History, Scientific Ignorance, and the Anthropocene

Abstract

This essay reflects on the ways in which the notions of scientific ignorance and the Anthropocene bear upon the development of the history of knowledge, asking what it might mean for the field to make an “ignorance” and “anthropocenic” turn. The central argument is that these turns suggest that the history of knowledge is and should strive to be more than an expansion of the history of science, instead taking up some of the epistemic challenges of the 21st-century of which scientific knowledge is just one part.

This article is part of a special issue entitled “Histories of Ignorance,” edited by Lukas M. Verburgt and Peter Burke.