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A service, rather than a threat, to the credibility of science
Author(s) -
Penders Bart,
Goven Joanna
Publication year - 2013
Publication title -
embo reports
Language(s) - English
Resource type - Journals
SCImago Journal Rank - 4.584
H-Index - 184
eISSN - 1469-3178
pISSN - 1469-221X
DOI - 10.1038/embor.2012.206
Subject(s) - credibility , politics , postmodernism , political science , public health , sociology , law , medicine , epistemology , nursing , philosophy
Marcel Kuntz argues that the credibility of science is under threat from postmodern thought and the field of science studies in particular [1]. However, we do not think even Kuntz could really accept his representation of science as a monolithic monopoly of truth, and his misrepresentation of science studies muddies the waters rather than clarifies them.Kuntz writes that “[t]he rational, scientific view of the world has been painstakingly built over millennia to guarantee that research can have access to objective reality.” By using the word ‘guarantee’, he ignores the provisional character of scientific research. He ignores the fact that scientists have been wrong in the past and will be wrong in the future. His claim that “there is only one science, as defined by the application of the scientific method in an objective and unbiased manner” seems to ignore the diversity and variability in scientific practice and infrastructure—a key strength of science. It also ignores scientific disagreements and the failure to replicate many scientific findings [2]. …