The Structural Transformation of the Public Sphere: An Inquiry into a Category of Bourgeois Society

In 1974 an article appeared in Science magazine with the dry-sounding title “Judgment Under Uncertainty: Heuristics and Biases” by a pair of psychologists who were not well known outside their discipline of decision theory. In it Amos Tversky and Daniel Kahneman introduced the world to Prospect Theory, which mapped out how humans actually behave when faced with decisions about gains and losses, in contrast to how economists assumed that people behave. Prospect Theory turned Economics on its head by demonstrating through a series of ingenious experiments that people are much more concerned with losses than they are with gains, and that framing a choice from one perspective or the other will result in decisions that are exactly the opposite of each other, even if the outcomes are monetarily the same. Prospect Theory led cognitive psychology in a new direction that began to uncover other human biases in thinking that are probably not learned but are part of our brain’s wiring.

Thinking fast and slow.

The presence of a Jupiter-mass companion to the star 51 Pegasi is inferred from observations of periodic variations in the star's radial velocity. The companion lies only about eight million kilometres from the star, which would be well inside the orbit of Mercury in our Solar System. This object might be a gas-giant planet that has migrated to this location through orbital evolution, or from the radiative stripping of a brown dwarf.

A Jupiter-Mass Companion to a Solar-Type Star

NUDGE: IMPROVING DECISIONS ABOUT HEALTH, WEALTH, AND HAPPINESS by Richard H. Thaler and Cass R. Sunstein Penguin Books, 2009, 312 pp, ISBN 978-0-14-311526-7This book is best described formally as a general explanation of and advocacy for libertarian paternalism, a term coined by the authors in earlier publications. Informally, it is about how leaders, systems, organizations, and governments can nudge people to do the things the nudgers want and need done for the betterment of the nudgees, or of society. It is paternalism in the sense that "it is legitimate for choice architects to try to influence people's behavior in order to make their lives longer, healthier, and better", (p. 5) It is libertarian in that "people should be free to do what they like - and to opt out of undesirable arrangements if they want to do so", (p. 5) The built-in possibility of opting out or making a different choice preserves freedom of choice even though people's behavior has been influenced by the nature of the presentation of the information or by the structure of the decisionmaking system. I had never heard of libertarian paternalism before reading this book, and I now find it fascinating.Written for a general audience, this book contains mostly social and behavioral science theory and models, but there is considerable discussion of structure and process that has roots in mathematical and quantitative modeling. One of the main applications of this social system is economic choice in investing, selecting and purchasing products and services, systems of taxes, banking (mortgages, borrowing, savings), and retirement systems. Other quantitative social choice systems discussed include environmental effects, health care plans, gambling, and organ donations. Softer issues that are also subject to a nudge-based approach are marriage, education, eating, drinking, smoking, influence, spread of information, and politics. There is something in this book for everyone.The basis for this libertarian paternalism concept is in the social theory called "science of choice", the study of the design and implementation of influence systems on various kinds of people. The terms Econs and Humans, are used to refer to people with either considerable or little rational decision-making talent, respectively. The various libertarian paternalism concepts and systems presented are tested and compared in light of these two types of people. Two foundational issues that this book has in common with another book, Network of Echoes: Imitation, Innovation and Invisible Leaders, that was also reviewed for this issue of the Journal are that 1 ) there are two modes of thinking (or components of the brain) - an automatic (intuitive) process and a reflective (rational) process and 2) the need for conformity and the desire for imitation are powerful forces in human behavior. …

Nudge: Improving Decisions about Health, Wealth, and Happiness

Stakeholder participation for environmental management: A literature review

Introduction Alan Irwin and Brian Wynne 1. Misunderstood misunderstandings: social identities and the public uptake of science Brian Wynne 2. Science and hell's kitchen: the local understanding of hazard issues Alan Irwin, Alison Dale and Denis Smith 3. Authorising science: public understanding of science in museums Sharon Macdonald 4. Disembodied knowledge? Making sense of medical science Helen Lambert and Hilary Rose 5. Now you see it, now you don't: mediating science and managing uncertainty in reproductive medicine Frances Price 6. Knowing ignorance and ignoring knowledge: discourses of ignorance in the public understanding of science Mike Michael 7. Insiders and outsiders: identifying experts on home ground Rosemary McKechnie 8. Nature's advocates: on putting science to work in environmental organisations Steven Yearley.

Misunderstanding science? : the public reconstruction of science and technology

Introduction 1. Science and Citizenship 3. Science, Citizenship and Environmental Threat 4. Witnesses, Participants and Major Accident Hazards 5. Freeing the Voices: A Science of the People 6. Building Sustainable Futures: Science Shops and Social Experiments 7. Science, Citizenship and Troubled Modernity

Citizen Science: A Study of People, Expertise and Sustainable Development

Talk of public dialogue and engagement has become fashionable internationally, and particularly within Europe. Building especially upon recent British experience, this paper argues that ‘public talk’ (that is, talk both by and about the public) represents an important site for science and technology studies analysis. The relationship between ‘new’ and ‘old’ approaches to scientific governance is considered. Drawing upon a series of official reports, and also the GM Nation? public debate over genetically modified food, the paper suggests that, rather than witnessing the emergence of a new governance paradigm, the current approach can more accurately be portrayed as an uneasy blend of ‘old’ and ‘new’ assumptions. Eschewing a straightforward normative account, the paper explores the social construction of public talk, the relationship between talk and trust, the search for the ‘innocent’ citizen, and the pursuit of social consensus. Current initiatives should not simply be criticized for their inadequacies, ...

The Politics of Talk Coming to Terms with the ‘New’ Scientific Governance

The relationship between science policy and public opinion has become a lively topic in the UK - especially with regard to the BSE crisis and genetically modified foods. A number of governmental publications have recently advocated greater public dialogue and engagement. In this general context, the paper explores the configuration of scientific citizenship and of the scientific citizen within policy and consultation processes. Building upon a detailed examination of one important social experiment - the Public Consultation on Developments in the Biosciences - the social construction of both science and public consultation is considered. With particular attention to the framing of issues for public debate, the constitution of audience and the construction of citizenship, the paper argues the need to move beyond mere sloganizing over science and democracy. The discussion concludes with a presentation of competing technologies of community and an assessment of their significance for the future practice of s...

Constructing the scientific citizen: Science and democracy in the biosciences

Preface Introducing theory, context and practice The public understanding of science and technology from cognition to context Science and public policy from government to governance Social theory and science Re-conceptualising science, society and governance Ethno-epistemic assemblages heterogeneity and relationality in scientific citizenship Politics and method governing the assemblage, unearthing the rhizome Conclusion Index.

Alan Irwin

Papers

Misunderstanding science? : the public reconstruction of science and technology

Citizen Science: A Study of People, Expertise and Sustainable Development

The Politics of Talk Coming to Terms with the ‘New’ Scientific Governance

Constructing the scientific citizen: Science and democracy in the biosciences

Science, Social Theory and Public Knowledge