Modern science has undoubtedly become one the principal engines of economic growth, even though the epistemological status of scientific knowledge has been continuously contested. Leaving the philosophical problem of knowledge aside, this paper examines how scientific discovery contributes to the production of wealth. The analysis focuses on a recent achievement at the crossroads of chemistry, immunology and biotechnology: antibody catalysis. For this purpose, we develop a model of entrepreneurial work to explain how the discovery of natural products and processes generates (...) new economic opportunities. The proposed model is based on the assumption that scientists believe that the natural environment is a repository of 'natural capital'. Natural capital includes goods that are not made by humans but can be used to produce other goods and services. The belief in natural capital induces scientists to search for and identify a natural property that, in the specific cultural context of their work, is recognized as a valuable resource. The selection of such a property forms the initial phase of the discovery process. Certain research methods are then deployed to create novel empirical conditions within which the selected property is transformed into a specific good. The discovery of natural capital thus comprises a historically accountable entrepreneurial endeavour. (shrink)

Recent studies of the social and political meanings of English science in the 17th century have often included only a cursory inspection of Locke's work. Conversely, detailed studies of Locke's theory of knowledge have tended to refrain from taking into serious consideration the social context of English science in that period. The paper explores the contribution of Locke's conception of experience to the rise of experimental philosophy as a new social force. It shows that Locke elaborated a doctrine that rendered (...) human experience the natural and nurtured means by which agents could discharge their duty to God and realize their right in God's dominion. Locke's account of the production of empirical knowledge thus delineated a theocentric system of a moral economy, which dovetailed with current advertisements of the new vocation of experimental philosophy. More particularly, Locke's debt to Boyle is manifested in their shared imagery of experience as a divine gift. While Boyle sought to encourage polite society to participate in cultivating the experimenter's gift, Locke propagated the view that proper conduct in the public sphere hinged on the recognition of the experimenter's findings as a new source of authority in everyday life.Keywords: empiricism; experimental philosophy; ideology; moral economy; gift economy. (shrink)