The expression “scientific method” is problematic for several reasons. First, it suggests that there is a single and uniform method employed in all scientific disciplines. However, even a cursory examination of various scientific fields reveals that this is not the case. Secondly, it ignores the historical fact that the general conception of science, including its
Scientific jury selection (SJS) is the use of a survey to decide which jurors to favor in a trial. Prior to the 1970s, jury selection was done by attorneys based on their hunches. The new quantitative method was welcomed enthusiastically by trial attorneys. Social scientists were more reserved. SJS led to the employment of social
The sociology of scientific knowledge (SSK) is a field of sociology that started to take form in the early 1970s. Sociologists, historians, and philosophers who shared a common interest in studying the social underpinnings of science took as a joint focus the very content of scientific knowledge. Previously, a division of labor had existed between
Scientific literacy, and more so the public understanding of science, have recently become areas of study in their own right within the sociology of science and science and technology studies (STS). This emergence is partly due to the increased focus on science as an inherently social activity, but more specifically it is due to the
The term model is used in multiple ways in science and there are several different kinds of models. The most basic scientific models are material and conceptual analogues. They are copies that stand in for more opaque systems. Cloud chambers and cell cultures are examples of material models, whereas conceptual models are more abstract analogies
The notion that scientists and other scholars constitute a kind of community of scholars has frequently been asserted and discussed (Godfrey Smith 2003). The ”invisible college” of natural philosophers is a seventeenth century idea (Price 1963). The phrasing is reminiscent of Adam Smith’s later ”invisible hand,” except that the scientists are real persons and it
The classic sociological formulation of the scientific norms was given by Robert K. Merton, in an article originally published as ”A Note on Science and Democracy” (1942) and reprinted as ”Science and Democratic Social Structure” in his Social Theory and Social Structure (1968 [1949, 1957]) and as ”The Normative Structure of Science” in The Sociology
Scientific productivity refers to the productivity of scientists in their research performance. In other words, the term concerns how much output scientists produce within a certain time period, or compared to the inputs that are utilized for the research. The major outputs from research are publications, patents, inventions, and product developments. However, especially in research
A classic analytical distinction between a citation and a reference reads: ”if paper R contains a bibliographic footnote using and describing paper C, then R contains a reference to C, and C has a citation from R.” According to this, citation and referencing are relations among published texts. But whereas referencing is an intratextual relation
Studies of scientific practice were the first to investigate scientific practice and science in the making empirically, something that had not been done by philosophers and historians of science. The outcomes of these studies opposed the standard view of science and instead showed how science and scientific knowledge are produced locally and scientists, instruments, computers