The Golem at Large :What You Should Know about Technology ( Canto Classics )

Publication subTitle :What You Should Know about Technology

Publication series :Canto Classics

Author: Harry Collins; Trevor Pinch  

Publisher: Cambridge University Press‎

Publication year: 2014

E-ISBN: 9781139899864

P-ISBN(Paperback): 9781107688285

Subject: G30 scientific research theory

Keyword: 自然科学史

Language: ENG

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The Golem at Large

Description

In the very successful and widely discussed first volume in the Golem series, The Golem: What You Should Know about Science, Harry Collins and Trevor Pinch likened science to the Golem, a creature from Jewish mythology, a powerful creature which, while not evil, can be dangerous because it is clumsy. In this second volume, the authors now consider the Golem of technology. In a series of case studies they demonstrate that the imperfections in technology are related to the uncertainties in science described in the first volume. The case studies cover the role of the Patriot anti-missile missile in the Gulf War, the Challenger space shuttle explosion, tests of nuclear fuel flasks and of anti-misting kerosene as a fuel for airplanes, economic modeling, the question of the origins of oil, analysis of the Chernobyl nuclear disaster, and the contribution of lay expertise to the analysis of treatments for AIDS.

Chapter

War, science, and technology

Was Patriot a success?

What everyone agrees about Patriot

Criteria of success

The indirect criteria of success

Sales, anti-tactical missiles, and Star Wars

The local political role of Patriot

Death and destruction

The direct criteria of success

Interception and diversion

Dudding and damaging

Reaching toward the laboratory

2 The naked launch: assigning blame for the Challenger explosion

O-ring joints

The design and testing of the SRB joints

The hydroburst test

Similarity and difference

More testing

Make sure the thing’s going to work

Testing for worst scenarios

First flight of the shuttle

1981-1985 erosion and blow-by become accepted and expected

Going operational

Blow-by

The Challenger launch decision

The pre-launch teleconference

Conclusion

3 Crash!: nuclear fuel flasks and anti-misting kerosene on trial

Two crashes: a solution to technological ambivalence?

Experiments and demonstrations

The crashes reanalysed

The train crash revisited

The plane crash revisited

Imagining what might have been done

Conclusion

4 The world according to Gold: disputes about the origins of oil

Gold’s world

Who is Gold?

Which came first, the fossil or the fuel?

Abiogenic evidence?

A crucial oil well?

Give us a gusher

5 Tidings of comfort and joy: Seven Wise Men and the science of economics

What is a macroeconomic model made of?

The Seven Wise Men and their ideas

Why do macroeconometric models survive?

(i) Underlying structure versus the behaviour of the economy

(ii) Quantitative prediction

(iii) Big forecast errors

(iv) Luck

(v) Trouble with the economy

Discussion

Postscript

6 The science of the lambs: Chernobyl and the Cumbrian sheepfarmers

Fallout over Britain

The government sounds the ‘all clear’

Radioactive lambs

The science of the lambs

The Sellafield factor

Conclusion

7 ACTing UP: AIDS cures and lay expertise

AIDS: The ‘gay plague’

PART I

A vaccine in two years?

The promise of anti-viral drugs

Clinical controlled trials and the FDA

Buyers clubs

Project Inform

The trials of AZT

Equipoise

Patients as body counts

Redefining the doctor-patient relationship

Community-based trials

PART II

ACT UP

Talking good science

Activists start to win allies

The expertness of lay expertise

Teaching old dogs new tricks

Conclusion: the golem goes to work

Promises delivered

Conclusion

References and Further Reading

Index

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