The History of Scientific Practice

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Scientific theory has traditionally been the center of attention in the history, philosophy and sociology of science. It is, after all, these grand theoretical breakthroughs which have so radically reoriented our understanding of our world and which bring about scientific "revolutions." Indeed, philosophers argue that, logically speaking anyway, even unexpected and contradictory observations and experimental results can be accommodated with certain alterations to the accepted theory. Having said this, however, everyone recognizes that it is the practice of science--what scientists do from day to day in their active testing of nature--which really needs study. It is in practice, for example, that one gain understand how traditions are preserved or national "styles" developed. But it is this "practice" which is most hidden from view. Students are taught it, but not in text books. Scientific papers present results, not practice. Professor McCormmach's project, working with Dr. Christa Jungnickel, will investigate this most important yet least understood aspect of science in the context of a critical period in science's development, the period just before the development of scientific disciplines. His research will center on the work of the members of the Royal Society in the 18th century and will be made possible by the society's own extensive archival records and rich collections of manuscripts of its members. Because the study uses broadly defined categories of scientific practice as its tool of analysis, the work draws extensively on the working lives of scientists, which are accessible to us through these manuscripts and correspondences. This study has the purpose of placing scientific practice and its results within the context of London, of British intellectual, social and economic life. By doing so, it exposes connections and parallels between 18th century British science and its context that were important for the development of British science.