ABSTRACT
It is possible to be against science in many ways. In this chapter I will present a view of science that is ‘against’ in the same way as it is possible to be against fox hunting or smoking. There is however another view, or more properly views, which regard science as a contingent social construction, no more privileged in its accounts of the world than (say) astrology or voodoo. In Bruno Latour’s words they aim ‘to abolish the distinction between science and fiction’ (Latour 1988: 166). I will argue that the first of these, (what I will call) the rejectionist view of science, is naïve and incoherent and the second view of science (what I will call social constructionist) is (mostly) in error. Nevertheless both positions do raise important issues around the question of the social and ethical basis of science, matters I will return to in chapter 6. Though many of the arguments ‘against’ and ‘for’ science are specifically aimed at the natural sciences they mostly would be equally applicable to the social sciences. However, some are specifically critical of the idea of social science as science and I will consider these particular criticisms in the next chapter.
