Guest Post: Sculpting Science?
[A recent post on feathered dinosaurs has led to an interesting discussion on whether and how we might extend Ian Hacking's ideas about the historical ontology of human kinds to think more carefully about the material construction of natural kinds. I asked Caitlin Wylie, who is working on a PhD about fossil preparation at Cambridge HPS, if she had any thoughts on the matter. In addition to the photo above, she was kind enough to send the following along:]
I’m glad to find that we all share a conception of scientific objects as theory-laden, even for objects as different as “bones, blood, and brains”! But I wonder if ontology is the most interesting focus to have here. Does it really matter if a fossil preparator actuallyremoves – or creates, for that matter – what today’s paleontologists interpret as feather traces? That interpretation and the resulting knowledge claims (i.e., that dinosaurs had feathers) are more important, if you ask me.
As Lukas wrote, “There is a strong intuit…
I’m glad to find that we all share a conception of scientific objects as theory-laden, even for objects as different as “bones, blood, and brains”! But I wonder if ontology is the most interesting focus to have here. Does it really matter if a fossil preparator actuallyremoves – or creates, for that matter – what today’s paleontologists interpret as feather traces? That interpretation and the resulting knowledge claims (i.e., that dinosaurs had feathers) are more important, if you ask me.
As Lukas wrote, “There is a strong intuit…