Another Science is Possible: A Manifesto for Slow Science

by Isabelle Stengers, Stephen Muecke (Translation)

Like fast food, fast science is quickly prepared, not particularly good, and it clogs up the system. Efforts to tackle our most pressing issues have been stymied by conflict within the scientific community and mixed messages symptomatic of a rushed approach. What is more, scientific research is being shaped by the bubbles and crashes associated with economic speculation and the market. A focus on conformism, competitiveness, opportunism and flexibility has made it extremely difficult to present cases of failure to the public, for fear that it will lose confidence in science altogether. 

In this bold new book, distinguished philosopher Isabelle Stengers shows that research is deeply intertwined with broader social interests, which means that science cannot race ahead in isolation but must learn instead to slow down. Stengers offers a path to an alternative science, arguing that researchers should stop seeing themselves as the 'thinking, rational brain of humanity' and refuse to allow their expertise to be used to shut down the concerns of the public, or to spread the belief that scientific progress is inevitable and will resolve all of society's problems. Rather, science must engage openly and honestly with an intelligent public and be clear about the kind of knowledge it is capable of producing. 

This timely and accessible book will be of great interest to students, scholars and policymakers in a wide range of fields, as well anyone concerned with the role of science and its future.

Genres: Philosophy, Science, Nonfiction, Physics, Research

220 pages, Paperback

First published January 1, 2013

About the author

Isabelle Stengers is the author of many books on the philosophy of science, and is Professor of Philosophy at the Université Libre de Bruxelles, Belgium.

Reviews

[Michael Scott · Rating 2 out of 5]

About: Isabelle Stengers' (2013) Another Science Is Possible: A Manifesto for Slow Science is a discussion about the need to avoid the excesses of fast-paced development in science. The author proposes slow science as an alternative. Overall, several good points, but the message is vague and/or written for experts in the philosophy of science.

Central idea: Slow science is about focusing on building a science more inclusive of ideas including non-scientific, and more politically friendly to non-experts. This is contrasted to the triumphalist approach of fast science, and to the idea of aiming to return to a golden age of science as an 'ivory tower' defining and focusing on its own problems, and ignoring their use by the society.

The better parts:
+ Good discussion about Thomas Kuhn's theory of paradigmatic science, and its vagueness and consequent 'science wars'. Finesse in contrast with Ludwig Fleck, for whom the autonomy of science is not absolute, because in his views science should respond to the 'matterns of concern' of the society.
+ Kuhn and Fleck are also opposed to the knowledge economy, which is seen as a 'destroyer of academia' for transforming the sciences into a marketplace of ideas judged mainly by industry or by mass appeal; this perspective is presented with more nuance than possible in this paragraph.
+ The Slow Science Manifesto is bashed wherever mentioned, as a childish regret for the Golden Age when science roamed free. The main critique here is that this is also the period when scientists could act in their 'ivory tower', refusing to take on problems of concern to the society without explanation, and refusing to accept co-responsibility for how scientific results were put into application.
+ The idea of a science more accepting and inclusive of matters of concern and ideas even without scientific background or direction seems appealing. Indeed, the consequences of this idea include deeper developments, taking into account more views (objections to the scientific answers) and thus eliminating more of the possibly wrong answers, but also to slower developments. Here, slow is seen as inherently superior to fast science.


Some of the main negatives:
'- The main argument against fast science is based on its excesses. Same goes for slow science gleaned from the Manifesto. In contrast, slow science is presented here in its ideal form, with little room for nuance; references to the many ways possible to do slow science are never continued with a real exploration of their possible drawbacks (or even benefits, other than collective).
'- The main points about slow science - - what it is? how it could be achieved? - - remain hidden by specialist jargon and/or vague formulation. (Ironically, the author has a similar complaint about Kuhn's theory.) Consequently, the book seems at times unnecessarily slow to read.
'- The related work is unusually brief, with only a few pointers to books or articles to pursue. Of these, many are local in nature - articles in French or Vlaams. One wonders if the author could not have found more global counterparts.
'- The role of Chapter 2 in the narrative remains marginal, and the book would probably not have suffered much without it. Perhaps the page-budget for this chapter would have been better spent on clarifying what ths author means by slow science.

[Andrew · Rating 4 out of 5]

I think this book absolutely nails the predicament of contemporary researchers; the blinkered worlds we construct for ourselves to operate within, the pull of budgetary, institutional, political and commercial demands, the casual forgetting of whatever complicates our narrowly defined aims. If this was just another effort at deconstructing and unmasking science as an ideology, by some condescending critic from the humanities, then this book would be easy to dismiss. But it's not that at all. It's a call to take very seriously one's relation to others and their worlds, and to allow these relative to affect what we do. This is much more in the spirit of the pragmatism of James or Dewey rather than deconstruction.
There are two reasons I didn't give it 5 stars. First, I felt chapter 3 was a bit scattershot and unclear. Second, Stengers call for, in abstract terms, a slow science movement, and she explains broadly the kind of conduct this would involve. I am sympathetic with this.
But I am still left feeling the complex of fast science is so entrenched and insurmountable, that it's difficult to see how an alternative is politically, economically, institutionally possible, even if it's desirable.

[Sharad Pandian · Rating 3 out of 5]

Important issues raised, but unoriginally. Wispy and unconvincing solutions.

It’s best to start by understanding what Stengers means by “fast science”:

Fast science refers not so much to a question of speed but to the imperative not to slow down, not to waste time, or else... It may be tempting to associate this ‘or else’, which evokes the prospect of a fall, with the noble demands of a vocation, which scientists would betray if they did not devote their whole life to its fulfilment. However, the way this so-called devotion is obtained and maintained, through a training that channels attention and eagerness while restraining imagination, has nothing noble about it. (115)

She doesn’t contest the efficacy of science, but just insists o its reliability being restricted to narrow, artificially simplified laboratory conditions:

The reliability of fast science’s results is relative to purified, well-controlled laboratory experiments. And competent objections are competent only with regard to such controlled environments. Which means that scientific reliability is situated, bound, to the constraints of its production. (118)

The problem as Stengers sees it is that scientists are taught to narrow attention to a particular domain, even taught that it’s the only serious approach. So, when the results produced through legitimate means in lab conditions are introduced into the messy world, scientists don’t take the full complexity of the situation seriously, dismissing non-colleagues and imposing by default the methods of their narrow speciality willy-nilly.

In contrast, Stengers wants “slow science”:

It is about them facing up to the challenge of developing a collective awareness of the particularity and selective character of their own thought-style… It is rather a matter of collective learning through the test of an encounter with dissenting voices around issues of common interest... So slowing down the sciences means civilising scientists, civilisation being equated here with the ability of members of a particular collective to present themselves in a non-insulting way to members of other collectives, that is, in a way that enables a process of relation-making.

In order to relate rather than insult, a presentation should never involve the claimed possession of an attribute that defines the other as lacking it. For instance, when a scientist defines her practice as objective or rational, she is insulting to the extent that she implies that this is a distinctive characteristic that the one she is addressing lacks.

…Presenting oneself in a civilised manner means presenting oneself in terms of one’s specific matter of concern, that is, admitting that others also have their matters of concern, their own ways of having their world matter. Civilised scientists would make it public, a matter of exoteric knowledge, that the reliability of their results is related to matters of concern as well as to competent knowledge; and that the very particular conditions required by the latter come at the price of ignoring what may be important factors outside the laboratory. They would acknowledge that when what they have achieved leaves its native environment – the network of research laboratories – and intervenes in different social and natural environments, it may well be leaving behind its specific reliability. And they would recognise that restoring reliability means weaving new relations proper to each new environment, which entails welcoming new objections – no longer just the objections of colleagues, but those of other collectives concerned by aspects of the environment that the scientists themselves were not concerned with.

…Such a redistribution cannot be thought of in terms of the contrast between exoteric and esoteric knowledge. Rather, it demands that the situation be understood through the diverse matters of concern that connect with it, with no a priori differentiation between what really matters and what doesn’t. (100-102)

This is not a call for a new general culture, however:

Civilised scientists are not, however, scientists with a general culture. What they have to cultivate is the capacity to participate in the collective assessment of the consequences of an innovation, rather than a decision based on values. Indeed reliability ‘out there’ will depend on facts other than the scientific kind, brought by other, non-scientific, collectives. They may also come from objections that might be very different from those of competent colleagues who all share the same values and work in similar environments. General culture is no great help when interacting with protagonists who are not academically trained but are nevertheless empowered to object; nor is interdisciplinary culture as it has developed among certain polite academics. Where a minimum of trust prevails, even in the best of cases the process will be, and must be, slow, difficult, rich in friction, and torn between diverging priorities. (103)

Hence, slow.

To her credit, she recognizes that such an approach is no guarantee, but a wager:

Slow science thus represents not only a challenge to fast, mobilised science. It is also a wager. A wager on the capacity of scientific thought collectives to enter into new symbiotic relations with other collectives that have different matters of concern... Slow food movements, for instance, are discovering that the interests of producers and consumers need not be opposed. Thinking together and negotiating can not only open up new, mutually agreeable transactions, but might also become important and rewarding in themselves... Such experiences give new meanings to food. (103)

Sketching out how slow science looks

This would indeed include the necessity that the addressee (from whom the investigator is supposed to be learning) be empowered to evaluate the way they are being addressed, and to do so without trying to ‘capture’ the investigator in the process, making her into their spokesperson. This double condition is a symbiotic interlinking. Both the ‘visiting’ investigator and her hosts should be capable of agreeing not to capture each other. If this condition is met, then they are likely to learn things that matter to them, but in different ways. (74-5)

When we ask the question, ‘How do we want to be evaluated?’, it is a real test requiring the collective dynamic of empowerment that I associated above with democracy. And it is obviously here that the social sciences could both learn and valorise their knowledge in an environment where that knowledge would not be an authority but a resource – not ‘against’ governance, but in a way that activates possibilities for resisting cameral capture. (76)

A genuine prohibition is needed to dissolve this link: no one should be authorised to define generally ‘what really matters’. This is not a moral prohibition, but a condition of symbiotic culture, of a culture in which the capacity of each protagonist to present what matters for them is important, and where each will know that what they may learn from the other will always be understood as a response to a question that matters for them. Our questions are ours. (79)

Sketchily abstract for my taste.


On connoisseurs

This ridding of the assumption that there's a right answer that scientists exclusively have access to means that instead of talk of a public understanding of science, we need a “public intelligence” of the sciences that involves “the creation of intelligent relationships not just with scientific outcomes, but with scientists themselves” (3-4). These “connoisseurs” will be “able to evaluate the products, assess the kind of information they are given, discuss its relevance, and differentiate between mere propaganda and calculated risk” (8). Since these amateurs do not have the same interests as knowledge producers, “they can appreciate the originality or the relevance of an idea but also pay attention to questions or possibilities that were not taken into account in its production, but that might become important in other circumstances” (9).

I have no idea how such a policy is supposed to work – how would they gain and maintain such expertise? The sociologist Harry Collins points to how a community’s knowledge across time is embedded in part in tacit knowledge and in knowledge about the relative reputations and credibility., i.e., merely being able to read published papers isn’t enough. How would an outsider be privy to this? And even if the necessary information could be obtained, why would this person have credibility themself? By ignoring standard themes in the history and sociology of science, Stengers proposal seems wispy at best.


On dealing with agnotology

Stengers argues fast science is bad for science too, since it leads to the public credibility problem. Her argument is that a picture of science that insists that it is only about producing solid, unambiguous facts makes the actual messy practice of science vulnerable (14-15) because

…the merchants [of doubt] take advantage of debates among specialists – for whom it is quite normal to draw on models of interlocking processes as well as data from the field – to present the difficulties they deal with as crucial disagreements that ‘they are hiding from us’. In the name of the ‘balance of opinions’ that has to be respected (since in the absence of a proof there is only opinion), the ‘sceptics’ demand that their case be heard whenever and wherever the question of climate change arises. (18)

This isn’t an implausible argument, but while it certainly captures one aspect of the climate change debate, it leaves out how the respect generated by the unrealistic picture is still a powerful tool to argue for claims too. So the question for me is whether this ideal really is the cause of the crisis, or am umbrella in a rainstorm – imperfect but a real defence we would be foolish to chuck. Stengers does not convince.


Miscellaneous cool quotes

[-Teaching a few courses on epistemology and history not enough (11)]

- The democratic individual, the one who says, ‘It’s my right . . .’, is the one who takes great pride in an ‘autonomy’ which, in fact, hands back to the State the responsibility for ‘thinking through’ the consequences. (80)

-The retroactively described cumulative development that finally led to the Wassermann test needed such flowing water, that is, the continuous cooperation and mutual interactions of the members of a collective. But this water would have remained dispersed in a thousand rivulets if syphilis had not been a matter of public concern, if there had not been an ‘insistent clamour of public opinion for a blood test’ … For Kuhn, the paradigm is what determines the right questions. What comes from the outside and cannot be identified as a puzzle would only perturb the course of normal, cumulative, science. So paradigmatic sciences have to be protected from the expectations they may kindle in society. More precisely, they have to both kindle them and disallow them. (94-5)

-One way or another, much of what is being destroyed may be characterised, like the academy, as deserving of its fate, but the meaning of such a characterisation has changed. It has become a way of refusing the challenge we are confronted by. (108)

-As for us academics, what about introducing slow meetings, that is, meetings organised in such a way that participation is not only formal? What about slow talks, not just inviting people one really wishes to hear, but reading and discussing beforehand so that the meeting is not reduced to the ritual of attending a prepared lecture that ends with a few banal questions? What about demanding that when colleagues speak or write about issues that are beyond their field of expertise, they present the information, learning and collaborations that have allowed them to do so? What about ensuring, when expertise is needed on an issue of common concern, that co-experts are present and able to represent effectively the many dimensions relevant to the issue? (124)

- I certainly mean to give voice to my deep frustration with the quasi-constitutive relation between critical reflexivity and suspicion, wherein debunking or deconstructing appear as achievements in themselves. This speaks to me of a mobilisation of its own kind, implying that a distance is to be maintained from what others present as really mattering to them. (126)

-I do not wish to deconstruct what has been called Reason, Objectivity or the Advance of Knowledge in order to uncover, for instance, the conquering machine they conceal. Indeed, such a deconstruction, however legitimate, might justify the conclusion that the knowledge economy is only destroying scientists’ illusions, which would make it impossible to acknowledge their outrage, despair and mounting cynicism, or to address them as potential participants in any reclaiming operation. Thus, even if it is factually justified, deconstruction fails from a pragmatic, speculative point of view: from the point of view of its effects, it leaves us with a more desolate, empty world. (145)

-three features of this political ecology and a limitation (148-153)

The first feature is that political ecology needs to ‘put the sciences into politics’, but without reducing them to politics. (148) The second feature is …A choice has to be made between political ecology and political economy, and more precisely what I called above capitalist logic. (149) The third …is the need to resist not only the knowledge economy…but also the kind of training scientists receive in modern academic settings, which are dominated by the sharp opposition between questions defined as scientific and those that should be left to politics, or rather to ‘ethics’ (which has taken the place of politics). (149-50)

[Limitation:] The cosmos of cosmopolitics must therefore be distinguished from any particular cosmos or world as a particular tradition may conceive of it, or from something that would transcend all of them. There is no representative of the cosmos as such, no one talks in its name, and it is not a matter of special concern. (152-3)

-A first aspect of this artificial staging, I would suggest, involves making an active distinction between the figure of the expert and that of the diplomat… The experts’ role requires them to present themselves, and to present what they know, in a mode that does not pre-empt how that knowledge should be taken into account. By contrast, diplomats are there to provide a voice for those whose practice, mode of existence, world, or what is often called identity, may be threatened by a decision: ‘If you decide that, you’ll destroy us.’ (153)

[Upsilonn · Rating 4 out of 5]

Je suis contente de retrouver la pensée de Stengers dans cet essai, mais je pense que ce n'est pas forcément le plus simple à lire. A force de prendre le temps de prendre des notes, j'ai réussi à mieux la suivre et à comprendre (globalement) où elle allait, et à retrouver l'enthousiasme que j'avais eu à la lecture de Résister au désastre. J'ai trouvé précieux et intéressants les moments où Stengers définit le mouvement "reclaim", qu'elle entend comme un processus dans lequel on reconnaît les dommages faits et où l'on part d'eux pour reprendre, pour récupérer, pour guérir quelque chose. La question du futur et des moyens que l'on met en œuvre dès aujourd'hui pour qu'il soit plus que simplement vivable irrigue cet essai, et malgré l'urgence et l'inquiétude soulevées je trouve encore une fois la position de Stengers porteuses d'espoir et encourageante.

[Gary Moreau · Rating 5 out of 5]

Galileo ushered in the era of reason and science. More than anything else, however, he gave science authority, undermining all other ways of interpreting reality, and ultimately mobilizing scientists in much the same way an army mobilizes its soldiers in a mission of conquest, largely ignoring the impact of the means in the interest of the desired end. It has been a deconstructive and relentless conquest that has finally resulted in today’s super-competitive knowledge economy.

Following Galileo’s lead, France and the US ushered in the democratic republic that ultimately, in the US at least, led to the commercialization of society and the primacy of ruthless, individualized competition in all things, including politics, business, science, and academia. All segments of society, including science, have thus morphed from the collegial to the cutthroat, contributing greatly to the individualist revolution by legitimizing narrow economic and political interests with the stamp of science’s presumed objective authority.

The result has been modern development. And in terms of its sustainability, it is a social and ecological disaster. It may, in fact, be too late to do anything about it, although the author does offer hope in the form of ‘slow science’ and a civilizing politics that she calls cosmopolitics. At the very least she makes a strong case that simply biding our time in the hope of a scientific solution is a fool’s game.

Science has revealed nothing quite so completely as it has revealed that nothing exists in isolation. Reality is more complex, and its parts more interdependent, than we could have ever imagined. Just as human health cannot be left to the cardiologist and the neurologist alone, our collective reality cannot be sustained through the efforts of one or two scientific specialists working in isolation. It will take all of us working collaboratively and that, of course, will require both interest and civility.

Isabelle Stengers is a professor of the philosophy of science. And while many might consider the philosophy of science to be an oxymoron, therein lies the fundamental problem. Science is not a body of knowledge, bipartitely divided into those facts which have been revealed and those which are about to be.

Reality exists in a dynamic context (my term). The process of discovery, therefore, both reveals and shapes the knowledge unveiled. Scientists in all fields, although some more than others, pre-define their results, often inadvertently, by the questions they ask, both singularly and in total, and how they interpret the answers they find.

Google does not calculate the answer to your search query. It hypothesizes the answer using probabilities, which are defined, in part, by what has come before. It does so through a complex series of computations that collectively approximate a discrete and objective answer, but do not guarantee its validity. The only way to evaluate the innate validity of the answer is to compare it to rational expectations.

The Google engineers do that every day. And so do scientists. If scientific inquiry yields an answer that is either unanticipated (which, of course, implies the existence of a paradigm) or considered beyond “legitimate” questions of science, it will be ignored or refuted.

The result is a closed information loop not unlike the self-reinforcing digital news loops that are fueling our tribal political wars. Both sides become increasingly isolated and increasingly hostile.

The resulting perversion is greatly exaggerated by the reality that we have commercialized all of society, including science. Scientists, and the universities that often govern them, have become captive to the entrepreneurs and politicians who turn to science, not out of genuine interest in the acquisition of knowledge, but as a tool to promote their agenda and discredit the opposition.

We, as consumers and citizens, promote the charade to the extent we fail to grasp what science is and is not. In the area of climate change, the author notes, citizens and politicians cling to doubt citing science, when, in fact, their doubt flows from an ignorance of what science means (again, not her words exactly). Scientifically speaking, there is no doubt about climate change among scientists. The few voices you hear may be speaking with the authority of science, but that is not what ultimately defines scientific truth.

She uses the science of genetically modified organisms (GMOs) as an example of the reverse bias. Scientists have done the bidding of entrepreneurs and politicians who see nothing but the ability to end world hunger and the spoils that will generate. The much larger questions of the science’s impact on society, the environment, and the future of our organic world are essentially dismissed as naïve vestiges of pre-scientific opinions, values, and superstition.

Stengers’ proposed solution, in part, is a ‘slowing’ of science, although the term is not meant to calibrate speed per se. What it means is that we take the time, collectively, to understand scientific discovery in the larger context of its value to human development. Conquest become adventure. Truth becomes a value.

An aside: As a subset of the issue, albeit an extremely important one, the author provides the most insightful portrayal of gender bias I have yet to read. She applies it to science but it could be readily applied to business, politics, or whatever. In essence, the ‘fraternity’ of science was designed by men and it is constructed to reward, and conversely punish in the negative, those qualities historically associated with male virility (e.g., blind obsession, the sacrifice of social responsibilities, urgency at any cost, etc.) To read that argument alone is well worth the effort and investment to read the book.

I only offer one caution, but it is not meant to deter you in any way. The book is translated from the French. And while I think it’s a very good translation, translation is a much more nuanced process than people who do not normally communicate in a second language always appreciate. This isn’t typically obvious in a general conversation on the street corner, but often becomes more obvious in an academic and more complex text such as this. The English is perfectly understandable, to be sure, but it does progress to a slightly different cadence than you might be accustomed to.

All told, I think this is a fabulous book and the timing couldn’t be more appropriate. One of the fallacies to have grown out of the belief in the authority of science and the power of democracy is the belief that rugged individualism conquers all. While that conviction served us well until now, it is implosive in the smaller, wired, and technologically integrated world we now live in. We must start to measure success in what Robert Reich has insightfully defined in his latest book as ‘the common good.’

We must further recognize that life and the planet on which we live it are not built on a foundation of discrete binary options. Reality is less a function of either/or and more a function of and/but.

Scientifically and academically we can’t turn back the clock and we don’t want to. We must, however, redefine our science, our academics, our economics, and our politics, in ways that recognize our common humanity and our common ecology. And Professor Stengers, thankfully, gives us a way forward.

What we can’t forget is that progress is meaningless if it fails to recognize the reality that we are truly all in this together.

[fabio · Rating 5 out of 5]

Los científicos tienen que dejar de ser unos gansos. O por lo menos dejar de verse a sí mismos como tales. Con esta frase se puede resumir la propuesta de este manifiesto por una "ciencia lenta". Pero claro, esto no dice mucho sin un poco de explicación y traducción. Stengers no se refiere a los científicos como nerds ni les pide superar su torpeza social para convertirse en los chicos populares de la secundaria. O quizá si, por lo menos en cierto sentido. Pero el libro no desarrolla una trama tan hollywoodense, sino algo más crucial y preocupante para todos como la pérdida de la confianza pública en la ciencia.

Si bien este libro es una traducción al inglés aparecida en el 2018 del original francés del 2013 (hay una versión en español del 2019) y los problemas concretos que suscitan la discusión son los GMOs y la crisis climática, el libro adquiere obvia relevancia en tiempos de pandemia y el fortalecimiento del movimiento antivacunas.

Una evaluación del estado de las cosas nos muestra que las relaciones entre la ciencia y la sociedad andan en un momento difícil. El público general le ha perdido respeto y algunos, como los antivaxxers, cuestionan insolentemente su objetividad, negando la realidad del conocimiento científico.

Por otro lado, los intereses de la industria se han imbricado tanto con la ciencia que ha surgido una verdadera "economía del conocimiento". Si bien esta atrae financiamiento hacia los laboratorios, a la vez amenaza el ideal de pureza y objetividad que la ciencia reclama para si. El mercado se impone y la competencia rige el comportamiento de los científicos. Todo se acelera y el barullo externo perturba el curso normal de las cosas.

La tragedia: la ciencia pierde su autonomía y, con ella, autoridad. Se le impide, como al ganso de las fábulas, poner los huevos de oro de la innovación tecnológica que, de otro modo, podrían solucionar los graves problemas que aquejan a la sociedad.

Ante esta situación, los defensores de la ciencia claman que se la deje en paz, que se respete su separación de las preocupaciones de otros. Si se le permite que se desarrolle sin interferencias; que responda solo y únicamente al ideal de la investigación pura, "como era antes", la ciencia podrá nuevamente funcionar como la vanguardia de la humanidad y rescatarnos de las catástrofes que se avecinan.

Pero esto es una fábula. Los científicos no son gansos ni es necesario un divorcio entre "la ciencia" y "la sociedad" por el bien de la familia humana. Las comillas son importantes. Stengers propone a lo largo del texto que la ciencia debe necesita una ralentización. Pero en qué consiste esto?

Es necesario una nueva relación entre las ciencias (que son plurales, nunca unitaria, como narra el mito positivista) y sus públicos. Stengers reclama como indispensable desarrollar una "inteligencia pública de las ciencias". A primer vistazo puede parecer una propuesta conservadora: los científicos producen conocimiento y el público lo consume. El problema, nos dicen, es que la ignorancia triunfa y se hace necesario combatirla con mejores estrategias de comunicación, con mayor énfasis en la educación escolar y universitaria para incrementar la literacidad científica.

Pero una "inteligencia pública" apunta a otra figura. Construirla concierne tanto a los científicos como a los no-científicos. En lugar del ideal de distanciamiento entre productores y consumidores que ha degenerado en la situación actual, una inteligencia pública supone expertos en permanente diálogo con conocedores, amateurs de la ciencia que, sin ser expertos ellos mismos, cultivan un interés y capacidad de objetar durante el proceso.

Estas objeciones, al venir de agentes externos, necesariamente serán articuladas en diferente idioma al de la ciencia. Responderan a valores más allá de la objetividad del laboratorio. Son, lo que Stengers, junto a Bruno Latour, llama asuntos o materia de preocupación (matters of concern). Aquello que importa en el desarrollo de la ciencia no puede ser más solamente definido por unos pocos agentes autorizados por si mismos.

El campo debe ser ampliado y rearticulado en una ecología de conexiones parciales. Quizá suena muy idealista y poco práctico. Incluso peligroso. Pero cuidado: no se trata de que el campo científico debe ser diluído y aceptar cualquier discurso sin ningun tipo de rigurosidad. La ciencia debe mantener sus procesos, pero estos deben ser estratégicos, existir de manera civilizada junto con el resto.

Construir una ciencia lenta implica repensar la formación de los científicos, dejar atras la idea de que "tener pasta de científico" significa saber excluir todo criterio "externo". Una ciencia lenta implica problematizar la imagen de una ciencia como proveedora de soluciones correctas y más allá de toda disputa, y verificables por cualquier letrado.

Esto implica cultivar vínculos con grupos diferentes y aceptar que sus objeciones no siempre estarán dentro del orden de "la razón". Mas aún, esta exterioridad no implica que no sean razonables. Cultivar estos vínculos supone, entonces que se empieza de lugares diferentes y con preocupaciones dispares.

Las fricciones son inevitables cuando interactúan grupos con valores diferentes. El punto es que estos no pueden supeditarse a una narrativa maestra. Colonial, dirían algunos. Esto ya no funciona e insistir es inútil. Otra ciencia es posible y deseable si se busca restituir la confianza y efectividad del conocimiento científico en los asuntos públicos. Es necesario pensar con el público en lugar de hacerlo a espaldas de el, con todas las suspicacias mutuas que esta imagen supone.

Lo que más me gusta de la propuesta de Stengers es que no es "crítica" en el sentido de que revele los intereses oscuros detrás de la ciencia ni de deconstruir su discurso. Stengers se toma en serio a las ciencias y no trata de reducirlas a mera ideología o ilusorias grandilocuencias. La posibilidad de otra ciencia, una más lenta y responsable, requiere que los científicos hagan a su vez lo mismo: que se tomen en serio las preocupaciones de los otros.

Es un libro de lenguaje complejo y que no da soluciones inmediatas. Despues de todo, no se trata de una libro de "filosofía rápida". Lei algunas reseñas en las que se quejan de que no propone políticas públicas ni recomendaciones a aplicar mañana. Si bien es cierto que no es un manual de aplicación para el servidor público, me parece que esta acusación es injusta.

Además, Stengers ofrece algunos ejemplos interesantes como la figura del jurado cívico, una serie de eventos llevados a cabo en Francia por el movimiento Sciences Citoyennes (p. 43) en los que un público no especializado puede discutir sobre los nuevos adelantos de la ciencia con los expertos, poniendo en relieve su preocupaciones sin jerarquizar ni excluir los valores que forman parte de su formulación.

[Merol · Rating 3 out of 5]

2.5 ster. Geeft goed de consequenties van de rat race druk op wetenschappelijk onderzoek weer, ook de reflectie op gender daarin was mooi, maar het boek zelf was wel erg slow...

[Laura · Rating 1 out of 5]

I have tackled my library to get this book, I have hunted down the person who was not returning the book and keeping the hold-queue stuck. Boy did I not need to bother.

I'm a scientist about to leave academia and I believe that there are A LOT of problems with fast science. However, I found way more problems with this book and I think I wasted my time reading it. Why? Because the author does not explain her point(s) clearly AT ALL. Her sentences are word salads and she drops in names and terms without explaining any of them. Check out this exquisite example: “But what seems much less common in such fields is the type of dynamic that links competent colleagues - as indicated by references to work on which a particular author's own claim depend, signifying a cumulative dynamic wearing the recognized viability of a conclusion makes new questions possible.” What was that supposed to mean? Another example of just dropping names without taking the reader on a clear path: the author starts talking about Cassandra all of a sudden and it took me three sentences to realize that she's talking about a hurricane. We were not talking about weather or climate in the earlier paragraph, there was no mention of the words storm or hurricane, I was just supposed to know which Cassandra she's referring to?

The author does have a few good points (probably more than a few, but I couldn't understand her writing): that ethics or moral talks are discouraged and seen as signs of weaknesses in 'hard sciences'; that the 'macho' scientist which is the only good scientist is an aberration; that our obsession with parameters of success and patents is poisonous to research (and is probably at the heart of our current reproducibility crisis). But she also says so much garbage that is just not true. For example: she claims that: "proofs of biological evolution are the kinds of proofs that would make experimentalists chuckle. They should be brave enough to acknowledge that their effects are simply pointers.” Except we have observed evolution happen in real life, at both the microscopic and macroscopic levels. We have actually designed experiments (isolation experiments and bacterial in vitro experiments) and have observed natural selection and evolution IN REAL TIME. Also, what does she think antibiotic resistance and virus strain changes represent? Earlier in the book the author states that she doesn't think that everyone should immediately embrace scientific theories such as evolution, and I wonder if she'd also like to say "nor should we all except the earth is round and not flat." There were times when I wondered if she understood the terms she was talking about. Which is interesting, because she talks about how scientists should encourage a lay audience of connoisseurs, the way the tech industry accepts users as connoisseurs. First of all, I don't believe that software complexity and cellular and biochemical complexity are even on the same scale. Second, I think there is evidence of connoisseurs involved in astronomical research, but the smaller the object of interest, the harder it is to build a good base of knowledge. Because you can't directly observe a protein, an antibody, a virus. You rely on complicated tools, you rely on tons of prior experimental knowledge, you rely on human samples. It's much harder to form the same level of connoisseurship in microbiology, compared to zoology, botany, astronomy, etc. The author does make a good point that the way science is currently taught is wrong and dangerous (science as the right answer to a question). There is a lot of ambiguity in science. But there is a decent amount of good solid ground we're standing on. It wasn't clear for me what the author had against that solid ground. Because she didn't express herself clearly. (also, she killed me with all her single quotes; too many, waaaaaaaaaaay to many).

Overall, a hard to follow, horribly written work of philosophy that doesn't seem to care if non-philosophers can follow. Which is hilarious, considering the author seems to condemn this exact type of specialized writing in fast-scientists.

If you're interested in reading about problems in modern science there are other books I recommend which are clearer and easier to follow. Consider reading instead: "X+Y" by Eugenia Cheng; "The seven deadly sins of psichology" by Chris Chambers; "Snowball in a blizzard" by Steven Hatch.

[Shane · Rating 4 out of 5]

Isabelle Stengers has a gift for turning the knife on philosophical polemic. Another Science Is Possible presents a feminist ethos on the world of scientific research, challenging the hegemony of science (and research in general) and how this hegemony leads to research that is industry-focussed and part of a bigger problem. The book is not an in-depth research project so much as a solidly presented argument for a type of collaborative "slow science" that, Stengers argues, will halt the intensive drive of research and science.

The language throughout has a wry humour and a quick delivery that makes for an enjoyable read and a passionate presentation. Having experienced academia from the inside, Stengers presents the growing faults of a bloated system with sharp efficiency. A slow science is possible, and may well be of benefit to everyone.

[Molsa Roja(s) · Rating 3 out of 5]

Yet another extremely boring book from Stengers. It just feels like she's dragging herself to write something, so she can continue to exist in the never-ending citation and peering cycle. This book is pointless most of the time, not only because most of the topics are covered in other books of hers -which makes me think if these are, in fact, the only things she has ideas about- but because they have already been abundantly discussed by Bruno Latour, in a much, much, brighter way. Stengers has that strange ability to write pages without saying anything substantial at all, and along with this ability there's her lack of capability to narrate. As a matter of fact, dull, unworthy and unsurprising as her texts are, her writing seems to be an exact opposite to Haraway's speculative fabulation and her continuous creation of fables of response-ability.

[DeboraS. · Rating 4 out of 5]

completamente obcecada por esse livro

[Daniel Eduardo Hernández Olmos · Rating 3 out of 5]

3.5

[Stephen Muecke · Rating 5 out of 5]

This book was cited about 500 times by March '23, making it the most read book I have translated.