384 Livingstone
Jena library under Goethe’s rule, the Philoperisteron pigeon breeding club
with which Darwin was familiar, or the court of the Medici in Galileo’s
time, and their signifi cance for scientifi c endeavor, are now beginning to
be heard. “Thick description” of the ethnographic variety, however, is not
my quarry here. Instead I want to dwell on three classes of scientifi c space
in order to tease out something of the different kinds of inquiry they em-
body and the ways in which location matters in the claims they deliver.SPACES OF EXPERIMENTATION
The securing of space within which to carry out experimental investi-
gations of nature was the outcome of historical negotiations revolving
around the appropriate location in which to acquire dependable knowl-
edge. In the West, it was long believed that retreating from the turmoil
of everyday life was imperative for the acquisition of authentic knowl-
edge.^24 Sages and seers sought spaces of solitude. To obtain knowledge that
was true everywhere, they had to go somewhere, to fi nd wisdom that bore
the marks of nowhere. But such places as the wilderness or the hermitage
were not equipped for the pursuit of experimental knowledge. A new sort
of space for withdrawal was needed for that activity, and this was often
sought within the confi nes of the home. The instrument maker and alche-
mist John Dee, for example, found it a diffi cult task to carve out a piece
of domestic space for his investigations in a house cram- full of servants,
and at a time when the home was considered female space.^25 Robert Boyle,
gentleman- philosopher had his laboratory in the basement of the home
of his sister Katherine.^26 Circumstances like these posed important ques-
tions about who had right of access to such quarters, and not least because
experimental activities, even if carried out in a private space, had to be,
in some signifi cant way, a public affair. In order to achieve the status of
warranted knowledge, experimental claims had to undergo public attesta-
tion. But this did not mean public in today’s sense. As Steven Shapin has
been at pains to demonstrate, the “experimental public” was composed of
gentlemen whose supporting presence was essential to the confi rmation
of experimental fi ndings.^27
I do not want to adjudicate here on the cogency of Shapin’s arguments
about the constitutive ties between the making of science, gentlemanly
codes of conduct, and testimonial attestation, in seventeenth century
England. Rather it is the signifi cance of space in his account of the genera-
tion of knowledge that presently appeals. Consider. An experiment might
“work” perfectly well in the private recesses of the scientist’s workplace.