PULSEA Journal  in History,  Sociology,  and  

Philosophy of Science

                              VOLUME 2                                                         2014

Organic Epistemologies, Disciplinary Biographies: LIFE AND METHOD

The second volume of Pulse: A Journal in History, Philosophy, and Sociology of Science (2014) is

dedicated to a careful consideration of the ways in which historically-situated local practices,

discourses, imaginaries, communities, and objects of research constitutive of “science” can be seen to

transform our understandings of and interactions with “living” entities. Moreover, in the process of re-

conceptualizing life at different levels and from different perspectives, such epistemic enterprises find

themselves profoundly transformed. The title of the volume is meant to capture this tensioned

proximity between the “living” as subject of knowledge and as inherent characteristic of knowledge

processes: the “organicity” of knowledge revealed through a(n) (inter)disciplinary biography centered

on the problematics of what life is, how it manifests itself, and in what conditions. Is there a tension,

for instance, between the ways “life” is currently being defined and debated in biotechnology and

biophilosophy? What kinds of methods are considered appropriate for the conceptual and operational

'capturing' of the living? Are there any 'bio-revolutions' both within specific disciplinary histories, and

within history and philosophy of science more broadly, that have simultaneously changed the way we

speak about life and about science? Is there a methodological 'bio-chauvinism' (biocentrism) on the

rise, whereby methods of analysis and experimentation are seen as in need of modeling their object

(“life”) in order to better account for it? How can such changes of epistemic regime be contextualized

with respect to local shifts in gender, race, and class relations, in sexuality regimes, in historical

conditions of manual and intellectual labor, in what comes to stand under the label “nature” within the

confines of the laboratory or of the computer screen?

A plethora of bio-disciplines emerged at the intersection of historiographical macro-shifts concerning

the nature of scientificity and scientific change, and disciplinary micro-shifts concerning the

idiosyncrasies and complexities of the living. From biophysics, biochemistry, bioastrophysics,

bioinformatics, to bioanthropology and bioarcheology, and further on to biopolitics, bioeconomics,

biomanagement, biopedagogism, biophilosophy, biotheology, biotecture and bioart, different fields in

both the sciences and the humanities seem to engage in critical self-reflexiveness, and to re-

conceptualize their own subjects, methodologies, and goals precisely as they become involved in a

broader historical reconsideration of the ontology and epistemology of the living.

We welcome interdisciplinary work on relevant topics:

− cross-comparative perspectives on discipline-specific practices directed at the

identification, characterization, and manipulation of the “living” (ex. life as organization, from

perspectives such as systems biology and political theory; life as information, from the

perspective of genetics and cybernetics etc.)

− disciplinary biographies centered on self-reflexive moments when the direction, main

questions, and relevant methodologies of a discipline were objects of inquiry in themselves

− historical epistemology (Hegel, Michel Foucault, Georges Canguilhem, Hans-Jörg

Rheinberger, Ian Hacking etc.), biophilosophy (Jakob von Uexküll, Henri Bergson, Gilbert

Simondon, Deleuze), or philosophy of biology as offering model spaces for the practice of an

“organic epistemology”?

− author-centered inquiries

− metaphors & metalanguage in constructing particular perspectives on the living, and

particular trajectories of knowledge of the living

− the possibility of an aesthetics of bioscience/ bioaesthetics in philosophy

− biography as life-experiment

We are interested in asking about the genealogy of our concepts of “life,” and about how those

inter/disciplinary genealogies contributed in turn to the emergence, erasure, preeminence, or fading-

into-the-background of specific disciplines, of specific modes of inquiry, of specific tools and

behaviors. We welcome submission of articles (3,000-5,000 words) and essays (2,000-3,000) on these

themes.

All abstracts and questions should be submitted to pulse.scistudies@gmail.com.

We also have a call for Editors, designers, and those interested in assisting with other elements of the journal which can be found at our Facebook page: https://www.facebook.com/pulse.scistudies.

Timeline:December 15th, 2013 - Abstracts dueJanuary 15th, 2014- Selected Authors InformedFebruary 15th, 2014- First half of paper (1,000-2,500 words) due.April 15th, 2014- Final Paper DueJune/July- Journal Published

Pulse is a graduate-student, peer-reviewed journal founded and housed within Central European Uni-versity and particularly within the CEU Science Studies Research Unit. For consulting the first issue of Pulse please visit: http://bit.ly/19Lk7cH