Objectivity in the Making

the long version

In Objectivity in the Making Julie Robin Solomon describes how disinterestedness became a dominant principle of intellectual modernity by examining Bacon's notion of scientific self-distancing against the background of early modern political ideology, socioeconomic behavior, and traditions of learning. Solomon places Bacon between two cultures - Jacobean monarchical mercantilism and the self-distancing strategies of early-seventeenth-century traders and travelers. She shows that - by virtue of his prominent political position within the Jacobean court, familiarity with prevailing commercial practices, and humanistic learning - he made signal contributions to natural philosophy. While arguing how much the rise of scientific objectivity owed to sociohistorical circumstances, Solomon nonetheless challenges the single-minded reliance upon the explanatory power of social-construction theory within the context of literary and cultural studies of science.