Laboratory Studies: A Comment on the State of the Art

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Abstract
Current work in `laboratory studies' promises to contribute a detailed understanding of scientific practice to the social study of science. However, much depends on the extent to which we take as unproblematic the idea of studying science `as it happens'. A distinction is developed between instrumental and reflexive conceptions of the ethnography of scientific practice. The former is characterized by the use of observer experiences for preconceived theoretical purposes and by the evasion of major difficulties in the production of sociological description. Reflexive ethnography retains the ability to produce `news' about scientific work, but also opens up new ways of addressing fundamental questions about reasoning practices in general. Sources of antipathy to reflexive ethnography are outlined, notably that stemming from the selective application of epistemological relativism implicit in recent calls for a revision of epistemological attitudes to science.

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