tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1030220433025894048.post5258221651273353287..comments2023-11-03T08:02:25.369-04:00Comments on AmericanScience: A Team Blog: What-I-Will-Call-ics Anonymous: Some Current Trends in Science and, Especially, Technology StudiesDavid Roth Singermanhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/12841041983824755867noreply@blogger.comBlogger3125tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1030220433025894048.post-49460326673440496582014-04-03T22:57:09.184-04:002014-04-03T22:57:09.184-04:00Very cute boy what to see more cute boys then clic...Very cute boy what to see more cute boys then click on <a href="http://guruofmovie.blogspot.in/2014/03/angelina-jolie.html" rel="nofollow">http://guruofmovie.blogspot.in/</a><br><br />Sudheer Yadavhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/14336763195411670132noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1030220433025894048.post-34304935661900162552014-01-03T12:24:28.539-05:002014-01-03T12:24:28.539-05:00Lee — I think this is very well-put and an accurat...Lee — I think this is very well-put and an accurate observation, at least from my vantage point. I similarly have found that the new tools available have opened up entire new avenues of tackling problems, and that perhaps separate from that (but perhaps not unrelated) there is a new excitement in doing raw empirical work as opposed to getting lost in the thickets of theory (which has its value, to be sure, but at some point has diminishing returns when it becomes an end unto itself).<br /><br />Your search for explanations for this neo-empiricist turn is one part intellectual and one part about tools. Another possible mode of explanation to consider is the social context of the academic market for young scholars. Dave Kaiser's work on the ways in which the boom/bust cycles in the American physics profession, and its influence on the intellectual trends pursued by physicists, is the obvious example that comes to mind. Dave has done some work on how similar cycles have affected dissertation topics in the humanities as well, though I don't quite remember all of the conclusions I saw him present at a talk some time back. This market approach might also relate to the "generational" differences between scholars — our advisors got jobs in very different employment climates than we did. <br /><br />(Though talking about "advisors" as if they were one monolithic generation is not quite right — some of my advisors got their start in very theory-heavy climates, but some did not. In my own case there are two different "strata" of advisors, one who got their start in the late 1980s and another one 10-15 years later, and there is a big difference between the two.)<br /><br />Personally, from a more intellectual standpoint, I think one problem with an over-emphasis on theory is that it becomes very "cheap" — when theories-of-everything are everywhere then they become disposable and interchangeable. I have read plenty of great case studies that end with conclusions that are meant to be ridiculously far-reaching. I get that we all want our work to be broadly meaningful, but there's something silly about the idea that every case study is going to affect every other piece of scholarship from that point forward. It is hubris among other things. <br /><br />As a small aside, I love assigning Thomas Kuhn, *not* because he reflects what we do at all, but because he sucks undergraduates in. I'm not 100% sure why Kuhn is so good at this, but part of the reason seems to be that he is so half-baked. Kuhn has a way of making epistemology and history interesting to students, and I think half of it is that he really doesn't have a tight, well-formed argument. He's practically thinking out loud for half of the book, and there is a wonderfully wooly nature to his argument. The undergrads I have taught the book to love this aspect of him — they want to debate him, flesh out the ideas further, talk about the implications that he never seems to get around to. I think many of our more recent scholarship presents too much of an unassailable face to be a useful introduction for students who are not already sold on the program. Kuhn, on the other hand, opens up the door to many interesting questions, and from there one can lead them down the path that gets them into very different places (including realizing that Kuhn's approach is in fact very conservative, practically "internalist," and he is not much of an historian!). Kuhn is a great starting point, even if we all agree he's an unsatisfying end-point. Alex W.http://blog.nuclearsecrecy.comnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1030220433025894048.post-43917231535347300612014-01-02T10:09:48.329-05:002014-01-02T10:09:48.329-05:00Absorbing posts (I refer to this and the previous ...Absorbing posts (I refer to this and the previous one). I read them with pleasure.<br /><br />I look forward your book very much—in part (in small part) to learn how my account of the Hoover conferences was "inaccurate." (I'm quite sure there are deficiencies, and I hope to learn what they are.) I would also like to find out what "truths" I missed about participants in the conferences, as I was perfectly aware of (and emphasized) the conference participants' diversity, the bold character of Hoover's project, and the great size of the conference's "table."<br /><br />If I may, I wish to point out that I have never contended "that federal government failed to regulate the auto industry" in the 1920s, or anything of the kind. I wasn't interested in regulation of the industry, or in federal safety regulations. As for regulation of the vehicle, of course the conference's model state vehicle code did very successfully promote state regulation. And of course the model municipal traffic ordinance contributed substantially to state and local regulation of drivers and pedestrians. The Hoover conferences promoted substantial and extensive state and local regulations (though the character of regulations envisioned changed significantly from 1924 to 1927). Indeed the conference's model code and ordinance, by promoting the displacement of civil law with statute, is an indispensable component of the process of change the book proposes.<br /><br />Finally, I hope you'll indulge a polite objection. I have elsewhere (first in my dissertation, pp. 9-11) very emphatically disagreed with the retrospective application (chiefly by Eastman) of Nader's thesis (that industry exacerbated road hazards by favoring styling and horsepower over safety) to the 1920s. While the book doesn't make this disagreement explicit (this was cut in manuscript revision), the book's thesis is wholly at odds with Nader-Eastman. I disagree not because the Nader-Eastman thesis is wrong but because it doesn't make much sense in the 1920s, when the typical accident casualty was a pedestrian. By applying the Nader thesis to the 1920s, Eastman missed the outrage from pedestrians and concluded that 1920s Americans really didn't care very much about traffic safety—a position I of course disagree with in the strongest possible terms. So I certainly don't wish to be associated with another anachronistic misapplication of Nader's thesis.<br /><br />Keep up the fine work—I'm looking forward to getting acquainted with it!<br /><br />Anonymoushttps://www.blogger.com/profile/13709172323784100658noreply@blogger.com