The Fate of Knowledge

249 Pages·2001·8.246 MB·English

by  Helen E. Longino

TOE FATE OF WOm^EDGE

THE FATE OF mO^EDGE
Helen E. Lon^no
PRINCETON UNIVERSITY PRESS PRINCETON AND OXFORD
Copyright © 2002 by Princeton University Press
Published by Princeton University Press, 41 William Street, Princeton,
New Jersey 08540
In the United Kingdom: Princeton University Press, 3 Market Place,
Woodstock, Oxfordshire 0X20 1SY
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Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data
Longino, Helen E.
The fate of knowledge / Helen E. Longino.
p. cm.
Includes bibliographical references and index.
ISBN 0-691-08875-6 (alk. paper) — ISBN 0-691-08876-4 (pbk.
alk. paper)
1. Knowledge, Sociology of. I. Title.
BD175 .L665 2001
121 —dc21
2001036267
British Library Cataloging-in-Publication Data is available
This book has been composed in Janson
Printed on acid-free paper. “
www.pup.princeton.edu
Printed in the United States of America
3 5 7 9 10 8 6 4 2
3 5 7 9 10 8 6 4 2
(Pbk.)
To my teachers in p^osophy, especiaUy
SUE LARSON
AARON SLOMAN
STEPHEN BARKER
PETER ACHINSTEIN
MARJORIE GRENE

Contend
Prrface and Acknowkd^enti ix
Chapter One
Introduction: The Rational-Social Dichotomy 1
Chapter Two
TaUng Social Studies of Science Seriously 11
Chapter Three
The Philosophers Respond 42
Chapter Four
Disassembling the Rational-Social Dichotomy 77
Chapter Five
Socializing Cognition 97
Chapter Six
Socializing Knowledge 124
Chapter Seven
Clarifications and Responses 145
Chapter Eight
Pluralism and Local Epistemologies 175
Chapter Nine
Conclusion 203
Rtferences 215
Index 227

Preface and Acknowledgments
This book owes its existence to many intellectual interactions and oppor­
tunities. It began life as a much more ambitious project, a rearticulation
of the thesis of the sociality of knowledge and its defense against critics,
and then an application of the thesis to new case studies, including a
discussion of the relation between oppositional or partisan science in the
West and approaches to science in newly industrializing postcolonial
societies. Eventually it became clear that the philosophical thesis
required more elaboration and that the other two parts of the project
needed and deserved lengthier and independent treatments. This book,
then, is the first installment: a reaffirmation of the thesis of the sociality
of knowledge, tempered by the very helpful and stimulating criticism I
have encountered, and developed in relation to other recent work, both
empirical and philosophical, in social theory of science.
I am grateful both to individuals and to institutions for stimulus and
opportunity. Ken Waters read and commented on each chapter, some­
times in several drafts, as they took shape. The influence of our conversa­
tions on philosophy and biology permeates this book. Elizabeth
Anderson and Richard Grandy each read a draft of the entire manuscript
and made numerous helpful suggestions for its revision. I owe all three of
these friends and colleagues a deep debt of gratitude for the generosity
and critical spirit with which they responded to this work. While these
readers cannot be blamed for the book’s remaining flaws, they are cer­
tainly responsible for much that is good about it. In addition, participants
in my graduate seminar, Philosophy 8660, in spring 1999, read an early
draft of most of the present chapters. Their individual interventions are
noted in the text, but the seminar as a whole provided an invaluable
opportunity to try these ideas out with a sophisticated group of readers.
Many ideas in the text are the consequence of conversation or corre­
spondence with, among others, Paul Boghossian, Robert Brandon,
Nancy Cartwright, Amita Chatterjee, J. Richard Creath, John Dupre,
Catherine Elgin, Miranda Flicker, James Griesemer, Jennifer Hornsby,
Don Howard, Irfan Habib, Evelyn Fox Keller, Philip Kiteher, Bruno
Latour, Kathleen Lennon, Elisabeth Lloyd, Jane Maienschein, Valerie
Miner, Shefali Moitra, Lynn H. Nelson, Dhruv Raina, Alan Richardson,
Robert Richardson, Steven Schiffer, Frederick Schmitt, Miriam
Solomon, Elizabeth Spelman, Sharon Traweek, Vivian Weil, William
Wimsatt, Alison Wylie, and my colleagues in Minneapolis, John Beatty,
Ron Giere, Geoffrey Heilman, Steven Kellert, David MacCallum,