---
title: "Laboratory Life"
chunk: 3/3
source: "https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Laboratory_Life"
category: "reference"
tags: "science, encyclopedia"
date_saved: "2026-05-05T03:32:57.624544+00:00"
instance: "kb-cron"
---

Slovik proposed an assay but his assay did not work everywhere; people could not repeat it; some could, some could not. Then one day Slovik got the idea that it could be related to the selenium content in the water: they checked to see where the assay worked; and indeed, Slovik's idea was right, it worked wherever the selenium content of water was high. (169)
This story is contrasted with another story based on interviews with the participants: The University of California required that graduate students get credits in a field totally unrelated to their own. Sara, one of Slovik's students, fulfilled this requirement by taking selenium studies, since it had a vague relation to her major. Graduate students had a tradition of informal seminars where they discussed these unrelated classes. At one meeting, Sara presented a paper on the effects of Selenium on cancer and noted that someone on campus proposed that the geographical distribution of selenium content in water might correlate with the geographical distribution of cancer rates. Slovik was at the meeting and thought that this might explain the geographical difference in his assay working. He phoned a colleague to tell him the idea and ask him to test the selenium in the water.
One story says merely that Slovik "got the idea"—the other notes that institutions (the University, grad student meetings) and other people (Sara, the colleague) provided key pieces of the inspiration.
The chapter closes by arguing that scientists do not simply use their inscription devices to discover already-existing entities. Instead, they project new entities out of the analysis of their inscriptions. Statements to the effect that "it's amazing they were able to discover it" only make sense when one ignores the arduous process to construct the discovery out of the inscriptions available. Similarly, justifications that the discovery is valid because it works well outside the laboratory are fallacious. Any claims as to whether a new substance like TRF works are only valid in a laboratory context (or its extension) -- the only way one can know that the substance is actually TRF (and thus that TRF is working) is through laboratory analysis. However, the authors stress that they are not relativists—they simply believe that the social causes of statements should be investigated.

== Cycles of Credit ==
Scientists frequently explain their choice of field by referring to curves of interest and development, as in "peptide chemistry [is] tapering off ... but now ... this is the future, molecular biology, and I knew that this lab would move faster to this new area" (191). Desire for credit appears to only be a secondary phenomenon; instead a kind of "credibility capital" seems to be the driving motive. In a case study, they show one scientist sequentially choosing a school, a field, a professor to study under, a specialty to get expertise in, and a research institution to work at, by maximizing and reinvesting this credibility (i.e. ability to do science), despite not having received much in the way of credit (e.g. awards, recognition).
Four examples: (a) X threatens to fire Ray if his assay fails, (b) a number of scientists flood into a field with theories after a successful experiment then leave when new evidence disproves their theories, (c) Y supports the results of "a big shot in his field" when others question them in order to receive invitations to meetings from the big shot where Y can meet new people, (d) K dismisses some of L's results on the grounds that "good people" won't believe them unless the level of noise is reduced (as opposed to K thinking them unreliable himself).
The credibility of a scientist and their results is largely seen as identical. "For a working scientist, the most vital question is not 'Did I repay my debt in the form of recognition because of the good paper he wrote?' but 'Is he reliable enough to be believed? Can I trust him/his claim? Is he going to provide me with hard facts?'" (202) CVs are the major way this credibility is proven and career trajectories are the story of its use. Technicians and minor leaguers, by contrast, do not accumulate capital but instead are paid a "salary" by major leaguers.

== Editions ==
English
1979.  Beverly Hills: Sage Publications. ISBN 0-8039-0993-4.
(online preview), Princeton, New Jersey: Princeton University Press, 1986, ISBN 0-691-09418-7, OCLC 4775088, retrieved 9 October 2010. Paperback{{citation}}:  CS1 maint: postscript (link) ISBN 0-691-02832-X.
The preface to the second edition (1986) reads:

"The most substantial change to the first edition is the addition of an extended postscript in which we set out some of the reactions to the book's first publication in the light of developments in the social study of science since 1979. The postscript also explains the omission of the term "social" from this edition's new subtitle."
So social construction becomes just construction of scientific facts. This change indicates a shift from social constructivism to Actor-network theory, which leaves more room for the non-social or 'natural' (albeit in a non-naturalistic / non-essentialist sense).

French
1988. La Vie de laboratoire : la Production des faits scientifiques, Paris: La Découverte.  ISBN 2-7071-4848-2, OCLC 19298021.

== See also ==
Politics of nature
Science in Action (book)
Aramis, or the Love of Technology
We Have Never Been Modern