Serendipity: Towards a taxonomy and a theory

Yaqub, Ohid

doi:10.1016/j.respol.2017.10.007

Cited by 143 publications

(123 citation statements)

References 65 publications

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“…An unsought findingas serendipity is often termedcan unexpectedly or luckily emerge not only from individuals, but also from a constellation of people that together pursue certain projects or ideas (Copeland 2017;Fine and Deegan 1996). Finding something unsought of can be the result of various kinds of luck (Van Andel 1994;Yaqub 2018;Roberts 1989). In the literature on luck, three conditions are usually mentioned in definitions of luck (all of them are contested): P is lucky regarding an event E, if E is unexpected, significant and beyond P's control.…”

Section: Discussionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Scientists’ views on (moral) luck

Sand

Jongsma

2020

Journal of Responsible Innovation

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Scientific discoveries are often to some degree influenced by luck. Whether luck's influence is at odds with common-sense intuitions about responsibility, is the central concern of the philosophical debate about moral luck. Do scientists acknowledge that luck plays a role in their work andif sodo they consider it morally problematic? The present article discusses the results of four focus groups with scientists, who were asked about their views on luck in their fields and its moral implications. The participants underscored circumstantial luck as a key dimension of luck in science. Nevertheless, most participants insisted that there are ways of executing 'control' in science: They believe that virtues and skills can increase one's chances for success. The cultivation of these skills and virtues was considered a reasonable ground for pride. Prizes and rewards were rarely tied to personal desert, but instead to their societal function.

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Section: Discussionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Scientists’ views on (moral) luck

Sand

Jongsma

2020

Journal of Responsible Innovation

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“…This reflects the pure definition of serendipity which suggests that it is the noticing of an unanticipated datum that spawns a new, unsought for, solution, explanation or theory (Edward Foster & Ellis, 2014). However, the definition is slippery (Makri & Blandford, 2012) and has been broadened to include both targeted searches which solve a problem via an unexpected route and also untargeted searches which solve immediate problems (Yaqub, 2018). Core to any definition seems to be that it is a problem solved by unanticipated and unplanned means.…”

Section: Interactivity and Microserendipitymentioning

confidence: 99%

Catch that word: interactivity, serendipity and verbal fluency in a word production task

Ross

Vallée-Tourangeau

2020

Psychological Research

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Problem solving outside of the cognitive psychologist's lab unfolds in an environment rich with bodily gesture and material artefacts. We examine this meshwork of internal mental resources, embodied actions and environmental affordances through the lens of a word production task with letter tiles. Forty participants took part in the study which contrasted performance in a high interactivity condition (where participants were able to move letter tiles at will), a low interactivity condition (where movements were restrained) and a shuffle condition (where participants could not move the tiles but were allowed to randomly rearrange the array). Participants were also video recorded to facilitate coding of behaviour. While aggregate performance measures revealed a marginal impact of interactivity on performance, when the participants' behaviour was taken into account, interactivity had a consistent and statistically significant beneficial effect. Detailed, exploratory examination of a subsample of participants informed the formulation of additional hypotheses tested across the full sample: the luckiness of the shuffle in that condition significantly predicted the number of words produced and a more efficient strategy was significantly easier to enact in the high interactivity condition. Additionally, two detailed case studies revealed several moments when accidental changes to the letter tile array offered unplanned words reflecting a serendipitous coagency as well as many moments when environmental chance was ignored. These data and observations indicate that interactivity, serendipity, and internal cognitive resources determine problem-solving performance in this task.

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“…For example, in the pharmaceutical industry, drugs are commonly repurposed when they are unexpectedly found to treat a disease other than their intended target. Thus, selecting a time period for the evaluation of research may capture some of the intended outcomes but miss the secondary serendipitous discoveries (Yaqub 2018).…”

Section: Valuation By Knowledge Outputmentioning

confidence: 99%

Assessing the Benefits of Research

2020

Dangerous Science Science: Policy and Risk Analysis for Scientists and Engineers

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Writing a book requires a substantial time commitment, and I would like to thank my family for their patience. It also requires resources, and I would like to thank Stony Brook University and the Department of Technology and Society in particular for its support. Thanks also goes out to David Tonjes for his helpful advice and Scott Ferson for his gracious support and instructive discussions regarding the nature of risk and the measurement of uncertainty. I must also express my deep gratitude to the late David Ferguson, instrumental in my academic career, who imparted kindness and wisdom in equal measure. Finally, I would like to thank Sheldon Reaven for our numerous conversations on the philosophy of science, science policy, and opera. The value of his insightful comments has been exceeded only by the value of his friendship. This book has also benefitted from the insightful peer review comments provided by Professor Frederic Emmanuel Bouder. Case Study: H5N1 Influenza Research Debate Media coverage of the latest scientific discoveries and technological innovations is usually enthusiastic. Long-standing questions are answered, productivity is increased, health is improved, and our standard of living is raised-all due to modern science and human ingenuity. However, sometimes the results of research can also inspire public fear and outrage. Let us consider a recent example. In September 2011, Dutch virologist Ron Fouchier announced at a conference in Malta that his research team had recently engineered a version of the H5N1 1 avian influenza virus that was highly transmissible between mammals. Shortly thereafter, virologist Yoshihiro Kawaoka of the University of Wisconsin presented results from a similar study. The subsequent media coverage scared the general public and set off demands for a review of how science research is assessed, funded, and managed. Why would these studies be so scary? The reason centers on the lethal potential of influenza and the H5N1 virus in particular. An influenza pandemic typically occurs when a flu virus substantially different from circulating viruses mutates to become easily transmissible between humans. The combination of 1 The formal naming convention for influenza viruses includes the antigenic type (A, B, or C); the originating host (e.g., swine); the geographical origin; year of identification; strain number; or for type A viruses, the specific subtypes of two surface proteins, hemagglutinin (H) and neuraminidase (N) (e.g., H5N1) (Assaad et al. 1980). Given the complexity of formal names, popular shorthand names, such as Spanish flu, Swine flu, and H1N1 can potentially be referring to the same influenza virus. The World Health Organization has been working to improve shorthand names to make them less stigmatizing and more informative.

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Serendipity: Towards a taxonomy and a theory

Cited by 143 publications

References 65 publications

Scientists’ views on (moral) luck

Scientists’ views on (moral) luck

Catch that word: interactivity, serendipity and verbal fluency in a word production task

Assessing the Benefits of Research

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