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John Dupré
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Journal Articles
Publisher: Journals Gateway
Perspectives on Science (2012) 20 (3): 310–319.
Published: 01 September 2012
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These comments generally applaud Kourany's project: if, as a growing number accept, one vital perspective on science is as a social practice, then it must surely be a central task of philosophy of science to evaluate this practice and consider how it should be carried out for the greatest social good. Kourany's book considers this task and offers interesting ideas about what this implies for science and for philosophy of science, while also relating this to the more familiar epistemological perspective on science. Some points where further work is needed are suggested, including the nature of value-ladenness in the epistemic content of science, the specific role of feminism in relation to a range of other critical standpoints on science, the appropriate treatment of values strongly opposed to those that Kourany advocates, and the diversity of roles that philosophy of science might expect to play in addressing the social nature of science.
Journal Articles
Publisher: Journals Gateway
Perspectives on Science (2004) 12 (3): 320–338.
Published: 01 September 2004
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Recent molecular biology has seen the development of genomics as a successor to traditional genetics. This paper offers an overview of the structure, epistemology, and (very briefly) history of contemporary genomics. A particular focus is on the question to what extent the genome contains, or is composed of anything that corresponds to traditional conceptions of genes. It is concluded that the only interpretation of genes that has much contemporary scientific relevance is what is described as the “developmental defect” gene concept. However, developmental defect genes typically only correspond to general areas of the genome and not to precise chemical structures (nucleotide sequences). The parts of the genome to be identified for an account of the processes of normal development are highly diverse, little correlated with traditional genes, and act in ways that are highly dependent on the cellular and higher level environment. Despite its historical development out of genetics, genomics represents a radically different kind of scientific project.