Rescuing reason : a critique of anti-rationalist views of science and knowledge
Do knowledge and science arise from the application of canons of rationality and scientific method? Or is all our scientific knowledge caused by socio-political factors, or by our interests in the socio-political - the view of sociologists of "knowledge"?
x, 559 p. ; 25 cm.
9781402010422, 1402010427
868301763
Acknowledgements. Introduction. Part I: Knowledge, Science and the Epistemological Enterprise. Synopsis of Part I. 1. The Critical Tradition and Some of its Discontents. 2. The Problem of Knowledge. 3. Naturalism and Norms of Reason and Method. Part II: The Poverty of the Sociology of Scientific Knowledge. 4. Some German Connections: Marx and Mannheim. 5. The Edinburgh Connection I: The Strong Programme and the Social Causes of Scientific Belief. 6. The Edinburgh Connection II: Strong and Wrong. 7. The Wittgenstein Connection: The Social and the Rational. Part III: The French Connection: Foucault. Synopsis of Part III. 8. An Archaeological Dig Through Foucault's Texts. 9. Genealogy, Power and Knowledge. Part IV: The German Connection: Nietzsche. Synopsis of Part IV. 10. Nietzsche's Genealogy of Belief and Morality. 11. Epilogue. References. Name Index.