Sociology of Science

Abstract

Sociology of science deals with the social conditions and effects of science, and with the social structures and processes of scientific activity. Science is a cultural tradi­ tion, preserved and transmitted from generation to generation partly because it is valued in its own right, and partly because of its wide technological applications. Its most distinguishing characteristic is that the primary purpose of its cultivators, the scientists, is to change the tradition through discoveries. This bears some simi­ larity to the purpose of modern artists and writers. But innovations in art and literature are accompanied by dissension and conflict, because there are no explicit criteria and accepted procedures to determine whether an innovation is an improve­ ment or deterioration of existing tradition. Although scientific criteria and proce­ dures are neither perfectly unequivocal nor entirely stable, they are still far superior to criteria used in the evaluation of other cultural products. The relatively objective, consensual evaluation of discoveries makes science an extreme case of institutionally regulated cultural change. Sociologists of science have concentrated on this characteristic of science as a tradition and as an institution. The questions they deal with are: How did this unique tradition of modern science emerge and become institutionalized? How is it maintained and controlled? How is research organized? What determines changes in scientific organization, and how are these changes related to research? These are wide-ranging problems, difficult to delimit. Our task of setting limits to this survey has been further complicated by the fact that the sociology of science, as of other cultural fields, is the common interest of several different disciplines. In our selection we concentrate on issues in which important work has been done during the last five years, but we also include earlier work to the extent that this is necessary as background for current developments. Relevant work done by non­ sociologists is included more or less on the same basis as that of sociologists.

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