Editing History of science (section)

== Approaches to history of science ==
{{Main|Historiography of science}}
{{further|Historiography}}
The nature of the history of science is a topic of debate (as is, by implication, the definition of science itself). The history of science is often seen as a linear story of progress,<ref>
{{cite book
 |last1                = von Wright
 |first1               = Georg Henrik
 |author-link1         = Georg Henrik von Wright
 |editor-last1         = Burgen
 |editor-first1        = Arnold
 |editor-last2         = McLaughlin
 |editor-first2        = Peter
 |editor-last3         = Mittelstraß
 |editor-first3        = Jürgen
 |editor-link3         = Jürgen Mittelstraß
 |date                 = 25 October 2012
 |orig-date            = 1997
 |chapter              = Progress: Fact and Fiction
 |title                = The Idea of Progress
 |url                  = https://books.google.com/books?id=kZ8gAAAAQBAJ
 |series               = Philosophie und Wissenschaft – Volume 13
 |edition              = reprint
 |publication-place    = Berlin
 |publisher            = Walter de Gruyter
 |page                 = 14
 |isbn                 = 9783110820423
 |access-date          = 13 October 2023
 |quote                = In historic reflections on art, cyclic schemas play a prominent role. This is a difference between art history and science history. The idea of linear progress simply does not apply in the esthetic domain.
}} 
</ref>
but historians have come to see the story as more complex.<ref>{{Cite book |last= Kragh |first= Helge |title= An introduction to the historiography of science |date= 1987 |publisher= Cambridge University Press |isbn= 0-521-33360-1 |location= Cambridge [Cambridgeshire] |oclc= 14692886}}</ref><ref>{{Cite book |title= A companion to the history of science |date= 2016 |author= Bernard V. Lightman |isbn= 978-1-118-62077-9 |location= Chichester (GB) |oclc= 950521936 | url = https://books.google.com/books?id=yQj9CgAAQBAJ}}</ref><ref>
{{cite book
 |last1                = Golinski
 |first1               = Jan
 |date                 = 22 July 2008
 |orig-date            = 1998
 |title                = Making Natural Knowledge: Constructivism and the History of Science
 |url                  = https://books.google.com/books?id=SZcCElvmF7sC
 |series               = Cambridge history of science
 |edition              = revised
 |publication-place    = Chicago
 |publisher            = University of Chicago Press
 |page                 = 188
 |isbn                 = 9780226302324
 |access-date          = 13 October 2023
 |quote                = [...] historical writing [...] has largely abandoned the aim of telling a story of science's universal progress.
}} 
</ref>
[[Alfred Edward Taylor]] has characterised lean periods in the advance of scientific discovery as "periodical bankruptcies of science".<ref>
{{cite book
 |last1                = Thomas
 |first1               = Norman
 |year                 = 1961
 |title                = Great Dissenters
 |url                  = https://books.google.com/books?id=FQ_PyhHvACoC
 |publisher            = Norton
 |page                 = 25
 |access-date          = 13 October 2023
 |quote                = [...] the brilliant Periclean Age, according to Dr. A. E. Taylor, witnessed one of the periodical bankruptcies of science [...].
}} 
</ref>

Science is a human activity, and scientific contributions have come from people from a wide range of different backgrounds and cultures. Historians of science increasingly see their field as part of a global history of exchange, conflict and collaboration.<ref>{{Cite book |last= Poskett |first= James |title= Horizons : a global history of science |date= 2022 |isbn= 978-0-241-39409-0 |location= [London] |oclc= 1235416152}}</ref>

The [[relationship between science and religion]] has been variously characterized in terms of "conflict", "harmony", "complexity", and "mutual independence", among others. Events in Europe such as the [[Galileo affair]] of the early 17th century – associated with the scientific revolution and the [[Age of Enlightenment]] – led scholars such as [[John William Draper]] to postulate ({{circa | 1874}}) a [[conflict thesis]], suggesting that religion and science have been in conflict methodologically, factually and politically throughout history. The "conflict thesis" has since lost favor among the majority of contemporary scientists and historians of science.<ref name="Russel, C.A. 2002 7">{{cite book |last= Russel |first=C. A. |editor-last= Ferngren |editor-first=G. B.|year= 2002| title= Science & Religion: A Historical Introduction |page= 7 |publisher= [[Johns Hopkins University Press]] |isbn= 978-0-8018-7038-5 |quote= The conflict thesis, at least in its simple form, is now widely perceived as a wholly inadequate intellectual framework within which to construct a sensible and realistic historiography of Western science.}}</ref><ref name="Shapin1996">{{cite book | last = Shapin |first=S. | year = 1996 | title = The Scientific Revolution | url = https://archive.org/details/scientificrevolu00shap_0 | url-access = registration | page = [https://archive.org/details/scientificrevolu00shap_0/page/195 195] | publisher = [[University of Chicago Press]] | isbn = 978-0226750200 | quote = In the late Victorian period it was common to write about the 'warfare between science and religion' and to presume that the two bodies of culture must always have been in conflict. However, it is a very long time since these attitudes have been held by historians of science.}}</ref><ref name="Brooke1991">{{cite book | last = Brooke |first=J. H.| year = 1991 | title = Science and Religion: Some Historical Perspectives | page= 42 | publisher = [[Cambridge University Press]] | quote = In its traditional forms, the conflict thesis has been largely discredited.}}</ref> However, some contemporary philosophers and scientists, such as [[Richard Dawkins]],<ref>
{{cite book
 |last1                = Taliaferro
 |first1               = Charles
 |author-link1         = Charles Taliaferro
 |editor-last1         = Oppy
 |editor-first1        = Graham
 |editor-link1         = Graham Oppy
 |editor-last2         = Trakakis
 |editor-first2        = N. N.
 |editor-link2         = Nick Trakakis
 |date                 = 11 September 2014
 |orig-date            = 2009
 |title                = Twentieth-Century Philosophy of Religion
 |url                  = https://books.google.com/books?id=N2h_BAAAQBAJ
 |series               = The History of Western Philosophy of Religion, Volume 5
 |edition              = reprint
 |publication-place    = Abingdon
 |publisher            = Routledge
 |isbn                 = 9781317546382
 |access-date          = 13 October 2023
 |chapter              = Twentieth-century Philosophy of Religiion: An Introduction
 |quote                = At the close of the twentieth century, proponents of the conflict thesis are well represented by Richard Dawkins, E. O. Wilson and Daniel Dennett. 
}} 
</ref> still subscribe to this thesis.

Historians have emphasized<ref>{{Cite journal |last=Shapin |first=Steven |date=September 1988 |title=The House of Experiment in Seventeenth-Century England |url=https://www.journals.uchicago.edu/doi/abs/10.1086/354773 |journal=Isis |volume=79 |issue=3 |pages=373–404 |doi=10.1086/354773 |issn=0021-1753|url-access=subscription }}</ref> that trust is necessary for agreement on claims about nature. In this light, the 1660 establishment of the [[Royal Society]] and its code of experiment – trustworthy because witnessed by its members – has become an [[Leviathan and the Air-Pump|important chapter]] in the [[historiography]] of science.<ref>{{Cite book |last= Shapin |first= Steven |title= Leviathan and the air-pump : Hobbes, Boyle, and the experimental life |date= 2018 |isbn= 978-0-691-17816-5  |location=Princeton, N.J. |oclc=984327399}}</ref> Many people in modern history (typically [[Women in science|women]] and persons of color) were excluded from elite scientific communities and [[Scientific racism|characterized by the science establishment as inferior]]. Historians in the 1980s and 1990s described the structural barriers to participation and began to recover the contributions of overlooked individuals.<ref>{{Cite book |last=Schiebinger |first= Londa L. |title= Nature's body : gender in the making of modern science |date= 2013 |publisher= Rutgers University Press |isbn= 978-0-8135-3531-9 |edition= 5th pbk. print |location= New Brunswick, N.J. |oclc= 1048657291}}</ref><ref>{{Cite book |last= Haraway |first= Donna Jeanne |title= Primate visions : gender, race, and nature in the world of modern science |date=1989 |publisher= Routledge |isbn=978-1-136-60815-5 |location=New York |oclc=555643149}}</ref> Historians have also investigated the mundane practices of science such as fieldwork and specimen collection,<ref>{{Cite journal |last= Kohler |first= Robert E. |date=December 2007 |title=Finders, Keepers: Collecting Sciences and Collecting Practice |journal= History of Science |volume= 45 |issue=4 |pages=428–454 |doi= 10.1177/007327530704500403 |s2cid= 147175644 |issn= 0073-2753}}</ref> correspondence,<ref>{{Cite journal |last=Secord |first=Anne |date=December 1994 |title=Corresponding interests: artisans and gentlemen in nineteenth-century natural history |journal=The British Journal for the History of Science |volume= 27 |issue= 4 |pages= 383–408 |doi= 10.1017/S0007087400032416 |s2cid= 144777485 |issn= 0007-0874|doi-access=free }}</ref> drawing,<ref>{{Cite book |last=Nasim |first=Omar W. |title= Observing by hand : sketching the nebulae in the nineteenth century |date= 2013 |isbn= 978-0-226-08440-4 |location=Chicago |oclc=868276095}}</ref> record-keeping,<ref>{{Cite journal |last=Eddy |first= Matthew Daniel |date= 2016 |title= The Interactive Notebook: How Students Learned to Keep Notes during the Scottish Enlightenment |journal= Book History |volume= 19 |issue=1 |pages=86–131 |doi= 10.1353/bh.2016.0002 |s2cid=151427109 |issn=1529-1499 |url= http://dro.dur.ac.uk/19136/1/19136.pdf |access-date= 17 September 2022 |archive-date=15 June 2022 |archive-url= https://web.archive.org/web/20220615185141/https://dro.dur.ac.uk/19136/1/19136.pdf |url-status= live }}</ref> and the use of laboratory and field equipment.<ref>{{Cite book |last=Schaffer |first= Simon |date= 1992-06-01 |editor-last= Bud |editor-first= Robert |editor2-last= Cozzens |editor2-first= Susan E. |title= Invisible Connections: Instruments, Institutions, and Science |chapter= Late Victorian metrology and its instrumentation: A manufactory of Ohms |journal=<!---->|series= SPIE Conference Series |volume=10309 |page=1030904  |doi= 10.1117/12.2283709|bibcode= 1992SPIE10309E..04S |s2cid=115323404 }}</ref>