"FIELDWORK" OF A TECHNOSCIENCE EPISTEMOLOGIST

Abstract

In addition to the already familiar “epistemology of concepts,” the article proposes a version of “field” epistemological research. Since the well-known approach of B. Latour is difficult to apply in domestic traditions, it is proposed to start with the most accessible – with the study of technoscientific texts, which exist in huge quantities and are widely available. It is possible to overcome the difficulties that arise when a scholar in the humanities reads technical texts, since any text, including technoscientific, has rhetorical characteristics. One of the characteristics of a technoscientific text is its “objectivity,” impersonality. The article provides examples of such texts from high-level journals. It is concluded that technoscientists use positivistic language in their articles with its concepts of objectivity, accuracy, and facts. The authors of the articles place themselves in an imaginary position of an “impartial spectator.” Such language does not allow scientists to develop modern intra-scientific communication, to discuss such problems of technoscience that were previously considered “external” and without understanding which modern science cannot develop. The transformation of the positivist language into a ritualized language of “common sense” of scientists is probably connected with the general tendency toward bureaucratization of science and the influence of the state. Mass higher education plays a huge role in the transmission of rules and standards. Another possible source of standardization of the simplified language of description may be the publishers of scientific journals. Technoscientists themselves, although infrequently, express concern about the current state of affairs, since they find that the serious problems that arise before them not only cannot be solved but also cannot be clearly formulated. Epistemologists, who have their own traditions and methods of research, could, in interaction with technoscientists, help the latter understand what kind of “prose” they write and speak and in what directions the professional languages and worldviews of technoscience can be advanced. Such interactions will also help the development of epistemology itself.