Collective Scientific Knowledge Research Articles

The subject of knowledge in collaborative science

The epistemic subject of collective scientific knowledge has been a matter of dispute in recent philosophy of science and epistemology. Following the distributed cognition framework, both collective-subject accounts (most notably by Knorr-Cetina, in Epistemic Cultures, Harvard University Press, 1999) as well as no-subject accounts of collective scientific knowledge (most notably by Giere, Social Epistemology 21:313–320, 2007; in Carruthers, Stich, Siegal (eds), The Cognitive Basis of Science, Cambridge University Press, 2002a) have been offered. Both strategies of accounting for collective knowledge are problematic from the perspective of mainstream epistemology. Postulating genuinely collective epistemic subjects is a high-commitment strategy with little clear benefit. On the other hand, eliminating the epistemic subject radically severs the link between knowledge and knowers. Most importantly, both strategies lead to the undesirable outcome that in some cases of scientific knowledge there might be no individual knower that we can identify. I argue that distributed cognition offers us a fertile framework for analyzing complex socio-technical processes of contemporary scientific knowledge production, but scientific knowledge should nonetheless be located in individual knowers. I distinguish between the production and possession of knowledge, and argue that collective knowledge is collectively produced knowledge, not collectively possessed knowledge. I then propose an account of non-testimonial, expert scientific knowledge which allows for collectively produced knowledge to be known by individuals.

Historical growth of concept networks in Wikipedia

Philosophers of science have long questioned how collective scientific knowledge grows. Although disparate answers have been posited, empirical validation has been challenging due to limitations in collecting and systematizing large historical records. Here, we introduce new methods to analyze scientific knowledge formulated as a growing network of articles on Wikipedia and their hyperlinks. We demonstrate that in Wikipedia, concept networks in subdisciplines of science do not grow by expanding from their central core to reach an ancillary periphery. Instead, science concept networks in Wikipedia grow by creating and filling knowledge gaps. Notably, the process of gap formation and closure may be valued by the scientific community, as evidenced by the fact that it produces discoveries that are more frequently awarded Nobel prizes than other processes. To determine whether and how the gap process is interrupted by paradigm shifts, we operationalize a paradigm as a particular subdivision of scientific concepts into network modules. Hence, paradigm shifts are reconfigurations of those modules. The approach allows us to identify a temporal signature in structural stability across scientific subjects in Wikipedia. In a network formulation of scientific discovery, our findings suggest that data-driven conditions underlying scientific breakthroughs depend as much on exploring uncharted gaps as on exploiting existing disciplines and support policies that encourage new interdisciplinary research.

Not just “nomadic jars”: The Late Bronze Age ceramic assemblage from the mobile pastoralist site of Ojakly, Murghab region, Turkmenistan

Recent archaeological research in the Murghab region of modern Turkmenistan has highlighted the variable interweaving of material, technological, and social traditions between sedentary farmers and mobile pastoralists during the late 3rd through first half of the 2nd millennium BCE. This research has also made apparent significant gaps in collective scientific knowledge, particularly in relation to the materials and habits of mobile pastoralists. In this paper, we address the lack of a basic quantitative and qualitative description of mobile pastoralist ceramics for the prehistoric Murghab by presenting the results of a multi-faceted ceramic analysis for the occupation at Ojakly. Results demonstrate a greater degree of variability in form, function, and style of handmade coarseware than expected, calling into question the characterization of “nomadic jars” as a uniform type of material culture, and further emphasizing the plurality of mobile pastoralist strategies and behaviors in this key region.

Looking for collective scientific knowledge

Looking for collective scientific knowledge

Crowds Replicate Performance of Scientific Experts Scoring Phylogenetic Matrices of Phenotypes.

Scientists building the Tree of Life face an overwhelming challenge to categorize phenotypes (e.g., anatomy, physiology) from millions of living and fossil species. This biodiversity challenge far outstrips the capacities of trained scientific experts. Here we explore whether crowdsourcing can be used to collect matrix data on a large scale with the participation of nonexpert students, or "citizen scientists." Crowdsourcing, or data collection by nonexperts, frequently via the internet, has enabled scientists to tackle some large-scale data collection challenges too massive for individuals or scientific teams alone. The quality of work by nonexpert crowds is, however, often questioned and little data have been collected on how such crowds perform on complex tasks such as phylogenetic character coding. We studied a crowd of over 600 nonexperts and found that they could use images to identify anatomical similarity (hypotheses of homology) with an average accuracy of 82% compared with scores provided by experts in the field. This performance pattern held across the Tree of Life, from protists to vertebrates. We introduce a procedure that predicts the difficulty of each character and that can be used to assign harder characters to experts and easier characters to a nonexpert crowd for scoring. We test this procedure in a controlled experiment comparing crowd scores to those of experts and show that crowds can produce matrices with over 90% of cells scored correctly while reducing the number of cells to be scored by experts by 50%. Preparation time, including image collection and processing, for a crowdsourcing experiment is significant, and does not currently save time of scientific experts overall. However, if innovations in automation or robotics can reduce such effort, then large-scale implementation of our method could greatly increase the collective scientific knowledge of species phenotypes for phylogenetic tree building. For the field of crowdsourcing, we provide a rare study with ground truth, or an experimental control that many studies lack, and contribute new methods on how to coordinate the work of experts and nonexperts. We show that there are important instances in which crowd consensus is not a good proxy for correctness.

The route of science: Labyrinths and algorithms - Inspirations by human papillomavirus testing and cervical cancer

Popper's landmark work, Logik der Forschung (The Logic of Scientific Discovery) (1959), starts with the lines: “Without a doubt, the collective scientific knowledge of mankind is the greatest miracle of the world.”[1] According to Popper, a theory should not only be “verified” but should also be “tested” and even “objectified” for it to be considered as scientific. He argues that pursuit of knowledge is only possible because of the objections to and versatility of said knowledge. Popper remarks that “when referring to human knowledge, he will usually have this objective sense of the word ‘knowledge’ in mind.”[2] These concepts are clarified in the following lines:

Epistemic dependence and collective scientific knowledge

I argue that scientific knowledge is collective knowledge, in a sense to be specified and defended. I first consider some existing proposals for construing collective knowledge and argue that they are unsatisfactory, at least for scientific knowledge as we encounter it in actual scientific practice. Then I introduce an alternative conception of collective knowledge, on which knowledge is collective if there is a strong form of mutual epistemic dependence among scientists, which makes it so that satisfaction of the justification condition on knowledge ineliminably requires a collective. Next, I show how features of contemporary science support the conclusion that scientific knowledge is collective knowledge in this sense. Finally, I consider implications of my proposal and defend it against objections.

Collective Scientific Knowledge

AbstractPhilosophical debates about collective scientific knowledge concern two distinct theses: (1) groups are necessary to produce scientific knowledge, and (2) groups have scientific knowledge in their own right. Thesis (1) has strong support. Groups are required, in many cases of scientific inquiry, to satisfy methodological norms, to develop theoretical concepts, or to validate the results of inquiry as scientific knowledge. So scientific knowledge‐production is collective in at least three respects. However, support for (2) is more equivocal. Though some examples suggest that groups have scientific knowledge independently of their individual members, these cases are also explained in terms of relational complexes of members’ beliefs.

How to read (and understand) Volume A ofInternational Tables for Crystallography: an introduction for nonspecialists

Since fewer and fewer students get proper crystallographic education at the undergraduate level, the responsibility to promote and propagate this knowledge must be directed to alternative channels. It is not a marginal issue, because the language of crystallography is rather hermetic and, without proper support, it might disappear from the collective scientific knowledge, so that in the next generation there would be no-one able to use it properly, to say nothing about advancing the field. Black-box crystallography might be useful in some situations, but it cannot replace well informed, conscious scientific pursuits by properly trained specialists. Without sufficient understanding of crystallographic terms and principles, the now thriving branch of structural research would wither, and this could have particularly lamentable consequences for structural biology. The purpose of this article is to teach non-initiated persons, primarily structural biologists, how to interpret the information contained in the fundamental Volume A of International Tables for Crystallography (ITA). An excellent and comprehensive overview of many issues concerning crystal symmetry is presented in a book by Burns & Glazer (Space Groups for Solid State Scientists, 2nd ed. New York: Academic Press, 1990), also explaining the contents of ITA, but this text is unfortunately not popular among structural biologists. There are several superb handbooks explaining the foundations of structural crystallography but they usually do it without direct reference to ITA. There is also a comprehensive introduction included in ITA, but it is written in rather hermetic language and is, therefore, not suitable for nonspecialists with no training in exact sciences. This article, which uses simple language to explain all the terms encountered on the space-group pages of ITA, is meant to bridge this growing gap in crystallographic instruction. The explanations are illustrated with actual examples taken directly from the pages of ITA.

IS THERE COLLECTIVE SCIENTIFIC KNOWLEDGE? ARGUMENTS FROM EXPLANATION

If there is collective scientific knowledge, then at least some scientific groups have beliefs over and above the personal beliefs of their members. Gilbert's plural-subjects theory makes precise the notion of ‘over and above’ here. Some philosophers have used plural-subjects theory to argue that philosophical, historical and sociological studies of science should take account of collective beliefs of scientific groups. Their claims rest on the premise that our best explanations of scientific change include these collective beliefs. I argue that Gilbert's account of collective scientific belief does not provide a better explanation of scientific change than a non-collective alternative. A different defence of collective scientific belief and knowledge is needed.

Clinical supervision in Canadian academic and service settings: The importance of education, training, and workplace support for supervisor development.

Abstract A national sample of Canadian psychologists who provide clinical supervision in academic or service settings (n = 156) was surveyed regarding their background preparation for clinical supervision, satisfaction with current supervisory load, and workplace support for supervisory activities and development. With respect to supervisor training and development, we found that (a) almost twothirds of the respondents received no formal training in supervision, (b) most initially felt inadequately prepared to supervise trainees, (c) subsequent self study of supervision was perceived as helpful, and (d) self study was associated with administrative encouragement for professional development. Exploration of supervisory load and workplace support showed that (a) a large majority of respondents were satisfied with their load, (bj satisfaction did not differ across academic and service settings, and (c) supervisors in service settings were more satisfied with opportunities for peer support around supervision. Respondents called for more training in supervision and increased amounts of time on the job to devote to supervision. The need for increased training in supervision at all levels, continuing professional education, and workplace enhancements to facilitate supervision are discussed. Consider the following question: What aspect of graduate training and education has the greatest impact on the applied competencies of clinical psychology trainees? For many psychologists the answer to this question would likely include the quality and quantity of clinical supervision received. Despite the importance of clinical supervision to the education and training of clinical students, our collective scientific knowledge about supervision has traditionally suffered from benign neglect (Bernard & Goodyear, 1998).In contrast to our knowledge about the theory and practice of psychotherapy, where we know a great deal, the literature on clinical supervision remains in its infancy (Watkins, 1997b) . The knowledge base concerning the practice of supervision by psychologists in Canada is no exception to the general neglect of supervision in the literature. To our knowledge, there exists only one published survey concerning psychology supervision in Canada. In 1996, Howes, Vallis, Wilson, Ross, and Louisy reported the results of a survey they distributed to psychology supervisors at 35 internships listed in the 1992-93 Canadian Council of Professional Psychology Programs (CCPPP) directory. Because our research builds on Howes et al.'s work, we will review some of their findings. The first noteworthy finding from the Howes et al. (1996) survey is that few clinical supervisors received training in supervision in the form of either supervision of supervision or an academic course in supervision. The absence of formal training in supervision is striking in view of the importance of supervision to the profession and the ubiquitous demand for supervision from clinical psychologists in their workplaces. This lacuna in the professional training of clinical psychologists is likely to have a variety of important implications for how supervisors conceptualize, practice, and feel about clinical supervision as a distinct professional endeavour. A somewhat unsettling consequence of this lack of training was noted by Howes et al., namely, that most supervisors could not articulate their model of supervision. Formal training in supervision can provide supervisors with an awareness of supervision models, as well as a conceptual framework and vocabulary for thinking through their supervision practice. The ability to reflect on one's approach to supervision may be particularly important for resolving conflict and other difficulties in the work. According to Howes et al.'s findings, occurrences of problems in supervising interns are by no means rare. They found that 42% of supervisors encountered problems, of which 41 % could not be resolved within the supervision relationship and required outside mediation. …