REVIEWS
“Perched between recursivity and transgression, precision and poetics—just like the research practices it discusses—this eagerly awaited volume is the ultimate exploration of the constellation of technologies, techniques, materials, and ‘savage moments’ that make experiments into a quintessential form of inquiry. Building on three decades of world-leading research in the history and philosophy of biology, Rheinberger shows how, in life as in science, experiments epitomize the human aspiration to intervene in the world with predictable results, and yet their power lies in exposing the limits of attempts to control and foresee the future. An unmissable read for anybody wishing to understand how science thrives by failing to carve nature at its joints.”
— Sabina Leonelli, University of Exeter
“In this new book, drawing on his groundbreaking Toward a History of Epistemic Things, Rheinberger explores the logic of a ‘phenomenology of experimentation.’ Attentive to the materiality of science, it brings out the creative, epistemic, and collective dimensions of scientific production in experimental context. Written by a historian and philosopher of science trained in molecular biology, Split and Splice opens up the path to a genuine historical epistemology of the forms of scientific practices for the twenty-first century.”
— Pierre-Olivier Méthot, Université Laval
“What's in an experiment? In this English edition of Split and Splice: A Phenomenology of Experimentation, a leading historian and philosopher of biology returns in fine form to renew his long-standing plea for scholarly attention to the human and material elements shaping experimentation in the life sciences. In this book, Rheinberger again pulls from the primary literature with which he is most familiar, that in molecular biology, to probe how both research materials and researchers' encounters with them, through experiments, shape the emergence of scientific knowledge. . . . There is much of interest to the working biologist in Split and Splice. Rheinberger offers a convincing way of characterizing the biologist's role in her craft: She is the mediator between the real and the written; between the world of the living and the books and papers that, eventually, report new discoveries.”
— FASEB Journal
“A highly original, systematically organized, and empirically enriched essay on scientific experimentation. . . . While its first part convinces with a precise and logically ordered analysis, the second part leads through a broad variety of philosophical thoughts and observations. . . . The reader is taken on an impressive journey through the vast territories of experimental knowledge cultures. And it adds to the surprises of the journey that each and every part of it is enriched with examples from the history of molecular biological experimentation.”
— Minerva
“Split and Slice borrows new perspectives from a broad range of scholarly fields, generating a long list of cited authors who are rarely associated in the same book. Rheinberger moves easily from phenomenology to biology and from science to art, and vice versa. . . . The book is in a way exhaustive, addressing many of the most significant issues discussed in science studies during the last decades, for instance the importance of practice and technologies, the rich source of information represented by notebooks, and in particular the protocols shared by the different members of a laboratory. Only Rheinberger could write such a book, which wanders between phenomenology and sociology of science, while still remaining engaging and attractive.”
— Journal of the History of Biology
“This book provides a captivating perspective on an essential area in the development of a comprehensive and cohesive epistemology of experimentation. Until now, this subject has only been approached in an incomplete and piecemeal manner. Therefore, this book is an absolute necessity for scholars seeking a holistic understanding of experimental practices, including those often overlooked aspects that are crucial for a true and impactful comprehension of the vital role that experiments play in shaping modern science.”
— Metascience
TABLE OF CONTENTS
Introduction - Hans-Jörg Rheinberger
DOI: 10.7208/chicago/9780226825311.003.0001
[phenomenology of experimentation;phenomenology of knowledge;phenomenology of history;Ernst Cassirer;Hans Blumenberg;Gaston Bachelard;phenomeno-technique;splitting;splicing]
The introduction begins with an overall characterization of the aims and the character of a phenomenology of experimentation. It briefly lays out what a phenomenology of experimentation entails. It then presents, in broad strokes, an overview of the two parts of the book, its first part taking a microscopic look at the different aspects of the experimental process, and its second part viewing experimentation in its macroscopic – temporal, spatial, and narrative – dimensions and extensions. The remainder of the introduction historically situates such an approach to experimentation in the context of twentieth-century phenomenology. It takes its starting point from Ernst Cassirer's phenomenology of knowledge and Hans Blumenberg’s reflections on a phenomenology of history on the one hand, and the French phenomenology of knowledge tradition on the other hand. Gaston Bachelard’s concept of phenomeno-technique plays a particularly important role in paving the way to a realistic vista on the experimental dynamics of the modern sciences. The introduction concludes with an explication of the reasons that lie behind the choice of the book’s title, Split and Splice. (pages 1 - 8)
This chapter is available at:
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1. Traces - Hans-Jörg Rheinberger
DOI: 10.7208/chicago/9780226825311.003.0002
[trace;data;radioactive tracing;Frederick Sanger;DNA sequencing;preparation;molecular biology]
The first chapter of the book takes its starting point from what happens at the core of an experimental setup. There, an epistemic object is brought to interact with an instrument of investigation, a research technology. Consequently, the interaction gives rise to – usually transient – traces of sorts. These traces have, however, to be made durable if they are to serve subsequently as sources of information about the epistemic object at stake. This process of transformation leads to what we are used to calling data. The different ways in which traces are being converted into data, what is being lost, and what is gained in the process are discussed. The chapter exemplifies these two key concepts by giving a detailed description of the technology of radioactive tracing and by having a close look at the molecular technique of sequencing nucleic acids, a preparation procedure developed by Frederick Sanger. The technology serves to visualize cellular processes and structures at the molecular level, and it was instrumental in bringing molecular biology into being around the middle of the twentieth century. (pages 11 - 23)
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2. Models - Hans-Jörg Rheinberger
DOI: 10.7208/chicago/9780226825311.003.0003
[space of traces;data space;structural model;functional model;model organism;computer model;simulation]
The distinction between traces and data leads to a corresponding distinction between the space of traces and the data space, as being discussed in chapter 2. The two spaces are separated by a media change. One of the key options that the data space provides is modeling. Working with and on models is ubiquitous in the sciences. In a first approximation, models in the empirical sciences can be addressed as data configurations. Embedded in the experimental process, they exhibit a double face: On the one hand, they represent the epistemic object in the realm of the symbolic, and on the other hand, they function as research tools in that they lead to the identification of knowledge gaps and to the tentative formulation of new research questions. Their function is demonstrated on the example of models that played important roles in the elucidation of the cellular process of protein biosynthesis. The chapter takes a close look at early structural and functional models as well as their interaction, as well as the concept of model organism, and it closes with a discussion of computer graphic models and simulations. (pages 24 - 45)
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3. Making Visible - Hans-Jörg Rheinberger
DOI: 10.7208/chicago/9780226825311.003.0004
[visualization;configuration;compression;dilatation;enhancement;schematization;ultracentrifugation;chromatography;electron microscopy;plaque technique]
Chapter 3 takes a close look at the ways and means of making things visible in the context of experimental work. One can distinguish between three different categories of visualization. They are at the same time strategies of experimentation. The chapter deals, first, with procedures of spatial and temporal compression and dilatation. They can be subsumed under the concept of configuration. Second, it deals with procedures of enforcement, or enhancement. And finally, it discusses procedures of schematization. As a rule, these procedures do not exist in isolation from one another. They rather coexist in different combination. Microscopy, for example, usually combines spatial dilatation with structural enhancement. The chapter is meant as a first outline of a typology of visualization in the sciences. All the examples of forms of visualization described in the chapter are taken from the ambit of five experimental techniques that were instrumental for the emergence of the molecular biosciences around the middle of the twentieth century: radioactive labeling, ultracentrifugation, chromatography, electron microscopy, and the phage plaque technique. (pages 46 - 65)
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4. Grafting - Hans-Jörg Rheinberger
DOI: 10.7208/chicago/9780226825311.003.0005
[grafting;hybridization;cultural technique;Gaston Bachelard;Jacques Derrida;writing;epistemic object;research technology;interface;transplantation]
Whereas chapters 1 to 3 were concerned with different aspects of the epistemic objects under consideration, Chapter 4 has a closer look at the technical side of experimentation: the research technologies that constitute an experimental system. They are discussed under the overarching concepts of grafting and hybridization. The terms are borrowed from the realm of biological cultivation techniques, including transplantation. They remind us, however, of the fact that the process of experimentation has also to be seen as a particular cultural technique, albeit in a different realm, that of knowledge generation. Interestingly, Gaston Bachelard has used the metaphor of grafting in his assessment of artistic work, in particular the poetic writing process. And Jacques Derrida has used the terms of grafting and dissemination in his generative assessment of a generalized notion of writing. All these techniques have one feature in common that deserves particular attention. They create and multiply interfaces. We can distinguish interfaces between different research technologies combined in an experimental setup, and interfaces between the technical apparatus of the experiment and the scientific object under investigation. (pages 66 - 79)
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5. Protocols - Hans-Jörg Rheinberger
DOI: 10.7208/chicago/9780226825311.003.0006
[protocol;note-taking;Claude Bernard;Ernst Mach;experiment sheet;laboratory manual;repository;electronic data bank]
Chapter 5 turns the attention to the activity of writing in the process of experimentation, generally addressed under the notion of protocolling. The chapter explicates these forms of writing that derive their meaning from their vicinity to the experiment. They are located in the space between the materialitiesof the experimental setup and the conceptual and narrative products that ultimately leave the immediate context of the laboratory and enter the sphere where knowledge circulates. The chapter is divided into four sections. Section one begins with a general discussion of note-taking on the historical examples of Claude Bernard and Ernst Mach. Section two turns the attention to the semi-formalized schematic experiment sheets and manuals that are generally in use in laboratories and structure the collective working process. Section three is concerned with the recording process of the experimental outcomes, the protocols in the narrow sense of the word. Finally, section four considers forms of collective writing and accounting that are usually addressed as repositories, or data banks. With the possibilities of electronic storage and retrieval, they have assumed a new quality, in particular in the life sciences. (pages 80 - 96)
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6. Shapes of Time - Hans-Jörg Rheinberger
DOI: 10.7208/chicago/9780226825311.003.0007
[George Kubler;shape of time;series;sequence;epistemic trajectory;model organism;Ephestia kühniella;physiological genetics]
Chapter 6 considers the forms that the temporal course of epistemic processes, such as experimentation, can assume. At stake is a phenomenology of time, not time as an experimental object. The first part of the chapter discusses art historian George Kubler’s reflections on the shapes of time within which works of art are conducted and develop, in particular his concepts of sequence and series. The second part of the chapter brings Kubler’s concepts in relation to the temporal forms of epistemic trajectories. In particular, it discusses five distinguishable forms. The first are trajectories of experimental systems. The second are migrations of epistemic things. The third are pathways of technical objects, that is, research technologies. The fourth are movement patterns of experimental cultures. Finally, the fifth are the migratory pathways of model organisms. They are discussed on a concrete example, the flour moth Ephestia kühniella that began its scientific life as a pest in applied entomology and ended it as an experimental organism of physiological genetics, which studies the relation between genes and enzymes. (pages 99 - 114)
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7. Experimental Cultures - Hans-Jörg Rheinberger
DOI: 10.7208/chicago/9780226825311.003.0008
[experimental system;experimental culture;scientific practice;in vitro experimentation;scientific discipline;culture in modernity;historiography]
Chapter 7 deals with the specific shapes of the spatial expansion of experimental systems. They can form ensembles that share one or more of their technical, epistemic-material, or social components. Such ensembles can be described as experimental cultures. The concept of culture is meant to emphasize the materiality of these interactions. The focus on experimental cultures offers the perspective of covering longer time spans in the development of a particular science, without losing touch to the dimensions of scientific practice. The first part of the chapter gives a brief historical survey of the culture of biological in vitro, or test tube experimentation, as it developed from the late nineteenth to the middle of the 20th century. The second part of the chapter locates the concept of experimental culture in the broader discussion on the notion of culture in modernity. The chapter concludes with an outline of the historiographic potential of working with the notion of experimental cultures, in contrast to the traditional emphasis on scientific disciplines. (pages 115 - 131)
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8. Knowing and Narrating - Hans-Jörg Rheinberger
DOI: 10.7208/chicago/9780226825311.003.0009
[narrativity;book of nature;contingency;historiography;microhistory;meso-history;macro-history;experimental system;experimental culture;scientific concept]
Chapter 8 is devoted to questions of narrativity in the context of experimental practice and in writing about experimental practice in history. The chapter begins with a brief introductory reflection about the metaphor of the book of nature and its legibility. The main argument of the following first part of the chapter is that experimental systems embody and realize a narrative structure. It argues that narrativity is built into experimentation as a result of the contingency that governs its major moves. The second part of the chapter turns attention to matters of historiography. The overarching question is how to write history of science without abandoning the perspective of scientific practice. Three levels are to be discerned: microhistory, meso-history, and macro-history. Microhistories as embodied by case studies can follow the movement of experimental systems. Meso-histories can trace the development of experimental cultures. And macro-histories are best written as following the meanderings of scientific concepts. All options are concretized by examples from the history of the life sciences. (pages 132 - 152)
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9. Thinking Wild - Hans-Jörg Rheinberger
DOI: 10.7208/chicago/9780226825311.003.0010
[François Jacob;science by day;science by night;Gaston Bachelard;abstraction;concretion;Claude Lévi-Strauss;wild thought;bricolage;science of the concrete]
Chapter 9 returns to the research process and tries to convey an image of its core structure. In doing so, it mobilizes a distinction to be found in the writings of molecular biologist François Jacob: that between “science by day” and “science by night.” The metaphor points to the irreducible unruliness of the research process that is in stark contrast to the way scientific findings are reported and circulated. The chapter also recurs to Gaston Bachelard’s characterization of scientific research as a process in which abstraction and concretion are inextricably linked. And it activates the notion of tinkering, of bricolage, that Claude Lévi-Strauss used to characterize what he understood to be wild thought, or science of the concrete. The chapter concludes by arguing that there is a common feature inherent in all creative activities, be it scientific or artistic. It is their search for novelty. What is really new cannot be extrapolated from what is already there;it must be found in the strong sense of that word. (pages 153 - 163)
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10. A Eulogy of the Fragment - Hans-Jörg Rheinberger
DOI: 10.7208/chicago/9780226825311.003.0011
[fragmentation;historical research;natural scientific research;reconstruction;deconstruction]
Chapter 10 is concerned with the problem of fragmentation. The fragmentary pervades the pursuit of the experiment in all its facets. Usually, the notion of fragment is negatively connoted. In contrast, this chapter focuses on its positive aspects. In relation to the scientific research process, the fragmentary can be viewed from two basic perspectives. Seen from the depths of time, the fragment is a chance residue which in the distant past belonged to a whole that must be reconstructed. Viewed from the future, the fragment is emblematic of an open horizon. Both past and future aspects have to be considered when talking about the fragment and the fragmentary in the context of a phenomenology of the experiment, that is, with regard to the forms of the scientific working process. The perspective on the past stays at the center of historical research. The historical archive is eo ipso fragmentary. Things look different in forward-oriented natural scientific research. It actively has to deconstruct its objects in order to gain knowledge about them. In both cases, the fragmentary is driving the research process. (pages 164 - 173)
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Postscript: In Place of an Afterword
DOI: 10.7208/chicago/9780226825311.003.0012
[Albert Flocon;construction;destruction;Gaston Bachelard;rhythm;rhythmanalysis;split;join]
The postscript revolves around a copper engraving of the artist Albert Flocon. It presents the four elements earth, water, air, and fire in a dialectical whirl of construction and destruction. It invites thoughtabout the rhythms of life and of nature. Rhythmanalysis is the keyword here. “Vibrating time,” in Gaston Bachelard’s words, integrally belongs in the whirls of subatomic, microphysical matter, the phenomena of life, individual experience, and the cultural manifestations of human activity. The experimental production of knowledge also follows temporal rhythms. Knowledge, too, can be extracted from reality only in waves that simultaneously expose and engulf, split and join.
