Why I Go to AAAS

Vol. 40, No. 1, January 2011
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photo by alandberning (alan berning), Flickr

by Bruce Lewenstein

My PhD is from a leading department of history of science; I am appointed in a department that has history of science at its core, and I introduce myself as a historian of science. But the meeting that I attend far more frequently than the History of Science Society conferences is the annual meeting of the American Association for the Advancement of Science (AAAS). Why? And why do I think more historians of science should make this a meeting they attend, as well?

I’m a historian of science because I care deeply about the relationship of science and society. I study the history of public understanding of science because I’m fascinated by the complexity of how science operates in a world in which it depends on public … support. I hesitate to use the word “support,” because it so often refers just to financial support from government; I also mean intellectual and cultural support for science as a key component of modern society. My French colleagues refer to “culture scientifique,” a phrase that has no direct English translation. It captures the idea of a world in which science is part of the everyday fabric of life, in practice, in ideology, in ideas.

Not only do I want to know more about how culture scientifique develops, but I also want to contribute to it myself. My own research and that of many historians whom I respect has demonstrated the complexity of how scientific knowledge is produced, including the ways in which social forces constrain and sometimes blind us to the limitations of particular understandings of the world. More importantly, that scholarship shows why modern science offers us reliable knowledge about the natural world. I deeply believe the world would be a better place if more people had access to that reliable knowledge (including understanding better both its strengths and its weaknesses).

For that goal, AAAS is an ideal setting. AAAS describes itself as “an international non-profit organization dedicated to advancing science around the world by serving as an educator, leader, spokesperson and professional association…. AAAS is open to all and fulfills its mission to ‘advance science and serve society’ through initiatives in science policy; international programs; science education; and more.” Founded in 1848, AAAS has more than 260 affiliated societies, including the History of Science Society. It publishes the journal Science, which has the largest paid circulation of any peer-reviewed general science journal in the world, with an estimated total readership of one million.

All of that is good, and I have been involved in many AAAS activities (including co-authoring a 1998 history of AAAS with former HSS president Sally Gregory Kohlstedt and former HSS executive director Michael Sokal). But the most important function for me is the annual meeting. There, I attend sessions addressing both the history of science and its contemporary activities. I meet with colleagues engaged in public understanding of science, public finance of science, government policy about science, science education, history of science. And in science itself: AAAS is one of the ways I keep up with what the latest excitement is in science, which is after all part of why I became a historian of science in the first place—I like science. At AAAS, I’m fully engaged with other people who are fascinated both by the latest findings of science and by the interaction of those findings with the rest of modern society.

AAAS meets each year in mid-February. At the 2010 meeting in San Diego, I highlighted in the program sessions on:

Civic scientific literacy in developed and developing countries
The brain on trial: Neuroscience evidence in the courtroom
Plato’s progeny: Academies of science [as tools for] bridging science and society
Oceans apart? Transatlantic perspectives on public research and business innovation
False discoveries and statistics: Implications for health and the environment
Physics and art: A gateway to the sciences
Can geoengineering save us from global warming?
Ethical and societal dimensions of biosecurity and dual-use research

And that doesn’t even count the sessions that were more historically oriented:

50 years of exobiology and astrobiology
SETI turns 50
Past, present, and future of forensic science in the United States
Celebrating the birth of the laser: A look back after 50 years

In addition I attended the annual Sarton Memorial Lecture, held at AAAS each year but selected by the HSS—last year, it was Caltech’s Jed Buchwald on “Knowledge in the Early Modern Era: The Origins of Experimental Error.” I attended the business meeting of the AAAS section on History & Philosophy of Science & Technology (“section L” of AAAS), where in past years I have served on the nominating committee. I also attended the business meeting of the section on Societal Implications of Science and Engineering (“section X”), where for about a decade I was HSS’s formal representative to the section. Although Section L is my primary affiliation within AAAS, I apparently became so well-known at Section X meetings that they considered me one of their own—I’m now serving as chairman of that section.

For the February 2011 meeting in Washington, DC, I have already noted that Larry Principe of Johns Hopkins will give the Sarton lecture, “Revealing the secrets of Alchemy”—and Larry’s lectures are consistently fascinating. Other major lectures will come from President Obama’s science advisor and a former director of the NSF. Browsing the program, I see a session celebrating the 100th anniversary of Marie Curie’s Nobel Prize in Chemistry, featuring several well-known historians of science. Naomi Oreskes will continue drawing on her recent extremely-well-reviewed Merchants of Doubt while speaking to a session on climate change denialists, and there’s a paper on the history of Islamic creationism in Turkey.

All of this is in addition to meeting my colleagues—often historians of science and technology—in the hallways, connecting with leading scientists, talking with collaborators at museums and outreach programs, meeting with publishers across a wide range of fields, and all the other ancillary activities of a good meeting. For me, AAAS has the diversity and stimulation that addresses the full range of my interests in science. It exemplifies culture scientifique.

Yes, I’m a historian of science. But I’m also a science fan, maybe even a science groupie, and for that AAAS is superb. I thoroughly enjoyed the HSS meeting in Montréal last November, but I can’t wait to get to AAAS in February.

…………

Bruce Lewenstein (PhD, University of Pennsylvania, History & Sociology of Science) worked for Isis as a graduate student, was managing editor for an issue of Osiris, and served as HSS’s public information officer and representative to AAAS Section X for many years. Today he is professor of science communication at Cornell, jointly appointed in Communication and in Science & Technology Studies.

[Editorial Note: The HSS is working to offer discounted meeting registration to AAAS for HSS members. Please contact Jay at jay@hssonline.org for more information.]

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