Summary: Fnp-32806 Class Notes

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• Dilemmas in the relation between science and society

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• What are the important points in the Meffe aricle?

  Scientists need to be more involved in getting important points across to the public. It is not enough anymore to just let the public chose bits of infromation themselves. However scientists do not have the right training for the job. Serious education of the press, direct discussions with political leaders and funded scientific presences in national capitals is important (especially for connections, playing the rules of politics).

• What are the limits of knowledge?

  Scientific knowledge is not timely, accessible and understandable

  
  

  Evidence may be ambiguous, conflicting or otherwise difficult to translate to action

  
  

  Decision making is guided by different rationalities and concerns

• What are tornado politics?

  Consensus about what the problem is, ,what the goals are and how to go about finding solutions including the role of scientific knowledge.

  (What to do when a tornado is about to strike)

• What are the dilemmas of distance and engagement between science and society?

  They are dependent on one another. Scientific authority and political legitimacy depend on distance.

• What point does Lawton make in his article?

  That there is a real problem with the deficit (linear) model. Cooperations is needed to come with solutions,

  The process of influencing polity is messy, iterative and involves many players, differen belief and value systems, powerful invested interests and so on. Scientific bodies needed, with in depth analysis and can act as a knowledge brokers to help adress problems caused both by knowledge deficits and too much information.

• What does the pure scientist role entail?

  - Facts are delivered

  - Cherishes ideals of objective and value free science

  - stays away from societal considerations

  - not responsible for how knowledge is used

• What does the advocate role entail?

  - environmental researchers are willing to collaborate with environmental activists and engage in solving environmental problems

  - explicit reasoning from ís' to 'ought'

  - links knowledge claims to a preferred course of action

  - no problem in 'tornado' politics but..

  - in a controversy, they risk being labeled as advocates

• What are the pro's and con's of the advocate role?

  Pro's: use and scrutiny of science is guarenteed, open debate is created, transparency. Closing options by making choises is unavoidable and legitimate. Taking a stand can be legitimate and crucial for a functioning democracy.

  Con's: Ineffective, closure difficult to achieve, personal attacks, science loses credibility and authority.

• From defining science to science in practice

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• What do essentialists argue?

  For the possibility and analytic desirability of identifying unique, necessary and invariant qualities that set science apart from other cultural practices and products and explain its singular acheivements (valid and reliable claims about the external world).

• What is meant by boundry work?

  Drawing the boundry between science and non science by means of strategic rhetoric.

  Defining science as a social accomplishment.