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CFP: Cosmos + Taxis

The interdisciplinary journal Cosmos + Taxis is issuing a call for papers for its second conference on spontaneous orders, to be held at the Rochester Institute of Technology from May 8 to May 9, 2015. Both days will feature morning and afternoon sessions and informal lunches and dinners. The theme of the conference is “Spontaneous…

Kuhn’s Evolutionary Social Epistemology

Here’s a review of K. Brad Wray’s Kuhn’s Evolutionary Social Epistemology. (Wray, by the way, has been a strong contributor to EPISTEME). It’s also worth checking out Alexander Bird’s entry on Kuhn for Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy. Kuhn is one of those thinkers whose work has been tarnished by academics who need an off-the-peg philosophical outlook…

Shapin on Polanyi

Shapin’s London Review of Books review of Michael Polanyi and His Generation: Origins of the Social Construction of Science by Mary Jo Nye. (Both Hayek and Oakeshott are mentioned by Shapin). Michael Polanyi lives on in the footnotes. If you want to invoke the idea of ‘tacit knowledge’, Polanyi is your reference of choice. You’ll probably…

Paradoxical Roots of “Social Construction”

David Kaiser reviews Michael Polanyi and His Generation: Origins of the Social Construction of Science by Mary Jo Nye. Fifteen years ago, scientists, historians, and sociologists traded salvos in what was termed the “science wars.” Passions ran high; “social construction of science” became a battle cry. Critics like physicist Alan Sokal pointed an accusing finger at…