Agnotología

Agnotology

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Robert N. Proctor

Resumen

Robert Proctor e Ian Bolin acuñaron el término agnotología para designar el estudio de la ignorancia. Este escrito propone superar la visión de la ignorancia como un vacío que puede ser llenado por el conocimiento e invita a pensar en las formas en que hoy se produce, en forma premeditada y estructural: por negligencia, miopía, secreto o supresión. El autor muestra que la creación deliberada de la ignorancia es una estrategia para engañar y sembrar dudas sobre los hechos observados y sobre el conocimiento científico, tomando como ejemplos el papel de los secretos comerciales, la actividad de las tabacaleras para negar la relación causal entre el consumo de cigarrillos y el cáncer y el papel del secreto militar. Por último analiza algunos casos en que la ignorancia es una expresión de valores morales, como la prohibición, en algunas universidades, de investigaciones cuyo único fin es el afán de lucro y, en algunas revistas científicas, de publicar trabajos financiados por ciertas fuentes, así como el rechazo de ciertas tecnologías por razones intelectuales y morales bien fundadas.

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