Ignoring Complexity
Epistemic Wagers and Knowledge Practices among Synthetic Biologists
Bibliographic Data
| ID | 5337185 |
|---|---|
| Authors | T Dan-Cohen (0000-0002-2578-2366, Washington University in St. Louis, corresponding author) |
| Year | 2016 |
| Volume | 41 |
| Issue | 5 |
| Pages | 899-921 |
| Publication date | 2016-09-01 |
| Peer Reviewed | Yes |
| Open Access | Yes |
| Type | ARTICLE |
| Venue | Science Technology & Human Values (JOURNAL) |
| Journal identifiers | ISSN: 0162-2439 • E-ISSN: 1552-8251 |
| Publisher | SAGE Publications Inc (PUBLISHER) |
| DOI | 10.1177/0162243916650976 |
| OpenAlex | W2468692928 |
| Language | EN |
| Citations received | 11 |
| References cited | 29 |
This paper links two domains of recent interest in science and technology studies, complexity and ignorance, in the context of knowledge practices observed among synthetic biologists. Synthetic biologists are recruiting concepts and methods from computer science and electrical engineering in order to design and construct novel organisms in the lab. Their field has taken shape amidst revised assessments of life's complexity in the aftermath of the Human Genome Project. While this complexity is commonly taken to be an immanent property of biological systems, this article presents an epistemological view of complexity according to which complexity relates to a specific scientific theory or model and refers to that which exceeds the theory or model's explanatory power. This epistemological view allows us to narrate a particular story about the changing relationship between biology and synthetic biology in the last decade and accounts for early knowledge practices in synthetic biology that "ignored" biology. This article further argues that while the failure of ignorance to produce clear-cut results for synthetic biologists has led practitioners back to biology, the entanglements between different pragmatic orientations and ways of knowing trouble the implications of this return for assessments of the complexity of biological systems
Biology · Computational biology · Data science · Epistemology · Ignorance · Synthetic biology · Cell Image Analysis Techniques · Computer Science · Evolution and Genetic Dynamics · Gene Regulatory Network Analysis · Mathematics · Philosophy
Isis Current Bibliography of the History of Science and Its Cultural Influences 2019
Between the genotype and the phenotype lies the microbiome
Enacting biosocial complexity
Life inter vivos
Braining’ psychiatry
Synthetic biology
Organizational complexity in big science
Strategic ignorance and global governance
Psychiatry and the Sociology of Novelty
Epistemic artefacts
Uncertainty, Bewilderment Aversion, and the Problem of Physician Suicide
The Century of the Gene
Refiguring Life
Ignorance and Surprise
Unsimple Truths
Complexities
Representing and Intervening
Global Assemblages
Rule of Experts
Science & fabrications
Negotiating the dynamics of uncomfortable knowledge
Experimental Complexity in Biology
Science without Laws
The logic of strategic ignorance
It's always dark in front of the pickaxe
Designing Human Practices
Epistemic Cultures
| Unique citing works | 11 |
|---|---|
| Citations per year | 1,22 |
| Citation span | 2017 - 2025 (9) |
| Citation velocity | recent |
| Highly cited | No |
| Citation types | Neutral: 11 |