On Demarcations between Science in Context and the Context of Science

Abstract

As far as I can remember most historians of science of the post-World War II generation acknowledged the significance of examining scientific documents in conjunction with the contextual circumstances in which science developed. Historians, it seems, simply took the pertinence of contextual circumstances for granted. That perspective was endemic to the times and inherent in the questions being raised from within the discipline. The generation of historians of science and technology mentioned here were lured into history almost immediately after the end of World War II. For most of them, who were trained scientists, history became the vocation; the subject matter of these new endeavors nevertheless remained firmly rooted in the sciences.