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buthistorically
and sociallyvariable.Havingconcededa multitude
of incommensurable
axiomaticstructures,
each consonantin some
waywithreality,Ajdukiewiczcould notexplainwhypeople in fact
chose one ratherthan another. Fleck argued that such choices
were dictated by the circumstancesin which collectivesfound
themselves.Thus Fleck certainlygained much-fromhis philosophical contemporaries,but his genius lay in the abilityto use
what littlesociologyhe knew in order to open up for empirical
analysisthoseepistemologicalissuesto whichthephilosophershad
no answer.
By the mid-1930s the most productive period for Fleck's
sociological work was over. With the German occupation of
Poland in 1941, he was confinedto Lwow's Jewishghetto,where
appalling sanitary conditions meant that 70 percent of the
inhabitantssufferedfrom typhus. In the ghetto hospital he
attempted to develop a vaccine against typhus until he was
deportedin 1943 to Auschwitzand subsequentlyto Buchenwald.
There, in the Waffen-SS'sInstitutefor Hygiene he directed a
laboratorywhose task was to develop a typhusvaccine which
would protectSS guardsfrominfection.Even duringthisperiod
Fleck remainedinterestedin the natureof scientific
inquiry.In an
essay published after the war he described the social process
wherebyone of the teamsin his laboratory(composed exclusively
of bacteriologicallyilliterate members) managed to convince
themselvesinitiallyof the validityof theirfindings,as well as the
subsequentprocess wherebythat certaintywas graduallyunderminedbyparticularevents.
From the end of the war untilthe late 1950s,withprofessional
recognition,a large researchschool and muchimprovedfacilities
in Lublin and Warsaw, Fleck's bacteriologicalwork flourished
while his sociological interestsreceded. In 1957 he emigratedto
Israel,wherehe died in 1961.
By any reckoning,Fleck was a remarkablescholar. That he
managed not only to stay abreast of historyand philosophyof
science while pursuing a medical career but also to publish
to thatliteratureis impressive.That thispublished
contributions
workshould have provedhighlyoriginal,even twentyyearslater,
is phenomenal.There can be littledoubt, therefore,thatLudwik
Fleck is a figureof considerablehistoricalinterest,even thoughhis
sociologicalwork made littleimpactin its own time. But are his
ideas stillnovel? What mightthe sociologyof knowledgebe able
to learnfromFleck today?
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FleckversusKuhn
When readingFleck, the modernwriterwho mostoftencomes to
mind is T.S. Kuhn. Both of them developed generalizable
propositionsabout scientificchange in the course of detailed
historical analysis rather than in the more abstract manner
common among philosophers.Various writershave noted the
strikingsimilaritiesbetween Fleck's conception of science and
Kuhn's 'normalscience',themostimportant
ofwhichare these:
1. According to Fleck, scientists'work is characterizedby a
traditionof sharedassumptions('thought-style')
whichare largely
invisibleto membersand thusrarelyquestioned(ET: 1929).
2. These assumptions,he argues, definewhich questions are
significantand prefigurethe appropriate answers (GDSF 40,
83-84, 104).
3. Using severalvividexamples,Fleck showsthatperceptionis
an active and selective Gestalt process, conditionedby these
assumptions.When one initiallylooks at objects in a visual field,
the impressionsare unclear and chaotic. With experience they
acquire shape and identitythroughcategoriesprovided by the
prevailingthought-style
(ET: 1929, 1935, 1947; GDSF 28-30,
90-92).
4. Challenges to the thought-style
as commonlyrejected or
assimilated(GDSF sec. 2.3; ET: 1935).
5. Members of differentresearch communities ('thoughtcollectives') adhere to differentthought-styles
and tend to talk
pastone another(ET: 1936; GDSF 109).
6. Admission to the research communityproceeds via a
dogmatic form of education. The prevailing thought-styleis
transmittedto the pupil, not throughthe masteryof formal
principles,but througha process of 'experience' that cannot be
rationallyreconstructed
butwhichresultsin theacquisitionofcraft
knowledge(ET: 1927, 1935, 1946; GDSF 52-54, 87ff.,95-97).
7. As scientificknowledge develops, its scope widens, we
acquire more knowledgeoverall, and some older problemsare
solved, but the process is patchy. Science cannot be said to
approach the truthbecause successive thought-styles
raise new
problemswhile discardingolder areas of understanding(ET 55,
125, 132; GDSF 19, 51, 137-39).
Inevitably,thereare also differences
betweenFleck and Kuhn,
both rhetoricaland substantive.Among the former,as Baldamus
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Thought-Style
and Thought-Collective
In keepingwithhis explicitlysociologicalanalysisof science,Fleck
has rather more to say about the structureof the scientific
is borne by a
communitythan does Kuhn. Each thought-style
Withina giventhought-style
thereexistmany
thought-collective.
which are developed by
particular concepts/theories/methods
each sectorconsisting
particularsectorsof the thought-collective,
of a small'esotericcircle'of specialistsand a larger'exotericcircle'
thusconsistsof manyesoof non-experts.The thought-collective
and exo-tericcircleswhichoverlapsincean individualscientistwill
belong simultaneouslyto one esotericbut manyexotericcircles.
Withinscience,these circlesare mutuallydependent:membersof
the exoteric circle must accept on trustthe knowledge-claims
generatedby the esotericcircle,whiletheultimatevalidityof such
claims (hence the possibilityof progress) rests on the exoteric
circle's assent. In this way, Fleck emphasizes, the scientific
communityis fundamentally'democratic': the esoteric elite
proposes, and the exoteric mass disposes. The structureof a
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religiousor metaphysicalthought-collective,
in contrast,is undemocraticbecause itsexotericcircleslack thepowerto challenge
itsesotericcircle'sclaims(ET: 1929).
Unfortunately,Fleck's discussion of social structureis very
abstract.He makes littleattempt,forexample,to relatehis richly
detailed accountof observation,classificationand the emergence
of a fact in bacteriologyto an equally detailed analysis of the
organization of the respective scientificcommunities.Furthermore, when he applies the terms 'thought-collective'and
'thought-style'
to concrete science, his analysis is inconsistent.
'Modern science' is said to constitutea single thought-collective
(GDSF 103, 105), Similarly,he refersfrequentlyto thethoughtstyle of modern science, as opposed to those of religion,art,
fashion,sport,or politics. On the other hand, he also refersin
passing to the distinctivethought-styles
of differentscientific
disciplines(GDSF 108) and even, as in the quotation above, of
differentscientists,withoutreconcilingthese divergentusages.
Towards the end of his monograph(section 4.5), he begins to
applythe termthought-style
in a more promisingway, discussing
differentstyles within a given discipline but only in widely
separated historical periods. Without conceptual elaboration,
therefore,his analysis is not as useful as it might be to
contemporary
sociologistsand historiansinterestedin contrasting
styleswithina givendisciplinein a particularperiod.
Quite apartfromthese ambiguitiesconcerningthe scope of the
term 'thought-collective',
the meaning of 'thought-style'
is also
disturbingly
broad. It is said to:
directperception(ET: 1935)
specifyquestionsto ask and solutionsto be sought(ET 48), as
well as methodsto use (GDSF 99)
conferintellectualpredispositions
and habits(ET 68)
establish'a certainmood' (GDSF 99).
Whentheconceptis stretchedto coverso muchground,itends up
meaninglittlemore than 'presupposition'.This minimalmeaning
may, of course, have been very usefulfor Fleck's attacksupon
logical positivismduringthe 1930s, but it is hardlynovel today
when the presuppositionalnatureof science has been argued so
often.
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is Fleck's suggestionthatpresuppositions
Much moreinteresting
may arise fromnon-rationalcommitmentto
of a thought-style
primitiveimagesor metaphors(Urideen)- forexample,the idea
of fouledblood in syphilisresearch(GDSF), the analogybetween
fireand lifein medicineand physiology(ET: 1936), or the model
of 'attack and defence' in the conceptualizationof infectious
disease (GDSF 59ff).Necessarilyderivedfrominheritedpopular
notions,such images are reshapedby the scientificcommunityin
orderto yieldconceptswhose morespecificmeaningbetterserves
the collective'sparticularpurposes.Like a letter,therefore,every
scientificconceptbears signsof both its originand its destination
(ET 92), itspast as well as itsfuture.
To conceptualizethe structureand emergenceof thought-styles
in thisway- thatis, to propose thattheyare based upon a small
numberof ontologicaland epistemologicalassumptionsendorsed
- is certainly
useful.But
by the membersof a thought-collective
since Fleck failed to develop these insights,he has littleto offer
those already familiarwith more recent concepts such as root
metaphor,themata (G. Holton), the hard-core of a research
embodiedin themodels
programme(Lakatos), or themetaphysics
matrix(Kuhn).
and values of a disciplinary
Finally,thereis the question of the relationbetween thoughtstyle and the process of thinking. Unfortunately, Fleck
ways which were
approached this relation in two contradictory
never reconciled. In a materialistvein he argued that human
beings control their ideas ratherthan vice versa, and that our
imposedby the
knowledgeis shaped, at least partly,byconstraints
real world(ET 70, 75, 126, 168; GDSF 38, 46, 51). On the other
hand,however,as StephenToulminand David Bloor noted at the
Hamburg symposium,he repeatedlyinsistedthat thought-style
'dictates'and 'coerces' how and whatthe scientistsees and thinks
(ET 75; GDSF 41, 122). Clearly,thislatteridealistinterpretation
of style fitsvery poorly with Fleck's Wittgensteineanemphasis
upon the continualrenegotiationof meaningswithina collective,
includingchangesin meaningof the styleitself.For exampleFleck
wrote:
... while it lasted, only one solutionto any given problemconformedto that
style... Such a stylizedsolution,and thereis alwaysonlyone, ... is always,or
almostalways,completelydeterminedwithina thoughtstyle.(GDSF 100)
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speaking,biographicalin approach. These essays (by N. Rotenstreich, Jerzy Giedymin, B. Wolniewicz, W. Markiewicz, T.
Schnelle, B. Zalc, A. Moulin and I. Lowy) relate Fleck's
epistemologicaland scientificviewsto a varietyof intellectualand
social contexts: developmentsin twentieth-century
philosophy,
interwarPolish philosophicaltraditions,the cultureof Lwow, and
schools of thoughtwithininterwarbacteriologyand immunology.
The second categoryaddressesgeneralproblemsof epistemology.
These authors(S. Toulmin,P.A. Heelan, Y. Elkana, D. Wittich,
S. Shapin and D. Bloor) use Fleck's workin variousways. Some
are criticalwhileothersappropriateFleck as an allyin advancinga
favouredepistemologicalposition.Significantly,
however,none of
these commentators(with the possible exception of Dieter
Wittich)makes a serious claim for the heuristicvalue of Fleck's
conceptsin contemporary
sociologyof knowledge.Wittichargues
that Fleck's work offersfar more theoreticalpossibilitiesthan
Kuhn's,but hisargument(confinedto 318-19) is too condensedto
be convincing.
It is thusdifficult
not to agree withBaldamus' judgement(see
note 7) that,while enormouslyinsightful
and pioneering,Fleck's
workis not systematicenoughto have had the impact,even in the
favourable climate of the 1960s and 1970s, enjoyed by The
Structureof ScientificRevolutions.Various observershave noted
conceptual inconsistencieswithin Fleck's monograph, and in
several places towards the end of the book (section 4.3) he
apologized fortruncateddiscussionof variouspoints,all of which
suggeststhathe wrotein haste.
The comparisonwithKuhn is again instructive.Like 'thoughtstyle',the conceptof 'paradigm'was originallyused by Kuhn, to
its detriment,in a greatvarietyof ways. But unlikeFleck, Kuhn
was a member of a professionalcommunityof historiansand
philosophersof science whose criticalresponsesled himto refine
theconceptsuccessfully.Paradigmas 'exemplar'characterizesthe
process of scientificdiscoverymuch more specificallythan does
'thought-style',
and even paradigmas 'disciplinarymatrix'- very
- is moreprecisein that
close in meaningto thatof thought-style
it identifiesparticular kinds of cognitive elements: symbolic
generalizations,exemplaryproblem-solutions,
models and values.
It is hardlysurprising,of course, that Fleck's insightsso often
remain underdeveloped.Not only was he of necessitya 'sparetime philosopher', but the only academic communitywhose
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* NOTES
For helpfulcommentson a previous draft,I am indebted to Peter Halfpenny,
Steven Shapin, Richard Whitleyand Edward Yoxen. Many thanks to Thomas
Schnelleforprovidingme withseveralworkspriorto publication.
1. W. Baldamus, 'The Role of Discoveries in Social Science', in T. Shanin
(ed.), The RulesoftheGame (London: Tavistock,1972), 276-302.
2. (Under review), henceforthGDSF. The editors of this edition are to be
variouspassages whichFleck
thankedforprovidingan indexas well as translating
had leftin Latin.
Tatsache (under
3. Entstehungund Entwicklung einer wissenschaftlichen
EEWT.
review),henceforth
4. Schnelle,LudwikFleck: Leben und Denken (underreview).
5. Erfahrungund Tatsache (under review). Referenceto specificpassages in
thisbook will be givenin the textas ET, followedby the relevantpage numbers.
General referencesto entireessayswillbe indicatedby 'ET:', followedbythe year
ofpublication.
6. 'Kolloquium Ludwik Fleck', Hamburg, 13-16 September 1981. The proceedings of thisconferencehave been recentlypublishedas Cohen and Schnelle
(eds), Cognitionand Fact (underreview).The volumeincludesEnglishtranslations
of Fleck's essayson sociologyof knowledge,originallypublishedas Erfahrungund
Tatsache:
'Some SpecificFeaturesoftheMedical Way ofThinking'(1927)
'On theCrisisof Reality'(1929)
'ScientificObservationand Perceptionin General' (1935)
'The Problemof Epistemology'(1936)
'Problemsof theScience ofScience' (1946)
'To Look, to See, to Know' (1947)
'Crisisin Science' (I 960)
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