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The Normative Structure of Science.
Merton, Robert K. "The Normative Structure of Science." In The Sociology of Science, edited by Norman W. Storer, 267–278. Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 1973. First published 1942.
Why this matters here
Merton’s “The Normative Structure of Science” (1942) describes organized skepticism, peer review, and related norms as ways scientific claims stay open to revision when evidence changes—trust paired with accountability to reality rather than personal authority. When Trust Stops Tracking Reality uses that account to argue that durable trust needs ongoing revision mechanisms, not loyalty alone. Merton’s claim is about science’s institutional norms; the book generalizes the need for feedback that can still overturn settled practice.
