Rival Interpretive Approaches in the Historiography of Science

Prior to the publication of Kuhn’s Structure of Scientific Revolutions in 1962, many histories of science offered accounts that assumed a progressive narrative. In Kuhn’s wake, many histories of science written by historians rejected progressive narratives (or “Whig histories” as they were sometimes called by their critics), opting instead for accounts that promoted a constructivist picture of the activity of science. Historian of science Jan Golinski has characterized constructivism as an interpretive approach that directs “attention at the role of human beings as social actors in the making of scientific knowledge.” The tension between scholars who embrace constructivism and those deeply suspicious of its utility and influence led to lack of cooperation between historians of science and philosophers of science in the later decades of the twentieth century and into the twenty-first century. After the Sokal Hoax in 1996 and the ensuing “Science Wars” abated, efforts have been made to bring into better alignment the history of science and the philosophy of science. One vision behind this effort is the integrated History and Philosophy of Science or iHPS. No single interpretive approach defines iHPS. I argue that the historiographies of science that underwrite iHPS may benefit from borrowing some of the intellectual resources used by philosophers working in the history of philosophy. I lay out what I take to be the basics of this interpretive approach, along with its perceived advantages, including charting a path between Whig history and constructivism."