Law & Technology

There is a fascinating interview with Steven Shapin, author of The Scientific Life: A Moral History of a Late Modern Vocation, at the U. Chicago Press website. Shapin questions the distinctiveness of academic and business modes of inquiry:

If we . . . look at the pure research done in industry and that done in academia, many of the most popular contrasts describe the situation rather poorly. If autonomy is the issue, many industrial scientists from early in the twentieth century enjoyed as much of that as their academic colleagues. And the same applies to notions of secrecy and openness. A clear contrast of quality between university and industrial science similarly seems not to hold, while a presumption that applied research and development requires less brain-power than pure research is just dogmatic. But most of all, I am impressed that both industrial and academic scientists seem to want environments in which they can do interesting work and, perhaps, to enjoy a degree of freedom in doing that work. . . .

Read More »Politics, Science, Vocation, and Purpose

I had a good afternoon of gallery-hopping today, checking out some of Casey Ruble’s fantastic series “Except in Struggle” and… Read More »Siebren Versteeg’s Infinite Touchscreen