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975La Ricerca Scientifica nell'Era dei Big DataMeltemi. 2018."Scientific Research in the Era of Big Data" - this book was also published in French (Mimesis) in 2019 and in Portuguese in 2022 (FIOCRUZ editors)
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896Classificatory Theory in Data-intensive Science: The Case of Open Biomedical OntologiesInternational Studies in the Philosophy of Science 26 (1). 2012.Knowledge-making practices in biology are being strongly affected by the availability of data on an unprecedented scale, the insistence on systemic approaches and growing reliance on bioinformatics and digital infrastructures. What role does theory play within data-intensive science, and what does that tell us about scientific theories in general? To answer these questions, I focus on Open Biomedical Ontologies, digital classification tools that have become crucial to sharing results across rese…Read more
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545What’s so special about model organisms?Studies in History and Philosophy of Science Part A 42 (2): 313-323. 2011.This paper aims to identify the key characteristics of model organisms that make them a specific type of model within the contemporary life sciences: in particular, we argue that the term “model organism” does not apply to all organisms used for the purposes of experimental research. We explore the differences between experimental and model organisms in terms of their material and epistemic features, and argue that it is essential to distinguish between their representational scope and represent…Read more
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347Reframing the environment in data-intensive health sciencesStudies in History and Philosophy of Science Part A 93 203-214. 2022.In this paper, we analyse the relation between the use of environmental data in contemporary health sciences and related conceptualisations and operationalisations of the notion of environment. We consider three case studies that exemplify a different selection of environmental data and mode of data integration in data-intensive epidemiology. We argue that the diversification of data sources, their increase in scale and scope, and the application of novel analytic tools have brought about three s…Read more
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235What Counts as Scientific Data? A Relational FrameworkPhilosophy of Science 82 (5): 810-821. 2015.This paper proposes an account of scientific data that makes sense of recent debates on data-driven and ‘big data’ research, while also building on the history of data production and use particularly within biology. In this view, ‘data’ is a relational category applied to research outputs that are taken, at specific moments of inquiry, to provide evidence for knowledge claims of interest to the researchers involved. They do not have truth-value in and of themselves, nor can they be seen as strai…Read more
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175Scientific Understanding: Philosophical Perspectives (edited book)University of Pittsburgh Press. 2008.The chapters in this book highlight the multifaceted nature of the process of scientific research.
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172Open science, data sharing and solidarity: who benefits?History and Philosophy of the Life Sciences 43 (4): 1-8. 2021.Research, innovation, and progress in the life sciences are increasingly contingent on access to large quantities of data. This is one of the key premises behind the “open science” movement and the global calls for fostering the sharing of personal data, datasets, and research results. This paper reports on the outcomes of discussions by the panel “Open science, data sharing and solidarity: who benefits?” held at the 2021 Biennial conference of the International Society for the History, Philosop…Read more
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143Repertoires: A post-Kuhnian perspective on scientific change and collaborative researchStudies in History and Philosophy of Science Part A 60 18-28. 2016.not available.
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116On the locality of data and claims about phenomenaPhilosophy of Science 76 (5): 737-749. 2009.Bogen and Woodward characterized data as embedded in the context in which they are produced (‘local’) and claims about phenomena as retaining their significance beyond that context (‘nonlocal’). This view does not fit sciences such as biology, which successfully disseminate data via packaging processes that include appropriate labels, vehicles, and human interventions. These processes enhance the evidential scope of data and ensure that claims about phenomena are understood in the same way acros…Read more
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112Introduction: Making sense of data-driven research in the biological and biomedical sciencesStudies in History and Philosophy of Science Part C: Studies in History and Philosophy of Biological and Biomedical Sciences 43 (1): 1-3. 2012.
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110Re-Thinking Reproducibility as a Criterion for Research QualityResearch in the History of Economic Thought and Methodology 36 (B): 129-146. 2018.A heated debate surrounds the significance of reproducibility as an indicator for research quality and reliability, with many commentators linking a "crisis of reproducibility" to the rise of fraudulent, careless and unreliable practices of knowledge production. Through the analysis of discourse and practices across research fields, I point out that reproducibility is not only interpreted in different ways, but also serves a variety of epistemic functions depending on the research at hand. Given…Read more
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104Integrating data to acquire new knowledge: Three modes of integration in plant scienceStudies in History and Philosophy of Science Part C: Studies in History and Philosophy of Biological and Biomedical Sciences 44 (4): 503-514. 2013.This paper discusses what it means and what it takes to integrate data in order to acquire new knowledge about biological entities and processes. Maureen O’Malley and Orkun Soyer have pointed to the scientific work involved in data integration as important and distinct from the work required by other forms of integration, such as methodological and explanatory integration, which have been more successful in captivating the attention of philosophers of science. Here I explore what data integratio…Read more
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95What distinguishes data from models?European Journal for Philosophy of Science 9 (2): 22. 2019.I propose a framework that explicates and distinguishes the epistemic roles of data and models within empirical inquiry through consideration of their use in scientific practice. After arguing that Suppes’ characterization of data models falls short in this respect, I discuss a case of data processing within exploratory research in plant phenotyping and use it to highlight the difference between practices aimed to make data usable as evidence and practices aimed to use data to represent a specif…Read more
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92Data Interpretation in the Digital AgePerspectives on Science 22 (3): 397-417. 2014.Scientific knowledge production is currently affected by the dissemination of data on an unprecedented scale. Technologies for the automated production and sharing of vast amounts of data have changed the way in which data are handled and interpreted in several scientific domains, most notably molecular biology and biomedicine. In these fields, the activity of data gathering has become increasingly technology-driven, with machines such as next generation genome sequencers and mass spectrometers …Read more
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90Re-thinking organisms: The impact of databases on model organism biologyStudies in History and Philosophy of Science Part C: Studies in History and Philosophy of Biological and Biomedical Sciences 43 (1): 29-36. 2012.Community databases have become crucial to the collection, ordering and retrieval of data gathered on model organisms, as well as to the ways in which these data are interpreted and used across a range of research contexts. This paper analyses the impact of community databases on research practices in model organism biology by focusing on the history and current use of four community databases: FlyBase, Mouse Genome Informatics, WormBase and The Arabidopsis Information Resource. We discuss the s…Read more
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83Infrared metaphysics: radiation and theory-choice. Part 2Studies in History and Philosophy of Science Part A 36 (4): 687-706. 2005.We continue our discussion of the competing arguments in favour of the unified theory and the pluralistic theory of radiation advanced by three nineteenth-century pioneers: Herschel, Melloni, and Draper. Our narrative is structured by a consideration of the epistemic criteria relevant to theory-choice; the epistemic focus highlights many little-known aspects of this relatively well-known episode. We argue that the acceptance of light-heat unity in this period cannot be credibly justified on the …Read more
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78Performing abstraction: Two ways of modelling arabidopsis thalianaBiology and Philosophy 23 (4): 509-528. 2008.What is the best way to analyse abstraction in scientific modelling? I propose to focus on abstracting as an epistemic activity, which is achieved in different ways and for different purposes depending on the actual circumstances of modelling and the features of the models in question. This is in contrast to a more conventional use of the term ‘abstract’ as an attribute of models, which I characterise as black-boxing the ways in which abstraction is performed and to which epistemological advanta…Read more
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65What distinguishes data from models?European Journal for Philosophy of Science 9 (2): 22. 2019.I propose a framework that explicates and distinguishes the epistemic roles of data and models within empirical inquiry through consideration of their use in scientific practice. After arguing that Suppes’ characterization of data models falls short in this respect, I discuss a case of data processing within exploratory research in plant phenotyping and use it to highlight the difference between practices aimed to make data usable as evidence and practices aimed to use data to represent a specif…Read more
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63The Time of Data: Timescales of Data Use in the Life SciencesPhilosophy of Science 85 (5): 741-754. 2018.This article considers the temporal dimension of data processing and use and the ways in which it affects the production and interpretation of knowledge claims. I start by distinguishing the time at which data collection, dissemination, and analysis occur from the time in which the phenomena for which data serve as evidence operate. Building on the analysis of two examples of data reuse from modeling and experimental practices in biology, I then argue that Dt affects how researchers select and i…Read more
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58Classificatory Theory in BiologyBiological Theory 7 (4): 338-345. 2013.Scientific classification has long been recognized as involving a specific style of reasoning and doing research, and as occasionally affecting the development of scientific theories. However, the role played by classificatory activities in generating theories has not been closely investigated within the philosophy of science. I argue that classificatory systems can themselves become a form of theory, which I call classificatory theory, when they come to formalize and express the scientific sign…Read more
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55Karen-Sue Taussig: Ordinary Genomes: Science, Citizenship and Genetic Identities Content Type Journal Article Category Book Review Pages 1-4 DOI 10.1007/s10441-012-9150-8 Authors Sabina Leonelli, Department of Sociology and Philosophy, ESRC Centre for Genomics in Society, University of Exeter, Exeter, Devon, UK Journal Acta Biotheoretica Online ISSN 1572-8358 Print ISSN 0001-5342
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50Infrared metaphysics: the elusive ontology of radiation. Part 1Studies in History and Philosophy of Science Part A 36 (3): 477-508. 2005.Hardly any ontological result of modern science is more firmly established than the fact that infrared radiation differs from light only in wavelength; this is part of the modern conception of the continuous spectrum of electromagnetic radiation reaching from radio waves to gamma radiation. Yet, like many such evident truths, the light-infrared unity was an extremely difficult thing to establish. We examine the competing arguments in favour of the unified and pluralistic theories of radiation, a…Read more
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49What difference does quantity make? On the epistemology of Big Data in biologyBig Data and Society 1 (1): 2053951714534395. 2014.Is Big Data science a whole new way of doing research? And what difference does data quantity make to knowledge production strategies and their outputs? I argue that the novelty of Big Data science does not lie in the sheer quantity of data involved, but rather in the prominence and status acquired by data as commodity and recognised output, both within and outside of the scientific community and the methods, infrastructures, technologies, skills and knowledge developed to handle data. These dev…Read more
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45Growing Weed, Producing Knowledge An Epistemic History of Arabidopsis thalianaHistory and Philosophy of the Life Sciences 29 (2). 2007.Arabidopsis is currently the most popular and well-researched model organism in plant biology. This paper documents this plant's rise to scientific fame by focusing on two interrelated aspects of Arabidopsis research. One is the extent to which the material features of the plant have constrained research directions and enabled scientific achievements. The other is the crucial role played by the international community of Arabidopsis researchers in making it possible to grow, distribute and use p…Read more
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45Introduction: On the Philosophy of Science in Practice (review)Journal for General Philosophy of Science / Zeitschrift für Allgemeine Wissenschaftstheorie 44 (2): 259-261. 2013.
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45Open Science and Epistemic Diversity: Friends or Foes?Philosophy of Science 89 (5): 991-1001. 2022.I argue that Open Science as currently conceptualized and implemented does not take sufficient account of epistemic diversity within research. I use three case studies to exemplify how Open Science threatens to privilege some forms of inquiry over others, thus exasperating divides within and across systems of practice, and overlooking important sources and forms of epistemic diversity. Building on insights from pluralist philosophy, I then identify four aspects of diverse research practices that…Read more
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45Making Organisms Model Human Behavior: Situated Models in North-American Alcohol Research, since 1950Science in Context 27 (3): 485-509. 2014.ArgumentWe examine the criteria used to validate the use of nonhuman organisms in North-American alcohol addiction research from the 1950s to the present day. We argue that this field, where the similarities between behaviors in humans and non-humans are particularly difficult to assess, has addressed questions of model validity by transforming the situatedness of non-human organisms into an experimental tool. We demonstrate that model validity does not hinge on the standardization of one type o…Read more
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42Biomedical deployments of data science capitalise on vast, heterogeneous data sources. This promotes a diversified understanding of what counts as evidence for health-related interventions, beyond the strictures associated with evidence-based medicine. Focusing on COVID-19 transmission and prevention research, I consider the epistemic implications of this diversification of evidence in relation to: (1) experimental design, especially the revival of natural experiments as sources of reliable epid…Read more
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Philosophy of Biology |
General Philosophy of Science |