I think this is a throughly fascinating topic: my impression is that a lot of sociology of science (by no means all of it) was biased from the start in favour of trying to prove that science didn't have any kind of privileged epistemic ground.
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Replying to @F_Vaggi @Meaningness and
I'm a big fan of Reichenbach's distinction between the context of discovery/context of justification. Investigating science as a human enterprise is crucial because scientists are humans and science is a human activity that's just as subject to whims of power as anything else.
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Replying to @F_Vaggi @Meaningness and
More narrowly though, in social psych, a lot of underpowered research that didn't replicate was throughly progressive and egalitarian in nature. Power needs to be understood a lot more broadly than as a hegemonic government/capitalism.
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Yes… More broadly, bad science often results when people set out to prove things they want to believe, or want other people to believe, or want other people to think they believe themselves. Too often, a study is accepted uncritically because it confirms social preferences.
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I think that's exactly right. However, that calls for a nuanced and situated understanding of what the power dynamic are in different fields, instead of understanding 'power' as an all powerful generic hegemon.
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Right! It’s tiresome that many STS people feel they have to end every paper with “ergo capitalismus delenda est” even when that has nothing to do with the topic. It’s like when all physics papers had to end with “and so we see that God is great and good.”
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Replying to @Meaningness @F_Vaggi and
But, some branches of social science do have better understandings of power, and some STS people do deploy them.
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Replying to @Meaningness @F_Vaggi and
I doubt anyone would dare to say “it’s taboo to question the assumption that everything we do is morally justified solely by its contribution to discrediting neoliberalism” for instance
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I agree, but imho that's meaningless. The right question is: given the current incentives for publications/TT track positions, is it easier to publish a piece that argues that capitalism is to blame for X compared to the alternative?
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Replying to @F_Vaggi @Meaningness and
For example: A friend wrote a fantastic article about how some large scale genome sequencing studies showed that several origin myths that certain Indian tribes had about where they came from were implausible. He had a horrible time getting it published and eventually gave up.
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That’s an interesting example, yes!
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