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Ideology, Rhetoric, and Boyle's New Experiments

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  26 September 2008

Henry Krips
Henry Krips
Affiliation:
Department of CommunicationUniversity of Pittsburgh
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Abstract

In this paper I show that in its original setting Boyle's New Experiments was not only rhetorical but also ideological. By employing a Lacanian theory of the subject, I show that this text not only disguised various “real contradictions“ in the fabric of Restoration society but also acted as a site for certain textual practices that played a role in the constitution of a new form of subjectivity for scientists. I also address the philosophical question of whether the ideological and rhetorical nature of scientific texts impugns the status of their theoretical claims as paradigms of knowledge and rational belief.

Type
Article
Information
Science in Context , Volume 7 , Issue 1 , Spring 1994 , pp. 53 - 64
Copyright
Copyright © Cambridge University Press 1994

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