The Role of Participation in a Techno-Scientific Controversy
Total Page:16
File Type:pdf, Size:1020Kb
Load more
Recommended publications
-
Nikos Platis
NIKOS PLATIS Curriculum Vitae February 2019 Contents 1. Personal Information..........................................................................................................................................1 2. Education..............................................................................................................................................................1 3. Scientific Interests...............................................................................................................................................1 4. Professional Appointments..............................................................................................................................2 5. Research Collaborations...................................................................................................................................2 6. Publications.........................................................................................................................................................3 6.1 Publications in Refereed Journals..................................................................................................................3 6.2 Publications in Refereed Conference Proceedings...................................................................................3 6.3 Books and Lecture Notes.................................................................................................................................4 6.4 Miscellaneous Publications............................................................................................................................4 -
Foreign Policy Under Austerity Greece’S Return to Normality?
FOREIGN POLICY UNDER AUSTERITY GREECE’S RETURN TO NORMALITY? SPYRIDON N. LITSAS & ARISTOTLE TZIAMPIRIS Foreign Policy Under Austerity Spyridon N. Litsas • Aristotle Tziampiris Editors Foreign Policy Under Austerity Greece’s Return to Normality? Editors Spyridon N. Litsas Aristotle Tziampiris University of Macedonia University of Piraeus Thessaloniki , Greece Greece ISBN 978-1-137-57581-4 ISBN 978-1-137-57582-1 (eBook) DOI 10.1057/978-1-137-57582-1 Library of Congress Control Number: 2016955053 © The Editor(s) (if applicable) and The Author(s) 2017 The author(s) has/have asserted their right(s) to be identifi ed as the author(s) of this work in accordance with the Copyright, Design and Patents Act 1988. This work is subject to copyright. All rights are solely and exclusively licensed by the Publisher, whether the whole or part of the material is concerned, specifi cally the rights of translation, reprinting, reuse of illustrations, recitation, broadcasting, reproduction on microfi lms or in any other physical way, and transmission or information storage and retrieval, electronic adaptation, computer software, or by similar or dissimilar methodology now known or hereafter developed. The use of general descriptive names, registered names, trademarks, service marks, etc. in this publication does not imply, even in the absence of a specifi c statement, that such names are exempt from the relevant protective laws and regulations and therefore free for general use. The publisher, the authors and the editors are safe to assume that the advice and information in this book are believed to be true and accurate at the date of publication. -
Rhetoric for Becoming Otherwise
The Pennsylvania State University The Graduate School College of the Liberal Arts RHETORIC FOR BECOMING OTHERWISE: LIFE, LITERATURE, GENEALOGY, FLIGHT A Dissertation in English by Abram D. Anders © 2009 Abram D. Anders Submitted in Partial Fulfillment of the Requirements for the Degree of Doctor of Philosophy August 2009 ii The dissertation of Abram D. Anders was reviewed and approved* by the following: Richard M. Doyle Professor of English and Science, Technology and Society Dissertation Advisor Chair of Committee Jeffrey T. Nealon Liberal Arts Research Professor of English Xiaoye You Assistant Professor of English and Asian Studies Robert A. Yarber, Jr. Distinguished Professor of Art Robert R. Edwards Edwin Erle Sparks Professor of English and Comparative Literature Department of English Graduate Director *Signatures are on file in the Graduate School. iii ABSTRACT Rhetoric for Becoming Otherwise begins with the Isocratean premise that thought, speech, writing are best understood as bridges between the already said of language and the emerging circumstances that are the occasions for their production. This argument is rehearsed across a variety of domains and instances following Isocrates exhortation that the rhetorician or practitioner of philosophia can only model the movement of discourse without expecting to provide any “true knowledge” or “absolute theory” for how to encounter the problematics of an endlessly deferred present. As a matter of rhetoric, becoming otherwise is the continually renewed task of creating something new from the resources of language and for the demands of an ever deferred present—Presocratics versus Classicists (Chapter 1). As a matter of health, becoming otherwise is the necessity of overcoming limitation and suffering in order to achieve new norms of health and pursue the ever changing opportunities of a self‐developing capacity for producing new capacities—Normativity versus Normalization (Chapter 2). -
Nanoscience, Nanoscientists, and Controversy1
Chapter 12 Nanoscience, Nanoscientists, and Controversy1 Jason Scott Robert 12.1 Introduction Contemporary life sciences and biotechnology research is controversial. Whether the topic is embryos, evolution, genetics, neuroimaging, pharmaceutical discovery, synthetic biology, or xenotransplantation, the research is subject to public, political, legal, regulatory, clinical, and/or scientific controversy. In some cases, the controversy may not be worth engaging, given the credibility (or, rather, lack thereof) of those who would object. Often, though, those who would object must be taken seriously— and even where the objectors lack credibility, any response to them must itself be serious. These are basic elements of civility in a pluralistic society, and yet they are widely ignored when science and scientists are the subjects of controversy. As a scholar of the life sciences in society, I have tended to pay less attention to the question of generally whether research in chemistry, math, physics, or engineering is as widely deemed to be controversial as is research in biology and biotechnology— except, of course, where that research is oriented toward or undertaken in concert with the life sciences (as with engineering in relation to stem cell biology, or chemistry in relation to directed molecular evolution). But with advances in nanos- cale science and engineering (NSE) research, it is hard to miss the fact that NSE is an exemplar of research in the natural and physical sciences that is controversial both in relation to the life sciences (as expected) but also in its own right. Whether because of the spatial or financial scale of the research, or because of the prospects for immense changes—good and bad—in science, industry, medicine, and society, or for a combination of these or other reasons, NSE research is paradigmatically controversial. -
Social Decision-Making Under Scientific Controversy, Expertise, and the Precautionary Principle Olivier Godard
Social Decision-Making under Scientific Controversy, Expertise, and the Precautionary Principle Olivier Godard To cite this version: Olivier Godard. Social Decision-Making under Scientific Controversy, Expertise, and the Precaution- ary Principle. C. Joerges, K.-H. Ladeur and E. Vos. Integrating scientific expertise into regulatory decisionmaking - National experiences and European innovations., Nomos Verlagsgesellschaft„ pp.39- 73, 1997. halshs-00624027 HAL Id: halshs-00624027 https://halshs.archives-ouvertes.fr/halshs-00624027 Submitted on 15 Sep 2011 HAL is a multi-disciplinary open access L’archive ouverte pluridisciplinaire HAL, est archive for the deposit and dissemination of sci- destinée au dépôt et à la diffusion de documents entific research documents, whether they are pub- scientifiques de niveau recherche, publiés ou non, lished or not. The documents may come from émanant des établissements d’enseignement et de teaching and research institutions in France or recherche français ou étrangers, des laboratoires abroad, or from public or private research centers. publics ou privés. Published in C. Joerges, K.-H. Ladeur and E. Vos (eds.), Integrating scientific expertise into regulatory decision- making - National experiences and European innovations. Baden-Baden, Nomos Verlagsgesellschaft, 1997, pp. 39-73. Social Decision-Making under Scientific Controversy, Expertise, and the Precautionary Principle Olivier GODARD * Abstract Integrating scientific inputs into the regulatory process is generally attributed to experts. But, environmental issues are often characterised by an all-pervasive uncertainty and scientific and social controversies which make the experts' task difficult. This paper presents the concept of social decision-making under scientific controversy and comes to an examination of the implicit but decisive roles expected from expertise in those contexts. -
Scientific Controversies: Authentic and Contrived [Post-Print]
Trinity College Trinity College Digital Repository Faculty Scholarship 2017 Scientific Controversies: Authentic and Contrived [post-print] Mark P. Silverman Trinity College, [email protected] Follow this and additional works at: https://digitalrepository.trincoll.edu/facpub Part of the Physical Sciences and Mathematics Commons Science & Education 26 (3) (2017) 397-405 DOI 10.1007/s11191-017-9886-2 The published article is available at: http://link.springer.com/article/10.1007/s11191-017-9886-2 Scientific Controversies: Authentic and Contrived M P Silverman, G A Jarvis Professor of Physics Trinity College, Hartford CT 06106 USA Email: [email protected] Web: mpsilverman.com Review of David Harker (2015) Creating Scientific Controversies: Uncertainty and Bias in Science and Society, Cambridge University Press, Cambridge UK. ISBN: 9781107706903, 266 pages, price (PB): $28.99 (paperback) 1 Characteristics of Real Science and Real Scientific Controversy Science is more of a journey than a destination. And, as to be expected of any journey taken by diverse travellers to an unexplored place, there may arise disagreements over how to get there, what is seen, and what it all means. If the place is relatively unimportant and the number of travellers few, the discord rarely spreads far. But if the destination is important, the travellers are many, and the outcome of getting there (or not) is consequential, disagreements can escalate into a broadly sweeping controversy with a lot at stake. Some 25 years ago, I had the pleasure of contributing an invited paper (M P Silverman, 1992, “Raising Questions: Philosophical Significance of Controversy in Science”, Science & Education 1: 163-179) to the inaugural volume of this journal on the provocative topic of the significance of controversy in science. -
COVID-19 Pandemic and the Fool's Errand of Pseudoscience-Based Decision-Making COVID-19 Pandemic and the Fool's Errand of Ps
TIO CA N A DU N COVID-19 Pandemic and the Fool’s Errand of E D 9 A 1 C - Pseudoscience-Based Decision-Making T D I I O V N O C Science is a very successful and reliable enterprise for denial or inappropriate skepticism — rejecting or creating understanding the natural world. Without science and the doubt about science in order to fabricate an illusion that a technology that stems from science, human population scientific controversy exists. Both forms result in and life-expectancy would be a fraction of what it is now. uncertainty about and resistance to reliable scientific Tombstones in cemeteries provide testimony of how knowledge and consensus. This leads to doubting the prevalent childhood and early adult deaths were prior to community of authentic experts and a hesitancy to act advancements in science. Ironically, the success of appropriately to very real problems. Most disconcerting is science and technology blinds many people to the realities the purposeful promotion of pseudoscience for personal, of life and death in the not-to-distant past. Those who economic, and/or ideological reasons. The COVID-19 faced the ravages of disease, common ailments, pandemic illustrates how pseudoscience promotes poor inhospitable weather, and other devastating realities of life decision-making that places all of society at risk, and how would be shocked at the advances that we now take for the navigation of information and identification of granted. They would likely be equally perplexed at the trustworthy expertise are crucial for better decision- significant and growing distrust of advances in science making. -
STS and Researcher Intervention Strategies
Engaging Science, Technology, and Society 2 (2016), 55-66 DOI:10.17351/ests2016.15 STS and Researcher Intervention Strategies BRIAN MARTIN1 University of Wollongong Abstract When I learned about a concerted campaign against Australian vaccination critics, I decided to intervene in the debate. As a result, some proponents of vaccination turned on me, making abusive comments and complaining to university officials. At several points in this experience, I had to make choices about how to intervene or respond. STS perspectives offered valuable insights for understanding the dynamics of the controversy but provided little guidance for making decisions. Some reasons are offered for why STS lacks tools for guiding practical action in such situations. Keywords STS methodology; controversy; vaccination; engagement; dissent Introduction I’ve been thinking and writing from an STS perspective for decades. One of my special interests is public scientific controversies such as over nuclear power, fluoridation, and pesticides (Martin 2014a: 443–448). STS concepts, such as “boundary work” (Gieryn 1999), the role of interests in shaping scientific knowledge (Barnes 1977), and “undone science” (Hess 2006), are valuable in understanding the dynamics of controversies, and there are many insightful case studies (Kleinman et al. 2005, 2008, 2010). In 2010, when I first became involved in the Australian vaccination debate, I found STS concepts quite useful for understanding the controversy. But I encountered an aspect of the debate for which STS guidance was limited: how to respond to attacks and, more generally, how to proceed when intervening in the debate itself. For example, I needed to decide whether and how to respond to comments like this: Yep, that’s why I told Martin to fuck off; I don’t deal with liars. -
Manipulating Underdetermination in Scientific Controversy: the Case Of
Manipulating Underdetermination in Scientiªc Controversy: The Case of the Molecular Clock Michael R. Dietrich Dartmouth College Robert A. Skipper, Jr. University of Cincinnati Where there are cases of underdetermination in scientiªc controversies, such as the case of the molecular clock, scientists may direct the course and terms of dispute by playing off the multidimensional framework of theory evaluation. This is because assessment strategies themselves are underdetermined. Within the framework of assessment, there are a variety of trade-offs between differ- ent strategies as well as shifting emphases as speciªc strategies are given more or less weight in assessment situations. When a strategy is underdetermined, scientists can change the dynamics of a controversy by making assessments using different combinations of evaluation strategies and/or weighting what- ever strategies are in play in different ways. Following an underdetermina- tion strategy does not end or resolve a scientiªc dispute. Consequently, manip- ulating underdetermination is a feature of controversy dynamics and not controversy closure. 1. Introduction Underdetermination is common in scientiªc practice. It is widely recog- nized by scientists even if they do not discuss it in terms frequently used by philosophers. We argue that in the course of scientiªc controversies un- derdetermination can be and often is manipulated by scientists to direct the terms and course of dispute. During a dispute, scientists use a wide ar- ray of different strategies in different combinations in their comparative Thanks to Dick Burian, Roberta Millstein, and two anonymous reviewers for Perspectives on Science for comments on earlier drafts of this paper. RASjr also acknowledges the support of the Charles P. -
Greece Before and After the Euro: Macroeconomics, Politics and the Quest for Reforms
Department of Economics Athens University of Economics and Business WORKING PAPER no. 02-2021 Greece Before and After the Euro: Macroeconomics, Politics and the Quest for Reforms George Alogoskoufis February 2021 Πατησίων 76, 104 34 Αθήνα. Tηλ.: 210 8203303-5. E-mail: [email protected] / www.aueb.gr 76, Patission Street, Athens 104 34 Greece. Tel.: (+30) 210 8203303-5 Greece Before and After the Euro: Macroeconomics, Politics and the Quest for Reforms George Alogoskoufis* Athens University of Economics and Business Hellenic Observatory, London School of Economics February 2021 Abstract This paper analyses developments in the Greek economy before and after the euro. The main thesis is that the imbalances that led to the crisis of the post-2010 period were building up during the previous three decades and that their root causes were not merely economic, but social, structural, institutional and political. The fiscal imbalances created in the 1980s were not adequately addressed by the convergence policies of the 1990s, while the long-standing problem of low international competitiveness was further exacerbated by the failure to promote the necessary structural reforms. Greece's accession to the euro area with major structural and fiscal imbalances and low and deteriorating international competitiveness, led to a steep rise in its external indebtedness. The lopsided adjustment and the inadequacy of the reforms was due to domestic political and social constraints, both before and after euro area entry. In view of the institutional weaknesses of the euro area itself, the external imbalances ultimately led to the external debt crisis of 2010, the imposition of the economic adjustment programs and the ‘great depression’ of the 2010s. -
The Drama of Bioterror: Paranoia and the Rhetoric of Defense
THE DRAMA OF BIOTERROR: PARANOIA AND THE RHETORIC OF DEFENSE By George Huston Gittinger BA, Tulane University, 2002 MA, University of Pittsburgh, 2011 MA, University of Pittsburgh, 2013 Submitted to the Graduate Faculty of The Dietrich School of Arts and Sciences in partial fulfillment of the requirements of the degree of Doctor of Philosophy in Communication University of Pittsburgh 2014 UNIVERSITY OF PITTSBURGH THE DIETRICH SCHOOL OF ARTS AND SCIENCES This dissertation was presented by George Huston Gittinger It was defended on November 15, 2014 Dr. Heather Douglas, Associate Professor, Department of Philosophy Dr. Olga Kuchinskaya, Assistant Professor, Department of Communication Dr. Gordon Mitchell, Associate Professor, Department of Communication Dr. John Poulakos, Associate Professor, Department of Communication Dissertation Director: Dr. John Lyne, Professor, Department of Communication ii Copyright © by George Huston Gittinger 2014 iii THE DRAMA OF BIOTERROR: PARANOIA AND THE RHETORIC OF DEFENSE George Huston Gittinger, Ph. D. University of Pittsburgh, 2014 This study provides an account of how a rhetoric of bioterrorism developed and investigates its consequences. Currently, two competing ways of talking about bioterror, the skeptical and the paranoid, have been obscured because biosecurity researchers infrequently consider how particular historical and imagined events come to be defined as examples of bioterrorism. These rhetorical styles and their associated attitudes responded to a recurring problem in the history of biothreats – that there is rarely enough evidence to give clear accounts of the presence and origin of particular threats. As a result, conjectures become part of a unified history of bioterror, washing out the actual complexity of describing these rare events. -
Daubert V. Merrell Dow Pharmaceuticals, Inc. and the Need to Resurrect the Philosophical Insight of Frye V
Harvard Journal of Law & Technology Volume 10, Number 2 Winter 1997 A "DOGMA OF EMPIRICISM" REVISITED: DAUBERT V. MERRELL DOW PHARMACEUTICALS, INC. AND THE NEED TO RESURRECT THE PHILOSOPHICAL INSIGHT OF FRYE V. UNITED STATES Adina Schwartz" TABLEOF CONTENTS I. INTRODUCTION ..................................... 151 II. DAUBERT'SALTERNATIVE TO FRYE ..................... 156 III. A PHILOSOPHICAL CRITIQUE OF FALSIHABILH'Y ........... 165 A Popper's Project ................................ 165 B. Testability Is an Inadequate Logical Criterion ........ 168 I. Hempel's Critique ........................... 168 2. Facts Are TheorY-Laden ...................... 171 C. Testability Is an Inadequate Methodological Criterion.. 176 I. Basic Statements ............................. i77 2. The Prohibition ofAd Hocness ................. 179 3. The Distinction Between Scientific DiscoverY and Criticism .................................. 183 D. Practicing Scientists Are Not-- and Should Not Be w Falsificationists .................. 186 E. No Archimedean Standpoint Exists ................. 189 IV. IMPLICATIONS OF THE CRITIQUE OF DAUBER~ THE NEED TO RESURRECT AND REVAMP FRYE ............ 193 A. FrYe 's'Underlying Philosophical Insight. ,..... ...... 193 B. The Need for a Special Standard for the Admission of Scientific Evidence .............................. 196 C. The Need for a RevampedFrye Standard ............ 198 * AssociateProfessor, John Jay College of Criminal Justice and the Graduate School and University Center, City University of New York. Ph.D., The Rockefeller University, 1976; J.D.~ Yale Law School, 1985. A version of this paper was presented in The Provost's Lecture Series in Philosophy and Criminal Justice at John Jay College of Criminal Justice, December 5, 1995. I would like to thank those present for their comments and Tom Litwack for his written comments. 150 Harvard Journal of Law & Technology [Vol: 10 V. NECESSARY CONDITIONS FOR A REASONABLE JUDICIAL DETERMINATIONTHAT A THEORY OR TECHNIQUE Is SCIENTIFIC .......................................