David Bloor (1942-Present Day)

Birth

Jun 28, 1942

David Bloor was born in Derby, United Kingdom.

PhD

1972

In 1972, David Bloor was awarded his Ph.D. by the University of Edinburgh for his thesis "Speech and the Regulation of Behavior."

The Strong Programme

1976

The Four Tenets of the Strong Programme:
Causality: Demands sociological and psychological conditions when examining the statements of beliefs or knowledge.
Impartiality: All beliefs need to be explained whether they are true or not.
Symmetry: Apply the same causes to true and false beliefs.
Reflexivity: It must apply to sociology itself.
The Strong Programme

Knowledge and Social Imagery

1976

Written by David Bloor, Knowledge and Social Imagery became one of the key texts to the Strong Programme; however, this book was not the first to try and introduce the Strong Programme. Using this book, Bloor influenced the way philosophers think about science.

Awarded the John Desmond Bernal Prize

1996

David Bloor was awarded the John Desmond Bernal Prize by the Society for Social Studies of Science. Bloor received the award for his contribution to our understanding of mathematics and nonobvious social and cultural phenomena.

Anti-Latour

1999

David Bloor wrote this article to defend the approach of the Sociology of Knowledge against Latour’s philosophy. "Bloor’s text is marked by concern and surprise over the rise of Latour’s disruptive philosophy that attacks the principles of Sociology of Knowledge, eliminating the possibility of giving a sociological account of how knowledge is produced" (Rivera).