11 Jul 08

The Connecting Disciplines conference was held at Keble College

The largest ever History of Science conference has just been held at Oxford University’s Keble College, attended by around 600 academics.

Running from 4 July to 6 July 2008, the conference had the theme of ‘Connecting Disciplines’ and was the sixth joint meeting of the British Society for the History of Science, the Canadian Society for the History and Philosophy of Science and the History of Science Society. There was also a reception in the University’s History of Science Museum.

Introduced by Head of Humanities at Oxford University, Sally Shuttleworth, the conference also brought together around 50 academics from the Humanities Division from a whole range of disciplines. It featured more than 350 papers, many from Oxford University academics, being delivered over three days in up to 10 parallel sessions.

Professor Pietro Corsi, Professor of History of Science within Oxford University’s History Faculty, said: ‘As the list of colleagues interested in different aspects of the history of science, medicine, and technology – and also of the philosophy of science and science, technology, and society studies – well shows, a highly composite community is at work, and new institutional developments are taking place.

‘History of Science affects society’s beliefs, hopes and anxieties in fundamental ways - everything from theatre and literature to theology, philosophy, politics and forensic medicine used in court rooms. The History of Science is not limited to the study of what happens inside laboratories or ‘boring’ lecture theatres, but talks of the ways in which societies produce knowledge, reshape traditional beliefs, organise social relationships.

‘This conference allowed academics with a variety of interests in this area to interact, particularly those from Oxford University from Humanities, Science and Museums. It reiterated what an important area this is for the University. Despite us not having a Department in History of Science, the new Centre for the Enlightenment at the Voltaire Foundation now includes the History of Science within its core research themes and in various faculties, a growing number of colleagues are eager to include consideration of this area within their research agenda.’

Highlights of the conference included Professor John Van Wye discussing whether Darwin thought life on earth had arrived via meteorites and lectures by Professor Simon Schaffer and the novelist Iain Pears.