Publications | Working Papers | CV

Areas of Research at a Glance:

• Philosophy of Science
  • Science and Society
    • Values in Science
    • Science and Democracy
    • Science and Policy
    • Research Ethics & Engineering Ethics
    • Feminist Philosophy of Science
  • History of Philosophy of Science
    • John Dewey
    • Paul Feyerabend
  • Epistemology of Science
    • Evidence
    • Models
  • Philosophy of Physics
  • History and Philosophy of Psychology & Cognitive Science
    • William Moulton Marston
  • Philosophy and Politics of Climate Science
•  Philosophy of Mind / Cognitive Science
  • The role of the social, culture, environment, and technology in mind and cognition.
  • Science as a case of socially distributed cognition
  • Moral psychology of teams using socially situated/distributed cognition
• American Pragmatism
  • John Dewey’s Logic and Philosophy of Science
• Comics Studies & Pop Culture Studies
  • Wonder Woman in the context of the history & philosophy of psychology

Research Narrative

In my research, I am mainly concerned with the interaction of science (including technology and medicine) with values (including ethics, politics, and culture.) My work in philosophy of science and science studies is thus mainly concerned with the interactions of science and ethics, politics, and policy. I am especially concerned to uncover the ways in which science is a value-laden enterprise, the impact of the value-ladenness of science on our conception of the role of science in policy, and the parallels between scientific and technological, ethical and political inquiries.

My work in philosophy of science is strongly engaged with the history of philosophy of science, particularly with the work of John Dewey and Paul Feyerabend, who, among other things, were two early significant defenders of a radical view of science as value-laden.

My conception of philosophy of science is that it should be the analysis of scientific practice rather than merely scientific theories and reports. (Of course, theories, theory construction, and theory choice are all central elements of scientific practice.) As philosophers of science, we should be engaged with the history of science and contemporary scientific practice, and thus in dialogue with science studies. In my own work, I am engaged with scientific practice in several long-term projects.

As for my ongoing research, I have several works in progress related to issues of science, values, and politics. The most significant of these, at present, is a book project tentatively entitled Science and the Moral Imagination. The book will examine the role of choice, values, and responsibility in scientific inquiry, and it will articulate and defend a new normative ideal for value-laden scientific practice as a constructive alternative to the ideal of science as value-free. This ideal aims to expand and transform “the responsible conduct of research” from a narrow focus on compliance to a rich focus on the moral imagination. One project that is nearing completion is an investigation of these issues through a detailed case study of the disconnection between science and policy concerning global climate change. I am pursuing this project in collaboration with a philosopher of biology, Joyce C. Havstad, currently a postdoctoral researcher at the Field Museum in Chicago. Another project is a study of the role of values and standpoints in the history of the study of reproduction in the Anatidae family. I have had the honor of being invited to contribute a “state of the field” article on “Science, Values, and Politics” to Studies in History and Philosophy of Science, which I will be completing soon. I am also finalizing several publications on John Dewey’s philosophy of science.

In addition to this work in philosophy, history, and social studies of science, I am also interest in the role of culture in science, particular in psychology, cognitive science, and neuroscience. In my view, human cognition is a deeply cultural phenomenon, and human culture is in part a cognitive phenomenon.

For more, see my Publications and Working Papers.