One full day of the Science in the 21st Century meeting wound up being devoted to what might be characterized as defining what we mean by Science. This started off with a talk by Harry Collins (microblogging, video), a sociologist of science who has done a great deal of work on the nature of expertise, then there was a remote presentation by Steve Fuller (no video, alas, but here's the microblogging), followed in the afternoon by Lee Smolin on "Science as an Ethical Community" (microblogging, video).
The talks by Collins and Smolin have a high information density, but are well worth a look. The really interesting part came later in the day with a discussion session (no video, but microblogging here), in which the most striking thing was the contrast between the approach taken by Collins and that taken by Smolin. The contrast between their views also closely reflects a similar conflict in the science blogosphere.
Smolin's "ethical community" definition is really meant to be inclusive. He had some stuff in there about background and credentials, but when people pushed at that, it turned out not to be much of a barrier to anything. Rather, Smolin was focussed on elucidating some shared philosophical goals for scientists, which seemed to me to be aimed at constructing a very positive view of the field as a collective endeavor aimed at making progress. It's very warm and fuzzy, and if it has a flaw, it's that his slant is a little too particular to the perspective of a theoretical physicist working on fundamental issues.
Collins, on the other hand, was very keen on finding ways to keep undesirable people out of Science. His suggested definitions, and his objections to Smolin's definition, all centered around politically charged topics, and he repeatedly said that we needed a definition that would prevent Steve Fuller from promoting Intelligent Design.
What Collins seemed to want, in a way, is a sort of guild system for science, something along the lines of the Bar Association for lawyers, through which a given person's work would be certified as Science or Not-Science based on how well it fit with certain norms. This idea has come up before, and I'm not crazy about it. At the same time, I understand the attraction of having some sort of licensing scheme for professional scientists, that would enable people to quickly distinguish crackpots from respectable scientists.
There's a tension between the inclusive definition put forth by Smolin, and the exclusive definition preferred by Collins. It's not restricted to airy academic debates, either-- you can see the same tension in science blogs (and even within ScienceBlogs). There are science blogs whose primary purpose is to promote good science, in a resolutely apolitical manner-- think Backreaction or Cognitive Daily. There are other blogs whose main focus is not so much pro-science as anti-antiscience-- think Respectful Insolence. And there are a lot of blogs that wobble back and forth in the middle-- Cosmic Variance, say, or this blog.
(I don't mean to denigrate Orac's fine work on debunking quacks and crackpots of all sorts, by the way. I actually like his blog quite a bit, and think it's one of the most essential sites on ScienceBlogs. What he's doing most of the time is strikingly different from what Dave and Greta Munger are doing, though, and the difference between their blogging modes strikes me as similar to the approaches Smolin and Collins took to defining science.)
I don't have any brilliant suggestions for a way to release this tension, or replace the competing definitions with a grand overarching definition of science that will satisfy everyone. Given the incredible variety of science, and of the people who make use of science, we're probably stuck with these definitional arguments.
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Since I was not there, let me ask if there was a discussion of what is the purpose of those definitions. From what you describe what was taking place is less of a philosophical discussion of the demarcation issue, and more of a political/sociological discussion of what should be recognized and rewarded (and presented to the public) as good science. In that context I'd find myself probably closer to Collins than to Smolin.
Since I was not there, let me ask if there was a discussion of what is the purpose of those definitions. From what you describe what was taking place is less of a philosophical discussion of the demarcation issue, and more of a political/sociological discussion of what should be recognized and rewarded (and presented to the public) as good science. In that context I'd find myself probably closer to Collins than to Smolin.
I'm a little hazy on that myself.
I think that part of the problem was that the participants in the discussion had different ideas of what they were trying to accomplish. Smolin was talking in a very philosophical vein, while Collins was much more political.
A more explicit statement of goals at the beginning might've helped clear things up a bit.
Collins's talk did not really have much of anything to do with the Demarcation Problem. He does have some strong views on the subject, and those are mostly a reaction to ideas prevalent in the Science Studies community (and Steve Fuller in particular).
Smolin's point of view is a bit more of a puzzlement. He seems interested in opening up science to the participation of a wider pool of talent than has traditionally been drawn upon. (Garrett Lisi seemed to be everyone's favourite example of the sort of person he had in mind.)
Collins's talk did not really have much of anything to do with the Demarcation Problem. He does have some strong views on the subject, and those are mostly a reaction to ideas prevalent in the Science Studies community (and Steve Fuller in particular).
Sorry-- I should've been clearer. Collins's talk was not so much about the demarcation problem (though there are places where his discussion of expertise intersects with issues of demarcation). His comments at the late-afternoon discussion, on the other hand, were almost all about demarcation, and those are what I'm mostly talking about here.
Lee's take on what he was trying to achieve was to 'explain why science is successful in explaning the universe'. So it was not intended as I understood it to be exclusive - or even really to define 'what is science' but more 'why does science work?'. Harry Collin's was very much about preventing anyone defending ID in court as science.
My memory is that we got sidetracked into arguing about the exclusionary aspects of Lee's ideas and the inclusionary aspects of Harry's when actually that wasn't the point of what either of them were saying.
Mostly because he was disagreeing rather sharply with Smolin's proposed solution.
Collins did not propose a solution, of his own, to the Demarcation Problem --- which is nearly universally considered to be a Hard Problem in the Philosophy of Science. Mostly, his remarks consisted of poking holes in Smolin's proposal. Smolin's response was that he wasn't trying to come up with a solution that would satisfy a philosopher of science. Rather, he was proposing a definition that was adequate to his, more limited, purpose.
It was all rather entertaining. But, unless you bought into Smolin's objectives, of little practical import.