Why should philosophers of science pay attention to the commercialization of academic science?
pp. 129-138
in: Mauricio Surez, Mauro Dorato, Miklós Rédei (eds), Epsa epistemology and methodology of science, Berlin, Springer, 2010Abstract
Certain segments of academic science such as biomedicine, genetics and pharmacology are being rapidly commercialized especially in the U.S. In this article, I outline the developments that led to this phenomenon and argue that it has a number of negative effects on various aspects of science, such as the choice of scientific problems and the direction of scientific research, the discovery-invention distinction, social norms and the function of science. Since these issues are the standard purview of the philosophy of science, I urge philosophers of science to pay more attention to the commercialization of academic science.