Hostname: page-component-586b7cd67f-tf8b9 Total loading time: 0 Render date: 2024-12-02T23:29:13.576Z Has data issue: false hasContentIssue false
  • English
  • Français

Values in Science: The Case of Scientific Collaboration

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  01 January 2022

Kristina Rolin
Get access Rights & Permissions [Opens in a new window]

Abstract

Much of the literature on values in science is limited in its perspective because it focuses on the role of values in individual scientists’ decision making, thereby ignoring the context of scientific collaboration. I examine the epistemic structure of scientific collaboration and argue that it gives rise to two arguments showing that moral and social values can legitimately play a role in scientists’ decision to accept something as scientific knowledge. In the case of scientific collaboration some moral and social values are properly understood to be extrinsic epistemic values, that is, values that promote the attainment of scientific knowledge.

Type
Research Article
Information
Philosophy of Science , Volume 82 , Issue 2 , April 2015 , pp. 157 - 177
Copyright
Copyright © The Philosophy of Science Association

Access options

Get access to the full version of this content by using one of the access options below. (Log in options will check for institutional or personal access. Content may require purchase if you do not have access.)

Footnotes

†

I am grateful to Kevin Elliott, Brad Wray, and the reviewers for Philosophy of Science for their helpful comments on earlier versions of the manuscript. I also wish to thank the audiences at the Society for Philosophy of Science in Practice meeting in Toronto and the workshop “The Role of Values in Social Inquiry” in Copenhagen in 2013. This research has been made possible by funding from the Academy of Finland Centre of Excellence in the Philosophy of the Social Sciences at the University of Helsinki.

References

Andersen, Hanne. 2010. “Joint Acceptance and Scientific Change: A Case Study.” Episteme 7 (3): 248–65.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Andersen, Hanne, and Wagenknecht, Susann. 2013. “Epistemic Dependence in Interdisciplinary Groups.” Synthese 190 (11): 1881–98.10.1007/s11229-012-0172-1CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Anderson, Elizabeth. 1995. “Knowledge, Human Interests, and Objectivity in Feminist Epistemology.” Philosophical Topics 23:7–58.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Anderson, Elizabeth 2004. “Uses of Value Judgments in Science: A General Argument, with Lessons from a Case Study of Feminist Research on Divorce.” Hypatia 19 (1): 1–24.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Anderson, Elizabeth 2011. “Democracy, Public Policy, and Lay Assessment of Scientific Testimony.” Episteme 8 (2): 144–64.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Beatty, John. 2006. “Masking Disagreement among Experts.” Episteme 3 (1–2): 52–67.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Biddle, Justin. 2013. “State of the Field: Transient Underdetermination and Values in Science.” Studies in History and Philosophy of Science 44:124–33.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Bouvier, Alban. 2004. “Individual Beliefs and Collective Beliefs in Science and Philosophy: The Plural Subject and the Polyphonic Subject Accounts.” Philosophy of the Social Sciences 34 (3): 382–407.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Brown, James R. 2010. “One-Shot Science.” In The Commodification of Academic Research: Science and the Modern University, ed. Radder, Hans, 90–109. Pittsburgh: University of Pittsburgh Press.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Brown, Matthew. 2013. “Values in Science beyond Underdetermination and Inductive Risk.” Philosophy of Science 80 (5): 829–39.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Carrier, Martin, Howard, Don, and Kourany, Janet, eds. 2008. The Challenge of the Social and the Pressure of Practice: Science and Values Revisited. Pittsburgh: University of Pittsburgh Press.10.2307/j.ctt9qh7nhCrossRefGoogle Scholar
Cheon, Hyundeuk. 2014. “In What Sense Is Scientific Knowledge Collective Knowledge?” Philosophy of the Social Sciences 44 (4): 407–23.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Clough, Sharyn. 2011. “Gender and the Hygiene Hypothesis.” Social Science and Medicine 72:486–93.CrossRefGoogle ScholarPubMed
Crasnow, Sharon. 2014. “Feminist Science Studies: Reasoning from Cases.” Paper presented at the FEMMSS conference at the University of Waterloo, August 10–13.Google Scholar
de Melo-Martín, Inmaculada, and Intemann, Kristen. 2012. “Interpreting Evidence: Why Values Can Matter as Much as Science.” Perspectives in Biology and Medicine 55 (1): 59–70.CrossRefGoogle ScholarPubMed
de Ridder, Jeroen. 2013. “Epistemic Dependence and Collective Scientific Knowledge.” Synthese 191:37–53.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Douglas, Heather. 2000. “Inductive Risk and Values in Science.” Philosophy of Science 67:559–79.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Douglas, Heather 2007. “Rejecting the Ideal of Value-Free Science.” In Kincaid et al. 2007, 120–39.Google Scholar
Douglas, Heather 2009. Science, Policy, and the Value-Free Ideal. Pittsburgh: University of Pittsburgh Press.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Douglas, Heather 2013. “The Value of Cognitive Values.” Philosophy of Science 80 (5): 796–806.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Elliott, Kevin. 2011. “Direct and Indirect Roles for Values in Science.” Philosophy of Science 78 (2): 303–24.10.1086/659222CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Elliott, Kevin 2013. “Douglas on Values: From Indirect Roles to Multiple Goals.” Studies in History and Philosophy of Science 44:375–83.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Elliott, Kevin, and McKaughan, Daniel. 2014. “Nonepistemic Values and the Multiple Goals of Science.” Philosophy of Science 81 (1): 1–21.10.1086/674345CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Elliott, Kevin, and Willmes, David. 2013. “Cognitive Attitudes and Values in Science.” Philosophy of Science 80 (5): 807–17.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Fagan, Melinda. 2011. “Is There Collective Scientific Knowledge? Arguments from Explanation.” Philosophical Quarterly 61 (243): 247–69.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Fagan, Melinda 2012. “Collective Scientific Knowledge.” Philosophy Compass 7 (12): 821–31.10.1111/j.1747-9991.2012.00528.xCrossRefGoogle Scholar
Fallis, Don. 2006. “The Epistemic Costs and Benefits of Collaboration.” Southern Journal of Philosophy 44 (Supplement): 197–208.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Fehr, Carla. 2011. “What Is in It for Me? The Benefits of Diversity in Scientific Communities.” In Feminist Epistemology and Philosophy of Science: Power in Knowledge, ed. Grasswick, Heidi, 133–55. Dordrecht: Springer.Google Scholar
Frost-Arnold, Karen. 2013. “Moral Trust and Scientific Collaboration.” Studies in History and Philosophy of Science 44:301–10.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Galison, Peter. 2003. “The Collective Author.” In Scientific Authorship: Credit and Intellectual Property in Science, ed. Biagioli, Mario and Galison, Peter, 325–55. London: Routledge.Google Scholar
Gilbert, Margaret. 2000. “Collective Belief and Scientific Change.” In Sociality and Responsibility: New Essays on Plural Subject Theory, 37–49. Lanham, MD: Rowman & Littlefield.Google Scholar
Goldman, Alvin I. 2004. “Group Knowledge versus Group Rationality: Two Approaches to Social Epistemology.” Episteme 1 (1): 11–22.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Grasswick, Heidi. 2010. “Scientific and Lay Communities: Earning Epistemic Trust through Knowledge Sharing.” Synthese 177:387–409.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Häkli, Raul. 2006. “Group Beliefs and the Distinction between Belief and Acceptance.” Cognitive Systems Research 7:286–97.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Hardwig, John. 1991. “The Role of Trust in Knowledge.” Journal of Philosophy 88 (12): 693–708.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Hawthorne, Susan. 2010. “Embedding Values: How Science and Society Jointly Valence a Concept—the Case of ADHD.” Studies in History and Philosophy of Biological and Biomedical Sciences 41:21–31.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Hempel, Carl. 1981. “Turns in the Evolution of the Problem of Induction.” Synthese 46:389–404.10.1007/BF01130050CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Intemann, Kristen. 2001. “Science and Values: Are Value Judgments Always Irrelevant to the Justification of Scientific Claims?” Philosophy of Science 68 (Proceedings): S506–S518.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Intemann, Kristen 2005. “Feminism, Underdetermination, and Values in Science.” Philosophy of Science 72 (5): 1001–12.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Intemann, Kristen 2011. “Diversity and Dissent in Science: Does Democracy Always Serve Feminist Aims?” In Feminist Epistemology and Philosophy of Science: Power in Knowledge, ed. Grasswick, Heidi, 111–32. Dordrecht: Springer.Google Scholar
Jeffrey, Richard. 1956. “Valuation and Acceptance of Scientific Hypotheses.” Philosophy of Science 23 (3): 237–46.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Kincaid, Harold, Dupré, John, and Wylie, Alison, eds. 2007. Value-Free Science? Ideals and Illusions. New York: Oxford University Press.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Kitcher, Philip. 1993. The Advancement of Science: Science without Legend, Objectivity without Illusions. New York: Oxford University Press.Google Scholar
Kitcher, Philip 2001. Science, Truth, and Democracy. New York: Oxford University Press.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Kitcher, Philip 2011. Science in a Democratic Society. New York: Prometheus.Google Scholar
Kourany, Janet. 2010. Philosophy of Science after Feminism. Oxford: Oxford University Press.10.1093/acprof:oso/9780199732623.001.0001CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Kuhn, Thomas. 1977. “Objectivity, Value Judgment, and Theory Choice.” In The Essential Tension: Selected Studies in Scientific Tradition and Change, 320–39. Chicago: University of Chicago Press.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Kusch, Martin. 2002. Knowledge by Agreement. Oxford: Oxford University Press.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Lacey, Hugh. 1999. Is Science Value Free? Values and Scientific Understanding. London: Routledge.Google Scholar
Lacey, Hugh 2005. “On the Interplay of the Cognitive and the Social in Scientific Practices.” Philosophy of Science 72 (5): 977–88.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
List, Christian, and Pettit, Philip. 2011. Group Agency: The Possibility, Design, and Status of Corporate Agents. Oxford: Oxford University Press.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Longino, Helen. 1990. Science as Social Knowledge. Princeton, NJ: Princeton University Press.10.1515/9780691209753CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Longino, Helen 1995. “Gender, Politics, and the Theoretical Virtues.” Synthese 104 (3): 383–97.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Longino, Helen 2002. The Fate of Knowledge. Princeton, NJ: Princeton University Press.10.1515/9780691187013CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Machamer, Peter, and Wolters, Gereon, eds. 2004. Science, Values, and Objectivity. Pittsburgh: University of Pittsburgh Press.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Magnus, P. D. 2013. “What Scientists Know Is Not a Function of What Scientists Know.” Philosophy of Science 80 (5): 840–49.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Mathiesen, Kay. 2006. “The Epistemic Features of Group Belief.” Episteme 2 (3): 161–75.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
McMullin, Ernan. 1983. “Values in Science.” In PSA 1982: Proceedings of the 1982 Biennial Meeting of the Philosophy of Science Association, Vol. 2, ed. Peter D. Asquith and Thomas Nickels, 3–28. East Lansing, MI: Philosophy of Science Association.Google Scholar
Mitchell, Sandra. 2004. “The Prescribed and Proscribed Values in Science Policy.” In Machamer and Wolters 2004, 245–55.Google Scholar
Pettit, Philip. 2003. “Groups with Minds of Their Own.” In Socializing Metaphysics: The Nature of Social Reality, ed. Schmitt, Frederick, 167–93. Lanham, MD: Rowman & Littlefield.Google Scholar
Richardson, Sarah. 2010. “Feminist Philosophy of Science: History, Contributions and Challenges.” Synthese 177:337–62.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Rolin, Kristina. 2002. “Gender and Trust in Science.” Hypatia 17 (4): 95–118.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Rolin, Kristina 2010. “Group Justification in Science.” Episteme 7 (3): 215–31.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Rolin, Kristina 2011. “Diversity and Dissent in the Social Sciences: The Case of Organization Studies.” Philosophy of the Social Sciences 41 (4): 470–94.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Rooney, Phyllis. 1992. “On Values in Science: Is the Epistemic/Non-epistemic Distinction Useful?” In PSA 1992: Proceedings of the 1992 Biennial Meeting of the Philosophy of Science Association, Vol. 1, ed. David Hull, Micky Forbes, and Kathleen Okruhlik, 13–22. East Lansing, MI: Philosophy of Science Association.Google Scholar
Root, Michael. 1993. Philosophy of Social Science: The Methods, Ideals, and Politics of Social Inquiry. Oxford: Blackwell.Google Scholar
Rudner, Richard. 1953. “The Scientist qua Scientist Makes Value Judgments.” Philosophy of Science 20 (1): 1–6.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Solomon, Miriam. 2001. Social Empiricism. Cambridge, MA: MIT Press.10.7551/mitpress/6296.001.0001CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Solomon, Miriam 2006. “Groupthink vs. the Wisdom of the Crowds: The Social Epistemology of Deliberation and Dissent.” Southern Journal of Philosophy 44 (Supplement): 28–42.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Staley, Kent. 2007. “Evidential Collaborations: Epistemic and Pragmatic Considerations in ‘Group Belief.’” Social Epistemology 21 (3): 321–35.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Steel, Daniel. 2010. “Epistemic Values and the Argument from Inductive Risk.” Philosophy of Science 77 (1): 14–34.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Steel, Daniel 2013. “Acceptance, Values, and Inductive Risk.” Philosophy of Science 80 (5): 818–28.10.1086/673936CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Thagard, Paul. 1999. How Scientists Explain Disease. Princeton, NJ: Princeton University Press.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Thagard, Paul 2010. “Explaining Economic Crises: Are There Collective Representations?” Episteme 7 (3): 266–83.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Tollefsen, Deborah. 2006. “Group Deliberation, Social Cohesion, and Scientific Teamwork: Is There Room for Dissent?” Episteme 3 (1–2): 37–51.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Wagenknecht, Susann. 2013. “Collaboration in Scientific Practice: A Social Epistemology of Research Groups.” PhD diss., Aarhus University.Google Scholar
Wagenknecht, Susann 2014. “Facing the Incompleteness of Epistemic Trust: Managing Dependence in Scientific Practice.” Social Epistemology. doi:10.1080/02691728.2013.794872.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Wilholt, Thorsten. 2009. “Bias and Values in Scientific Research.” Studies in History and Philosophy of Science 40:92–101.10.1016/j.shpsa.2008.12.005CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Wilholt, Thorsten 2013. “Epistemic Trust in Science.” British Journal for Philosophy of Science 64:233–53.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Wray, K. Brad. 2001. “Collective Belief and Acceptance.” Synthese 129:319–33.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Wray, K. Brad 2002. “The Epistemic Significance of Collaborative Research.” Philosophy of Science 6 (1): 150–68.Google Scholar
Wray, K. Brad 2006. “Scientific Authorship in the Age of Collaborative Research.” Studies in History and Philosophy of Science 37:505–14.Google Scholar
Wray, K. Brad 2007a. “Evaluating Scientists: Examining the Effects of Sexism and Nepotism.” In Kincaid et al. 2007, 87–106.Google Scholar
Wray, K. Brad 2007b. “Who Has Scientific Knowledge?” Social Epistemology 21 (3): 337–47.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Wray, K. Brad 2014. “Collaborative Research, Deliberation, and Innovation.” Episteme 11 (3): 291–303.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Wylie, Alison. 2006. “Socially Naturalized Norms of Epistemic Rationality: Aggregation and Deliberation.” Southern Journal of Philosophy 44 (Supplement): 43–48.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Zollman, Kevin. 2010. “The Epistemic Benefits of Transient Diversity.” Erkenntnis 72:17–35.CrossRefGoogle Scholar