期刊名称：Hyle : International Journal for Philosophy of Chemistry
印刷版ISSN：1433-5158
出版年度：2002
卷号：8
期号：2
页码：129-131
出版社：HYLE Publications, Karlsruhe and University of Karlsruhe
摘要：Writing about recent science is very dif-ficult. On the one hand, there are popu-larizers and journalists whose job it is to get it across to those who are not ex-pert: and they will have an agenda. Pro-fessors of chemistry would like them to emphasize what interests researchers in the mainstream, and see them as under-laborers more-or-less accurately getting across material that cannot be strictly conveyed to those without mathematics and experience in handling apparatus and performing experiments. In this view, their job is evangelism and apolo-getics – and though the belief has often been falsified, most scientists dream that if people understand science better, they will love it more (and happily pay for it). This might apply to its history as well: and indeed a hope that the image of chemistry would be brightened lay behind the European Science Founda-tion's support of a splendid (but aus-terely academic) project on the devel-opment of the science between 1789 and 1939 – dates significant in both political and chemical history, with books by La-voisier and Pauling. Popularizers like history to be full of heroes struggling against the odds and against sceptics, and crying 'eureka'. We know that his-tory is not always edifying – but popu-larizers too may refuse to be advocates for the powers-that-be, seeing eminent scientists as a bunch of Frankensteins and seeking to debunk their pretensions and refocus their energies, while taking great interest in the 'alternative' science and medicine which most in the field would consider beneath notice
