Steve Woolgar is a Professor of Sociology at Linköping University, Sweden.
Earlier he served as Head of the Department of Human Sciences and director of CRITC at Brunel University, as well as Chair of Marketing and Head of Science and Technology Studies at the University of Oxford.
He has published widely in science and technology studies, social problems and social theory, researching topics as diverse as virtual society, neuromarketing, globalization, ontological disobedience and academic evaluation.
Abstract: The End of Cognition
The concept of 'cognition' is central to a wide literature in social science and philosophy where a key assumption conceptualises the central unit of analysis as a cognising agent. However, recent developments in Science and Technology Studies (STS) question this assumption and suggest the basis for its modification. In this presentation I will describe and evaluate these developments. I will first examine critiques of the "received view" of science and suggests that nothing less than a full scale analytic inversion is needed adequately to confront entrenched conceptions about cognition. I will then survey progressive attempts to achieve symmetry in STS. Finally, I consider three sets of key assumptions about agency: 1. what is the agent doing?; 2. what is the nature of the agent?; and 3. why should human agents have the monopoly on human attributes?