Picture Control : The Electron Microscope and the Transformation of Biology in America, 1940-1960 / Nicolas Rasmussen.

Format:

Book

Author/Creator:

Rasmussen, Nicolas, Author.

Series:

Writing Science

Language:

English

Physical Description:

1 online resource (436 p.) : 36 illustrations, 3 maps

Place of Publication:

Stanford, CA : Stanford University Press, [2022]

Language Note:

In English.

Summary:

Two major questions motivate this study: How do new devices get taken up as experimental systems by scientists? How does the adoption of new instruments affect scientific knowledge? Many ramifications emerge from these two simple questions. Among these are historical questions about how, by whom, and why new instruments are introduced, or about how another, different set of instruments might be adopted given alternative social and cultural circumstances. Philosophical questions include the ways in which scientific understanding of the world depends on scientists’ instruments and techniques. Sociological questions concern such issues as how the organization of work within disciplines and laboratories and other scientific institutions may depend on the equipment employed. All these questions are addressed in this book, which draws upon a range of archival sources as well as published scientific literature, through a detailed historical treatment of the electron microscope’s introduction and early impact on the life sciences. The author first describes the introduction of the electron microscope during the World War II years, and then traces its influence on the subsequent divergence of several life sciences research traditions, including what came to constitute cell biology. The historical evidence is discussed in the light of recent discussions on the origin and nature of molecular biology, the importance of new instruments in the postwar life sciences, and the nature of research traditions, among other issues. Building on the pragmatist tradition, the author also advances an original philosophical argument on the relation of experimental technology to scientific change, arguing that matters of scientific fact (and also matters of the social organization of science) are only settled through agreement on standardized “methods of inquiry.”

Contents:

Frontmatter

Preface

Contents

Tables and Figures

Note on Usage of Technical Terms

Introduction: Scientific Knowledge and Its Means of Production

1. RCA and the War Years

Stuart Mudd and His School of Bacteriological Electron Microscopy

3 The Rockefeller School and the Rise of Cell Biology

4· Muscle, Nerve, and the Iron Men of MIT

5· Wendell Stanley, Robley Williams, and the Land of the Virus

6. Through Another Looking Glass: Lived Experience and Biological Electron Microscopy

Notes

Works Cited

Index

Notes:

Description based on online resource; title from PDF title page (publisher's Web site, viewed 24. Mai 2022)

ISBN:

1-5036-1632-0

OCLC:

1322125437