Tom Stapleford

Repeatedly over the last century, scientists have described a tension between two different views of their profession, one in which scientific research is a valuable end in itself and a second in which research is merely a means to other goals (such as power, status, or money). This chapter shows how a framework of “communal practices,” drawn from the virtue ethics of Alasdair MacIntyre, can help scholars understand this tension while also creating a more nuanced and accurate view of its source and characteristics. Doing so allows us to take scientists’ accounts of their professional goals seriously without accepting oversimplified binaries, and it suggests ways to navigate the tensions they describe by cultivating virtues.

Over the past forty years, economists associated with the University of Chicago have won more than one-third of the Nobel prizes awarded in their discipline and have been major influences on American public policy. Building Chicago Economics presents the first collective attempt by social science historians to chart the rise and development of the Chicago School during the decades that followed the Second World War. Drawing on new research in published and archival sources, contributors examine the people, institutions and ideas that established the foundations for the success of Chicago economics and thereby positioned it as a powerful and controversial force in American political and intellectual life.

“Practice” has become a ubiquitous term in the history of science, and yet historians have not always reflected on its philosophical import and especially on its potential connections with ethics. In this essay, we draw on the work of the virtue ethicist Alasdair MacIntyre to develop a theory of “communal practices” and explore how such an approach can inform the history of science, including allegations about the corruption of science by wealth or power; consideration of scientific ethics or “moral economies”; the role of values in science; the ethical distinctiveness of scientific vocations; and the relationship between history of science and the practice of science itself.

What makes for a good scientist or a good engineer? How does using a new technology or working in a research lab begin to shape our thought and behavior? How can we best anticipate and navigate the ethical dilemmas created by modern scientific research and technology? Scholars across multiple disciplines have begun turning to a surprising resource to address these questions: discussions of virtue that have their roots in ancient philosophical and religious traditions. This volume gathers a number of these perspectives to show how concepts of virtue can help us better understand, construct, and use the fruits of modern science and technology.

Scientific research, considered in isolation, is often regarded as an amoral activity. In this view, ethics exists only around the margins of research – perhaps in the choice of topics pursued, the treatment of experimental subjects, or the use of results. Such an account seems to explain why brilliant scientists can be deeply flawed, at times even vicious, human beings. It also reflects a distinction between making and acting that found its most influential formulation in Aristotles distinction between poiesis (making) and praxis (acting). For Aristotle, only the latter can have moral content; the value of the former (making) lies strictly in its ability to achieve a predefined, external end.The making/acting distinction parallels a theoretical division of labor in important strands of 20th century political philosophy of science that sought to isolate an amoral, or at least apolitical, component of scientific research. Once a political community sets the goals and general framework for science (through the praxis of political life), the construction of new knowledge then becomes an apolitical form of making. I argue that while some forms of making (denoted here as fabrication) support such a division between those who define goals and those who carry out the work, other forms of making – including scientific research – do not. In this latter category, what I call design, the pure artist (or pure scientist) is necessarily enmeshed in ethical, and indeed political, judgments.

ArgumentCreated in 1884, the U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics has been the major federal source for data in the United States on labor-related topics such as prices, unemployment, compensation, productivity, and family expenditures. This essay traces the development and transformation of formal and informal consulting relationships between the BLS and external groups over the twentieth century. Though such a history cannot, of course, provide a comprehensive analysis of how political values have shaped the construction of labor statistics during this period, I argue that it can nevertheless provide important insights into the political context for the construction of knowledge about American workers and their living and working conditions.