ABSTRACT
In what sense do we say that evaluation procedures in the domain of science constitute a “machinery”? To answer this question, we need to indicate, first, what a machine is in the present context, and, second, how, for the purpose of our analysis, we differentiate between “machine” and “machinery”. The analysis of this chapter will bring to light a pattern which runs throughout this book: all structural and contextual elements of the phenomenon of evaluation - hence also its "machinal" character - turn out to be merely apparitional, and in a sense “degenerative”, instantiations of genuine metaphysical traits. Our brief foray into the metaphysics of the machine will be based mainly on the guidance provided by Aristotle and Nietzsche.
