Cordelia’s Love: Credibility and the Social Studies of Science

Abstract

This article assesses the current state of research on the credibility of scientific claims and makes some recommendations about the lines along which future historical and sociological inquiry might most constructively proceed. It sketches how credibility has emerged since the 1970s as an important focus for the social studies of science; it offers an appreciation of the scope of the problem involved in giving an explanation of credibility; it warns against the temptations of overambitious theorizing about how credibility is accomplished; and it provisionally identifies distinct predicaments in which the resources for establishing credibility may systematically differ.