Mark Iskarous

“the set of statements considered too costly to modify constitute what is referred to as reality. Scientific activity is not "about nature," it is a fierce fight to construct reality. The laboratory is the workplace and the set of productive forces, which makes construction possible... The cost of challenging the reified statement is impossibly high. Reality is secreted.”
― Bruno Latour, Laboratory Life: The Construction of Scientific Facts

“How odd it comes to a man one day that he cannot uproot his father from him, like an unwanted plant from the soil.”
― Maggie O'Farrell, Land

“They appear to have developed considerable skills in setting up devices which can pin down elusive figures, traces, or inscriptions in their craftwork, and in the art of persuasion. The latter skill enables them to convince others that what they do is important, that what they say is true, and that their proposals are worth funding. They are so skillful, indeed, that they manage to convince others not that they are being convinced but that they are simply following a consistent line of interpretation of available evidence. Others are persuaded that they are not persuaded, that no mediations intercede between what is said and the truth.”
― Bruno Latour, Laboratory Life: The Construction of Scientific Facts

“Indeed, our scientists had a much more subtle way of accounting success than simply measuring returns in currency. The success of each investment was evaluated in terms of the extent to which it facilitated the rapid conversion of credibility and the scientist's progression through the cycle. For example, a successful investment might mean that people phone him, his abstracts are accepted, others show interest in his work, he is believed more easily and listened to with greater attention, he is offered better positions, his assays work well, data flow more reliably and form a more credible picture. The objective of market activity is to extend and speed up the credibility cycle as a whole.”
― Bruno Latour, Laboratory Life: The Construction of Scientific Facts