Science and the ‘Neolithic Paradox’

Kuznets S. , Modern economic growth (New Haven, 1966), 9; Habermas J. , Toward a rational society (London, 1971), 81; Green V. H. H. , Luther and the Reformation (Mentor edn, London, 1964), 16; Cantor N. F. , Medieval history (New York, 1969), xxi. Green's other book cited is Renaissance and Reformation (London, 1964).

Popper K. R. , The logic of scientific discovery (London, 1959), 39.

On man as homo faber, as opposed to homo sapiens, see Sorge A. and Hartmann G. , “Technology and labour markets”, International Institute of Management Discussion Paper 80–39 (Berlin, 1980); Sorge A. , “Cultured organization”, IIM Paper 80–9 (Berlin, 1980); Sorge A. and Fores M. , “The fifth discontinuity”, IIM Discussion Paper 79–84 (Berlin, 1979); Fores M. , “Homo faber and the American disease”, Cambridge review, ciii (1982), 241–7.

Bloor D. , Knowledge and social imagery (London, 1976), 141.

Collingwood R. G. , The idea of history (paperback edn, Oxford, 1946), 269.

Lévi-Strauss C. , The savage mind (Chicago, 1966), 13, 15.

ibid., ch. 2.

Popper , op. cit. (ref. 2), 38.

The English-language construct ‘technology’ is criticized more fully in Fores M. , “Technik: Or Mumford reconsidered”, History of technology, vi (1981), 121–37, and “Technical change and the ‘Technology’ myth”, Scandinavian economic history review, xxx (1982), 167–88.

Butterfield H. , The origins of modern science 1300–1800 (London, 1949), viii.

Plumb J. H. , The Penguin book of the Renaissance (Harmondsworth, 1964), 12.

Rose H. and Rose S. , Science and society (London, 1969), 1–2.

Singer C. , A short history of scientific ideas (Oxford, 1959), 1–2. In another book on ‘science’, Singer defines it in a similar way: From magic to science (London, 1928), 60 (author's stress).

Hall A. R. , The scientific revolution 1500–1800 (London, 1954), xi; Sarton G. , A history of science: Ancient science through the Golden Age of Greece (London, 1953), 16.

Butterfield , op. cit. (ref. 10), 143, 68.

Dampier C. Sir , A history of science (Cambridge, 1966), i, vii, xiii.

Ibid ., xxiii–xxvii; Singer , A short history, op. cit. (ref. 13), 3; Taton R. (ed.), A general history of the sciences (London, 1963), i, 1–10.

This idea of Science I is discussed among four meanings of ‘science’ in Fores M. , “Francis Bacon and the myth of industrial science”, History of technology, vii (1982), 59–63. The utility of the ‘applied science’ idea is discussed in Fores, “Technical change”, op. cit. (ref. 9), 179–83.

Hesse M. , Revolutions and reconstructions in the philosophy of science (Brighton, 1980), xv, 29.

Bernal J. D. , Science in history (London, 1969), i, 30; Ziman J. M. , Public knowledge (Cambridge, 1968), 1–9; Polanyi M. , Personal knowledge (London, 1958), vii, 60 (author's stress).

Ravetz J. R. , Scientific knowledge and its social problems (Oxford, 1971), 3, 20. The chapter is in Spiegel-Rösing I. and de S. Price D. (eds), Science, technology and society (London, 1977), 71–89.

Popper , op. cit. (ref. 2), 34–39.

E.g. Kuhn T. S. , The structure of scientific revolutions (Chicago, 1970), 1, 10. The author discusses here “examples of actual scientific practice … [which] provide models from which spring particular coherent traditions of scientific research” (ibid., 10).

Gaston J. (ed.), The sociology of science (San Francisco, 1978), 2.

Popper , op. cit. (ref. 2), 40–41 (author's stress).

ibid., 34, 40, 54, 93; Popper K. R. , Objective knowledge (Oxford, 1979), 29.

On the general confusion which surrounds calling some human activity ‘practical’ and some not, see Fores , “Francis Bacon”, op. cit. (ref. 18), 71–73.

Merton R. K. , The sociology of science (Chicago, 1973), 270; Kuhn , op. cit. (ref. 23), 10. Merton's propositions are discussed under the heading, “The normative structure of science”.

Kuhn , op. cit. (ref. 23), 1, 2.

Barnes B. , Scientific knowledge and sociological theory (London, 1974), 5, 7, 10.

ibid., 45.

Bernal , op. cit. (ref. 20), i, 39; Popper , Objective knowledge, op. cit. (ref. 26), 27, 81. The other usages are quoted in the text of Section 2 above.

Heimann P. M. , “The scientific revolutions”, in Burke P. (ed.), The new Cambridge modern history , xiii (Cambridge, 1979), 248; Toulmin S. , The philosophy of science (London, 1953), 44; Polanyi , op. cit. (ref. 20), vii, 17, 63; Taton , op. cit. (ref. 17), ii, 11–174. The other usages are in the text above.

Bacon F. , Novum Organum (London, 1620), Book I, aphorism 74. For amplification on this, see Fores , “Francis Bacon”, op. cit. (ref. 18), 63–67.

Bacon , op. cit. (ref. 34), Book I, aphorism 49. See also quotation at Section 4 below.

ibid., Book I, aphorisms 11, 12.

“The human understanding is active and cannot halt or rest, but even, though without effect, still presses forward”, ibid., Book I, aphorism 48.

Lévi-Strauss , op. cit. (ref. 6), 10.

The sacredness of ‘industrial science’ is examined in Fores, “Francis Bacon”, op. cit. (ref. 18), 59–63; that of ‘applied science’ in Fores, “Technical change”, op. cit. (ref. 9), 179–83.

The use of Science II can be criticized on the restricted issue that, because Science I is presumed to be a ‘rational’ account, the Science I/Science II crossover has led to the misleading assumption that scientists are ipso facto distinctively rational actors. Fores , “Technik”, op. cit. (ref. 9), 130–4.

Lévi-Strauss , op. cit. (ref. 6), 13–15.

The idea of the practice of ‘technology’ having become ‘scientific’ at some stage is criticized in Fores, “Technical change”, op. cit. (ref. 9), 180.

This issue is expanded in Sorge and Fores , op. cit. (ref. 3).

E.g. Koestler A. , The act, of creation (London, 1964), where Gutenberg's printing press is bizarrely discussed as a ‘scientific discovery’.

This is the case for the so-called ‘management’ as well. Fores M. and Sorge A. , “The decline of the management ethic”, Journal of general management, vi, no. 3 (1981), 36–50.

Lévi-Strauss , op. cit. (ref. 6), 16–18.

ibid., 19.

ibid., 15, 21–22.

On the key role of design in technical work, see Fores M. , “Technical change and human skill”, IIM Discussion Paper 79–88 (Berlin, 1979).

Collingwood , op. cit. (ref. 5), 41–42.

Lévi-Strauss , op. cit. (ref. 6), 21–22.

Whitehead A. N. , Science and the Modern World (Cambridge, 1926; Fontana edn), 14.

Lévi-Strauss , op. cit. (ref. 6), 15.

In everyday speech a ‘revolution’ might take a few weeks only. A further complication is due to the fact that the condition of ‘modernity’ can be recognized by the emergence, in the eighteenth century, of a new, ‘revolutionized’ meaning of the word ‘revolution’ which is broadly the opposite of the old meaning. Fores , “Homo faber”, op. cit. (ref. 3), 244.

Bacon , op. cit. (ref. 34), Book I, aphorism 49.

Fores , “Technical change”, op. cit. (ref. 9), 168.

Merton , op. cit. (ref. 28), 270. This theme was first put forward in 1942.

The Pocket Oxford English Dictionary.

See also Fores , “Technik”, op. cit. (ref. 9), 132–3, and the thesis set out at ref. 40 above.

Fores , “Francis Bacon”, op. cit. (ref. 18), 69–71; Sorge and Fores , op. cit. (ref. 3), 22–30. In the last-named passage, man is discussed as a distinctively-skilful animal in circumstances where it is unclear what such skill consists of.