ABSTRACT
The discovery of artifacts in archeology sometimes occasions debate over how given material objects are distinguishable from mere stones, pieces of wood or bone, which occur independent of any prior human construction. Two general rubrics that appeared in lab members' accounts of their practices and which alluded to "negative" artifactuality were "superstitions" and "failures." Numerous examples of such recognitional troubles are cited in natural scientific writings as instructional warnings, historical descriptions of the "errors" of early scientists, and as arguments against the acceptance of particular announced discoveries by contending researchers. Microglia were featured in the lab's account of axon sprouting, and their involvement was a key link in a chain of hypothetical events which promised to yield significant discoveries. Instead, the work was set aside as inconclusive and too "expensive" to pursue further due to the lab's imperative to produce results.
