The HPS Podcast - Conversations from History, Philosophy and Social Studies of Science

After a short break, The HPS Podcast is back! Season 5 opens with a special handover episode. After several years as lead host, Samara Greenwood passes the mic to fellow PhD candidate Thomas Spiteri. Together, they look back on the podcast’s journey, what it has meant to them, and where it’s headed next.Hear from Samara and Thomas as they:Introduce Thomas as the new host and share plans for Season 5Reflect on hosting highlights and lessons learnedDiscuss insights from the 10th Integrated HPS Conference at Caltech (2025)Explore what it means to do integrated HPSWrap up with a lightning round on favourite concepts, research obsessions, and booksPlus, some exciting news: The HPS Podcast has received the 2024 BSHS Ayrton Prize for Public Engagement! Whether you’ve been with us from the beginning or are tuning in for the first time, this episode sets the stage for an exciting new season. We thank you for joining us!Relevant LinksThe HPS Podcast Website | hpsunimelb.orgBSHS Ayrton Prize – Public EngagementIntegrated HPS Conference 2024 – CaltechSamara Greenwood – University of MelbourneMusic by ComaStudio.Transcript coming soon.Thanks for listening to The HPS Podcast. You can find more about us on our website, Bluesky, Instagram and Facebook feeds.  This podcast would not be possible without the support of School of Historical and Philosophical Studies at the University of Melbourne and the Hansen Little Public Humanities Grant scheme.Music by ComaStudio. Website HPS Podcast | hpsunimelb.org

In the lead up to the launch of Season 5, we at The HPS Podcast are re-releasing some favourite episodes from our collection.In this episode Professors Lorraine Daston and Peter Harrison talk to Samara Greenwood on the often complex, sometimes fraught relationship between practicing scientists and the history of science. This episode was originally released on March 07, 2024.The transcript can be found at - S3 Ep1 - Lorraine Daston & Peter Harrison TranscriptThanks for listening to The HPS Podcast. You can find more about us on our website, Bluesky, Instagram and Facebook feeds.  This podcast would not be possible without the support of School of Historical and Philosophical Studies at the University of Melbourne and the Hansen Little Public Humanities Grant scheme.Music by ComaStudio. Website HPS Podcast | hpsunimelb.org

In the lead up to the launch of Season 5, we at The HPS Podcast are re-releasing some favourite episodes from our collection.In this episode, Professor Hasok Chang talks with Samara Greenwood about his concept of 'Epistemic Iteration', the idea that scientific inquiries do not start from a solid foundation, but rather begin from an imperfect position, using the outcomes of our further inquiry to refine and correct the original starting point.This episode was originally released on December 4, 2023.The transcript can be found at - Hasok Chang Transcript - S2 Ep 11___Thanks for listening to The HPS Podcast. You can find more about us on our website, Bluesky, Instagram and Facebook feeds.  This podcast would not be possible without the support of School of Historical and Philosophical Studies at the University of Melbourne and the Hansen Little Public Humanities Grant scheme.Music by ComaStudio. Website HPS Podcast | hpsunimelb.org

In the lead up to the launch of Season 5, we at The HPS Podcast are re-releasing some favourite episodes from our collection.In this episode we have Dr Rachael Brown talking to Samara Greenwood on challenge the common idea that Science is (and should be) 'Value-Free'. At a practical level, in choosing which phenomena to study, and how best to study them, can science really ever be value-free? Second, would we want it to, even if it could? Isn't it possible that, if used appropriately, values provide a beneficial component of the scientific process.This episode was originally released on July 13, 2023.The transcript can be found at - S1 Ep 7 - Rachael Brown on 'Values in Science'Thanks for listening to The HPS Podcast. You can find more about us on our website, Bluesky, Instagram and Facebook feeds.  This podcast would not be possible without the support of School of Historical and Philosophical Studies at the University of Melbourne and the Hansen Little Public Humanities Grant scheme.Music by ComaStudio. Website HPS Podcast | hpsunimelb.org

In the lead up to the launch of Season 5, we at The HPS Podcast are re-releasing some favourite episodes from our collection.First, we have Dr Kristian Camilleri talking with Samara Greenwood about the relatively recent realisation that this thing we call 'Science' is a less unified phenomena then is typically supposed. The 'disunity' becomes clear when we appreciate that scientific disciplines have developed in divergent ways and often employ very different methods and practices. This episode was originally released on June 8, 2023.The transcript can be found at - S1 Ep 2 - Kristian Camilleri on 'The Disunity of Science'Thanks for listening to The HPS Podcast. You can find more about us on our website, Bluesky, Instagram and Facebook feeds.  This podcast would not be possible without the support of School of Historical and Philosophical Studies at the University of Melbourne and the Hansen Little Public Humanities Grant scheme.Music by ComaStudio. Website HPS Podcast | hpsunimelb.org

Today we have not one, not two, but five fabulous guests who all presented at this year’s conference for the Society for Philosophy of Science in Practice, or SPSP24 for short. Many philosophers of science we have featured on the podcast, including Hasok Chang, Rachel Ankeny and Sabina Leonelli, were founding members of SPSP. Also, our earlier episode on ‘The Turn to Practice’ in philosophy of science has been one of our most popular. Therefore, it seemed an obvious decision to dedicate our final episode of the season to hearing from some of those doing current work in the area.Leading us further into the world of Philosophy of Science in Practice is our foreign correspondent Joshua Eistenthal, philosopher of physics at Caltech and regular contributor to the podcast. Thanks to Josh, we bring you compelling conversations with philosophers Julia Bursten, Aja Watkins, Sindhuja Bhakthavatsalam, Caleb Hazelwood, and Joseph Rouse.This is also Samara Greenwood's last episode as co-ordinator, producer and co-host of the podcast.Transcript coming soon.Relevant links:Society for Philosophy of Science in Practice | Mission statementSPSP 2024 - 10th Biennial Conference, South CarolinaSPSP 2024 - Conference Book of AbstractsThanks for listening to The HPS Podcast. You can find more about us on our website, Bluesky, Instagram and Facebook feeds.  This podcast would not be possible without the support of School of Historical and Philosophical Studies at the University of Melbourne and the Hansen Little Public Humanities Grant scheme.Music by ComaStudio. Website HPS Podcast | hpsunimelb.org

"It wouldn’t make sense to leave the entire burden of upholding objectivity in science on the shoulders of fallible individuals, right?" Prof. Fiona Fidler Today, we return to one of our favourite episodes, with the person who first came up with the idea for our podcast – Professor Fiona Fidler. Fiona is head of our History and Philosophy of Science Program at the University of Melbourne and co-lead of the MetaMelb research initiative. In this episode Fiona first discusses her early move from psychology to HPS when she was struck by the ‘dodgy’ statistical methods she found prevalent in many sciences. She has since dedicated her career to studying scientific practice to help improve confidence in scientific claims.Fiona introduces us to the concept of ‘Collective Objectivity’. Following from an earlier podcast on 'Values in Science' by Rachel Brown, Fiona discusses how contemporary understandings of objectivity have become more sophisticated.Rather than viewing objectivity in science as solely the role of individuals, today we understand there are strong social dimensions to ensuring scientific outcomes are not unduly biased.  As Fiona discusses, this not only requires diversity in 'who does science' to ensure multiple perspectives are incorporated, but we also need multiple collective review mechanisms to ensure we are developing truly robust, reliable, objective outcomes. A full transcript of this episode can be found hereRelevant links:AIMOS - Association for Interdisciplinary Meta-Research and Open ScienceProfile: Prof Fiona Fidler (unimelb.edu.au)Blog Post: MetaMelb – A New Research Initiative (hpsunimelb.org)Website: MetaMelb research groupStanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy - Objectivity as a Feature of Scientific Communities & Objectivity as a Social ProcessWhat is P Hacking: Methods & Best PracticesThanks for listening to The HPS Podcast. You can find more about us on our website, Bluesky, Instagram and Facebook feeds.  This podcast would not be possible without the support of School of Historical and Philosophical Studies at the University of Melbourne and the Hansen Little Public Humanities Grant scheme.Music by ComaStudio. Website HPS Podcast | hpsunimelb.org

"These conversations are the focus of fierce debate, not because scientists lack authority, but because these are the intellectual battles worth fighting. These are the stakes on which modern society depends"Our guest today is Erika Milam, Charles C. and Emily R. Gillispie Professor in the History of Science at Princeton University.Through her research, Erika has found it useful to coin the term ‘Colloquial Science’ to describe work that deals with technical scientific topics but is produced in such a way as to be accessible to a variety of audiences.The term colloquial science can be distinguished from other terms, such as popular science, as it is concerned with shared conversations between specialists and non-specialists.  Examples of colloquial science, including scientific memoirs, magazine articles, documentaries - and even podcasts – can act as critical sources of inspiration for practicing scientists as well as future generations of researchers. Transcript at: www.hpsunimelb.org/post/s4-ep-10-erika-milam-on-colloquial-science  Related resourcesErika Lorraine Milam | Personal WebsiteErika Lorraine Milam | Princeton UniversityCreatures of Cain by Erika Lorraine Milam | Princeton University PressErika Milam on Human Nature in Cold War America | JHI Podcast The Immense Journey by Loren Eiseley | GoodreadsTeaching | Erika Lorraine MilamThanks for listening to The HPS Podcast. You can find more about us on our website, Bluesky, Instagram and Facebook feeds.  This podcast would not be possible without the support of School of Historical and Philosophical Studies at the University of Melbourne and the Hansen Little Public Humanities Grant scheme.Music by ComaStudio. Website HPS Podcast | hpsunimelb.org

“This is Holden Thorp. I'm the Editor in Chief of Science and thanks to Sam and Carmelina for all they're doing to get the word out about the history and philosophy of science”Today's guest is Holden Thorp, professor of chemistry at George Washington University and Editor-in-Chief of the Science family of journals.In April of this year, Holden published an editorial in Science with the tantalising title ‘Teach Philosophy of Science’. Holden called for more substantial teaching of history and philosophy of science across undergraduate and graduate science curricula. He argued that learning about the historical and philosophical foundations of science is crucial for improving public trust. Encouraging deeper consideration of ongoing revision in science, as well as historical and societal contexts, will better equip future researchers and professionals with a more nuanced perspective on how robust, reliable knowledge is established.In the months since its publication the editorial provoked significant discussion across social media, so we decided to reach out to Holden to join us for a more in-depth conversation. We were keen to see exactly what role Holden saw for HPS scholars in such a shift and test his willingness to engage with the more challenging insights that research across History, Philosophy and Sociology of Science bring to the surface.A full transcript of the episode can be accessed here: https://www.hpsunimelb.org/post/s4-ep-9-holden-thorp-on-teach-history-and-philosophy-of-science Relevant links:'Teach philosophy of science' | Editorial by Holden Thorp | ScienceHolden's Seminar | 'Unreasonable Doubt' | The George Washington University'Cracking the Code of Science Denial' | On Holden's Seminar | GW Today'It matters who does science' | Holden Thorp | Science | AAASHolden Thorp | Editor-in-Chief | Science | AAASWhy Trust Science? | Naomi Oreskes | Princeton University PressThanks for listening to The HPS Podcast. You can find more about us on our website, Bluesky, Instagram and Facebook feeds.  This podcast would not be possible without the support of School of Historical and Philosophical Studies at the University of Melbourne and the Hansen Little Public Humanities Grant scheme.Music by ComaStudio. Website HPS Podcast | hpsunimelb.org

Today, Carmelina is joined by Dr. Nicole C. Nelson, Associate Professor in the Department of Medical History and Bioethics at the University of Wisconsin-Madison. Nicole is an ethnographer of science and a familiar face to many within both Science and Technology Studies, and Metascience. Today, Nicole explains how ethnographic studies can help us to make sense of the world, and how she uses ethnography to construct the story of science in a way that the published record of scientific articles can't. By immersing herself within the spaces where science takes place, Nicole's research produces a deeper and richer understanding of how and why science is conducted the way it is.A full transcript of the episode can be accessed at www.hpsunimelb.org/post/s4-ep-8-nicole-c-nelson-on-ethnographies-of-scienceRelevant Links:Profile: Nicole C. Nelson, PhD Books:Changing Order | CollinsArticles:Understand the real reasons reproducibility reform fails | NelsonThanks for listening to The HPS Podcast with current producers, Samara Greenwood and Carmelina Contarino. You can find more about us on our blog, website, bluesky,twitter, instagram and facebook feeds. Music by ComaStudio. This podcast would not be possible without the support of School of Historical and Philosophical Studies at the University of Melbourne. HPS Podcast | hpsunimelb.orgThanks for listening to The HPS Podcast. You can find more about us on our website, Bluesky, Instagram and Facebook feeds.  This podcast would not be possible without the support of School of Historical and Philosophical Studies at the University of Melbourne and the Hansen Little Public Humanities Grant scheme.Music by ComaStudio. Website HPS Podcast | hpsunimelb.org