Talk:Bruno Latour

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Is Bruno Latour from a wealthy or privileged background? I would like to know for one) to have some context of his opinion and 2) discern and use information about his to develop a further sense of who, how and why certain people contribute to the human debate and who, how and why others do not, or maybe do it differently. In either case, knowing his personal background and upbringing explains whether he is educated, how well, how much idol time he might have had to think when growing up (unless us middle class folks who had to work, learn, think and repeat the cycle), etc. Is he from the Latour estate wine family? Is he part of the aristocracy? Is he an exception, that has arisen out of poverty?

Stevenmitchell 03:21, 11 April 2006 (UTC)

what inference could you make from that information? --Buridan 12:07, 11 April 2006 (UTC)

Sokal and Bricmont

RE: "their critics were most particularly directed against the concept of Strong Programme". I do not believe that Sokal's criticism was directed at the 'strong programme'. At no point does he or Bricmont refer to Barry Barnes, David Bloor or John Henry, or anything else that derives from the Edinburgh school of Science and Technology Studies. A closer reading of Sokal would show that he is actually critical of relativism, nominalism, constructivism, and in particular postmodernism - therefore not the 'strong programme'. If anybody would like to disagree with this I am happy to discuss the matter further when i have the time. --CJ 12:47, 26 Apr 2005 (UTC)

I agree. Sokals attack is on postmodernism, literary theory and cultural studies. Though, much of the following debate is within science studies. A very interesting debate actually. Christopher Kullenberg 20:20, 23 October 2005 (UTC)

Right. The authors of SSK (Bloor, Barnes,..) are as much positivists as Sokal : to them Science tells something about the world, which is not the case of Latour : To him scientists represent Nature. Sokal has quite weak criticisms (in fact he doesn't understand latour's point at all), but the debate between Bloor and Latour is truely great ("Anti-Latour" by Bloor, "For David Bloor and Beyond" by Latour, "A Reply To Bruno Latour" by Bloor).

After Re-reading, this page is totally wrong : Pasteurization of France is everything BUT a biography of Pasteur! In the whole first part Latour describes "what and who made and translated Pasteur" to avoid giving the first place to somzthing like "the genius of Pasteur", "or the ideas of Pasteur" which he considers as nonsense. Latour has a very complex reflexion : it's not society that "explain" sciences nor the opposite. They're both simultenaously constructed : The discovery of microbs IS a sociological idea and construction.

You are right. The Pasteurization of France needs to be rewritten. I havent read it though, but it is on my "to-read-list". You are absolutely right about Pasteur and the microbes. I added the section "Science in Action" since I am reading the book right now. It will be completed as I go along reading. Since I am not a native english speaker, I would be happy if someone looked over the spelling. Christopher Kullenberg 15:53, 24 October 2005 (UTC)

In response to the above, Sokal and Bricmont do explicitly attack the strong programme at some length, in particular in their "Science and Sociology of Science: Beyond War and Peace" in The One Culture?: A Conversation about Science (University of Chicago Press, 2001) (PDF). --Delirium 22:39, 20 January 2007 (UTC)

[edit] Reference

Regarding the reference:

Latour Bruno 1992. "Where are the Missing Masses? The Sociology of a Few Mundane Artifacts." Pp. 225-258 in Shaping Technology/Building Society: Studies in Sociotechnical Change, edited by W. E. & Law Bijker, J. Cambridge: MIT Press.

Shouldn't the authors of the volume be W.E. Bijker & J. Law? Wijnand

Correct, well noticed Wijnand. When you observe such glaring mistakes you should be bold and make the necessary changes.--Nicholas 13:20, 9 November 2005 (UTC)

I am not sure about that. Making a reference to an article in a book that contains several articles one should make the reference to the authors and not the editors. But I guess that varies along different systems and practices... [[[User:Christopher.kullenberg|Christopher Kullenberg]] 21:42, 12 November 2005 (UTC)]

Of course, the author was indeed referenced. The problem identified by Wijnand, as I understood it, was that the editors had been referenced wrongly. For some reason, it said "W.E. & Law Bijker, J." ..... which makes no sense, it should havesaid: "W.E. Bijker & J. Law". --Nicholas 15:28, 22 November 2005 (UTC)

True, my mistake. I did not read properly but misunderstood [[[User:Christopher.kullenberg|Christopher Kullenberg]]]

[edit] This page needs a lot of work

I was a bit dismayed to come across this page and see Latour described as a "social constructionist" in the first paragraph; I believe this is misleading, and it ignores the pains Latour has taken to distinguish his form of "constructionism" from a "social" constructionism. Tonight I only had time to make a change to the first paragraph, but I believe many more changes are needed. At this point, the article fails to take into account recent developments in Latour's thought, best reflected in _Pandora's Hope_, _The Politics of Nature_, and _Reassembling the Social_. —The preceding unsigned comment was added by Holi0023 (talk • contribs).

Yes, I think this page is somewhat misleading as it stands, though I'm sufficiently knowledgeable to change it. Latour doesn't, currently at least, promote the view that science is wholly socially constructed, and David Bloor for one has attacked Latour for allowing for an influence from the natural world into the sociology of scientific knowledge. It might be fairly said that he used be either a social cosntructionist or at least something very similar prior to the 1990s. --Delirium 22:33, 20 January 2007 (UTC)