Interests and Epistemic Integrity in Science (eBook)

A New Framework to Assess Interest Influences in Scientific Research Processes

Jan De Winter (Autor)

eBook Download: EPUB

2016
196 Seiten
Lexington Books (Verlag)
978-1-4985-2934-1 (ISBN)

Infos

This book aims to distinguish acceptable from unacceptable interest influences in science. Jan De Winter criticizes existing views on the integrity of science and the roles of financial, political, and other interests in science, and develops an alternative view to shed new light on cases from medical science, aerospace science, climate science, and biology.

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Scientific research is often influenced by financial interests, political interests, or personal career interests of the scientists involved. For instance, the pharmaceutical giant Merck manipulated clinical trial data in order to make sure that data confirmed the safety of one of its products, Vioxx, in order to serve the company's short-term commercial interests. This case is obviously unacceptable. But why exactly is it unacceptable? One way to account for this judgment is on the basis of the ideal of purity. According to this ideal, scientific decision-making should be pure- that is, unaffected by financial interests, political interests, career interests, and so on. Although this ideal is questionable, many people (including philosophers of science) still hold on to it. In Interests and Epistemic Integrity in Science: A New Framework to Assess Interest Influences in Scientific Research Processes, Jan De Winter first argues that it is better to fully abandon the ideal of purity, then proposes an alternative ideal to assess interest influences in science: the ideal of epistemic integrity. He spells out and systematically defends a new concept of epistemic integrity, using it not only to analyze the Vioxx debacle, but also to identify unacceptable interest influences in aerospace science, climate science, and biology, and to explain exactly why these interest influences are unacceptable. These analyses make a compelling case for the new concept of epistemic integrity which will be interesting and useful for philosophers of science, scientists, engineers, science policymakers, and anyone else concerned about the integrity of science.

Autor

Jan De Winter earned his PhD in philosophy from Ghent University, and currently teaches ethics to children and adolescents.

Inhalt

IntroductionPart 1 THE ROLES OF INTERESTS WITHIN SCIENTIFIC RESEARCHChapter 1: The Ideal of PurityChapter 2: Mechanistic Artifact ExplanationChapter 3: Explanations in Software EngineeringChapter 4: Interests and Explanation in the SciencesPart 2 EPISTEMIC INTEGRITYChapter 5: Developing a Concept of Epistemic IntegrityChapter 6: The Four Requirements of ExplicationChapter 7: The Space Shuttle ProgramChapter 8: Controversies concerning the IPCCChapter 9: Frans de Waal’s Work on Animal MoralityConclusionBibliography

Produkt-Details

• Erscheint lt. Verlag: 26.7.2016
• Zusatzinfo: 11 Illustrations including: - 5 Black & White Illustrations; - 6 Tables.
• Verlagsort: Lanham
• Sprache: englisch
• Themenwelt: Geisteswissenschaften ► Philosophie ► Allgemeines / Lexika
• Themenwelt: Geisteswissenschaften ► Philosophie ► Ethik
• Themenwelt: Naturwissenschaften ► Biologie
• Themenwelt: Sozialwissenschaften ► Soziologie
• Schlagworte: aerospace science • Applied Ethics • Biology • Climate Science • Conflict of Interest • Engineering Ethics • Epistemology • ethics • Medical Science • Merck • philosophy of science • Public Policy • Science Policy • scientific explanation • Vioxx
• ISBN-10: 1-4985-2934-8 / 1498529348
• ISBN-13: 978-1-4985-2934-1 / 9781498529341