great ammunition: physics teachers have been known to
fume when asked to reconcile quantum mechanics鈥攚hich suggests that you
influence an event at the quantum level just by observing it鈥攚ith the fact
that this doesn鈥檛 work at the macroscopic level. Science teachers and lecturers
can also be entertainingly annoyed by questions about epistemology: ask what
they mean when they say 鈥渨e know鈥�.

Advanced annoyers can achieve satisfying results by mentioning the French
philosophe Bruno Latour and his proposal that our knowledge is decided
within a 鈥淧arliament of things鈥�. This may, however, be a bit esoteric for the
above-mentioned literal-minded profs. You may need to start with concepts that
have better brand recognition. 鈥淪ocial construction鈥� is explosive. Sociologists
love this term and their heated exchanges with scientists have become known as
the 鈥淪cience Wars鈥�. If you want to follow the action鈥攐r
enlist鈥攜ou鈥檒l need combat training. You could start at the beginning, with
Genesis and Development of a Scientific Fact, by Ludwick Fleck, a medic
from Lvov鈥攁t various times in Poland, Austrian Galicia, and now in the
Ukraine.

In this remarkable book published in 1935, Fleck traces the history of
syphilis. When August von Wasserman developed his test for the disease in 1906,
argument raged over what syphilis was, pitting 鈥渕oral impurity鈥� against 鈥渂ad
blood鈥� and 鈥渁 set of symptoms鈥�. The test defines the modern concept of the
disease, so what does it mean to say that the test is accurate? Fleck contends,
therefore, that syphilis was socially constructed. Were it to have been defined
through psychiatric symptoms, it would have been something else.

Generally, because science is a human activity and thus necessarily a social
one, its research priorities鈥攁t least鈥攁re determined by cultural and
economic forces. We have a vaccine against rubella, but not malaria, because
malaria mainly strikes poor countries that can鈥檛 afford the research, or the
cost of a jab.

A strong version of social construction, which drives scientists mad, holds
that there is no such thing as objective knowledge. Depending on their
religious, cultural and social background, different scientists view a problem
through different eyes, ask different questions, and may arrive at different
conclusions based on the same data.

For an up-to-date discussion of what people mean by social construction turn
to Ian Hacking鈥檚 The Social Construction of What? His book evinces a
remarkably sane mind at work. A professor of philosophy at the University of
Toronto, he opens with an A to Z of 鈥淪ocial Construction鈥� books, from Authorship
via Quarks to Zulu Nationalism. It is easy to accept that 鈥渁uthorship鈥�, for
example, is not an objective feature of the world, but exists in a legal and
economic framework.

Opponents of social construction ask how 鈥渞eal things鈥�, such as rocks, can be
socially constructed. Surely they exist independently of social or economic
circumstances鈥攁nd independently of observers and our actions? Not so, says
Hacking. He considers the history of the mineral dolomite. Different questions
about the mineral, says Hacking 鈥渃ould have led to a thoroughly nonequivalent
geology and geophysics鈥�. He clarifies: 鈥淒olomite is a whole mess of stuff, a
mixture. It gets characterised as `a stuff鈥� because of the interest of oil
geologists. It would have been a nonentity were it not for its applications.鈥�
But once particular questions are asked, he says, dolomite is a predetermined
answer. Don鈥檛 ask what this means in 鈥渢he real world鈥�: these philosophers are
talking about a different kind of world, largely as a result of the huge
problems that the concept 鈥渞eal鈥� causes in philosophical enquiry.

In Science Without Laws, Ronald Giere proposes that the
nature of scientific theories can be understood using a phrase he calls
鈥渃onstructive realism鈥�. If that sounds like a Science Wars peace mission, then
you鈥檙e catching on. Giere, a professor of philosophy at the University of
Minnesota, proposes that scientific theories are more like maps and, like maps,
their validity depends on where you stand and what use you want from the map.
The standard map of London鈥檚 Underground, for example, is quite unlike a
geological map of the city, or a road map of its streets.

A side benefit of all this is that you may find you prefer the social life
which springs from late-night discussions with philosophers, fuelled by caffeine
and other relatively harmless alkaloid chemicals, to that available through
hanging out with, say, engineers and ethanol. The downside is that you may be
tempted to drop out and end up as a freelance science writer, or something.