K. Brad Wray

Social epistemology is a wide-ranging field of study concerned with investigating how various social factors, practices, and institutions affect our prospects of gaining and spreading knowledge. Philosophers working in social epistemology have focused on a range of topics, including trust and testimony, the effects of social location on knowing, and whether or not groups of people can have knowledge that is not reducible to the knowledge of the individual members of the group. Much of the work in social epistemology is not concerned specifically with science and scientists but, rather, with knowing agents in general. This chapter will be concerned narrowly with the social epistemology of scientific knowledge. After a brief discussion of Thomas Kuhn's contribution to the social epistemology of science, the chapter addresses the following issues: the ideal epistemic community; collaboration and trust; social values and bias; and science policy and expertise. The chapter ends with a brief discussion of methodology in the social epistemology of science.

Otto Neurath compared science to a ship at sea on which the sailors have to repair their vessel as they keep it afloat. Metascience is a ship of a similar sort. Do not worry. There are no repairs to report. But changes are being made at Metascience on an ongoing basis, even as we work to meet our production deadlines. With this, our second issue, we would like to announce some further changes with the journal.Ties Nijseen and Christi Lue who have long been responsible for many of the matters related to Metascience are handing over the responsibilities to Lucy Fleet. Ties has been the Publishing Editor for Metascience since 2009, and Christi has supported him as editorial assistant since 2012. Ties and Christi are still with Springer, but they have taken on other projects. We would like to take this opportunity to thank them for their years of service to Metascience.Lucy will be our new Publishing Editor. She has worked for Springer for 11 years. She is, in addition, ..

David Hull accounts for the success of science in terms of an invisible hand mechanism, arguing that it is difficult to reconcile scientists' self-interestedness or their desire for recognition with traditional philosophical explanations for the success of science. I argue that we have less reason to invoke an invisible hand mechanism to explain the success of science than Hull implies, and that many of the practices and institutions constitutive of science are intentionally designed by scientists with an eye to realizing the very goals that Hull believes need to be explained by reference to an invisible hand mechanism. Thus, I reduce the scope of Hull's invisible hand explanation and supplement it by appealing to a hidden hand explanation

I examine whether or not it is apt to attribute knowledge to groups of scientists. I argue that though research teams can be aptly described as having knowledge, communities of scientists identified with research fields, and the scientific community as a whole are not capable of knowing. Scientists involved in research teams are dependent on each other, and are organized in a manner to advance a goal. Such teams also adopt views that may not be identical to the views of the individual members of the group.

Last year Stathis and Theodore approached us about taking on the editorship of Metascience, as their 5 year term was coming to an end. We were greatly honoured but also overcome with trepidation. Metascience has become an important source for keeping abreast of the most recent books published in the history, sociology and philosophy of science. And the number of reviews published in the journal each year is prodigious. Further, it has been run with thoughtfulness and great care since its beginnings in 1984.Indeed, we are honoured to follow in the footsteps of our esteemed predecessors in this role, beginning with Randall Albury, followed by Michael Shortland, John Forge, Nicholas Rasmussen, Steven French, and finally Stathis Psillos and Theodore Arabatzis. We are also conscious of the very many copy-editors, proof-readers, associate editors, and regular contributors who have donated so much time and effort towards the success of this journal, so widely respected in our field internatio..

My aim in this paper is to re-examine specialization in science. I argue that we need to acknowledge the role that conceptual changes can play in the creation of new specialties. Whereas earlier sociological accounts focus on social and instrumental changes as the cause of the creation of new specialties, I argue that conceptual changes play an important role in the creation of some scientific specialties. Specifically, I argue that conceptual developments played an important role in the creation of both endocrinology and virology.

I present a history of Kuhn’s discovery of paradigms, one that takes account of the complexity of the discovery process. Rather than emerging fully formed in Structure , the concept paradigm emerged through a series of phases. Early criticism of Structure revealed that the role of paradigms was unclear. It was only as Kuhn responded to criticism that he finally articulated a precise understanding of the concept paradigm. In a series of publications in the 1970s, he settled on a conception of a paradigm as a concrete exemplar that functions as a guide to future research

Realists and anti-realists disagree about whether contemporary scientists are epistemically privileged. Because the issue of epistemic privilege figures in arguments in support of and against theoretical knowledge in science, it is worth examining whether or not there is any basis for assuming such privilege. I show that arguments that try to explain the success of science by appeal to some sort of epistemic privilege have, so far, failed. They have failed to give us reason to believe (i) that scientists are prone to develop theories that are true, (ii) that our current theories are not apt to be replaced in the future, and (iii) that science is nearing its completion