Sociologist Christian Smith mulls personhood:
The standard, received doctrines of scientism tell us that to conduct good science we need to strip ourselves of much of our human particularities, that we need to become “objective,” to set aside our personal ways of knowing, to somehow transcend the human condition of historical and cultural conditioning, of being situated, of being subjective knowers with interests and commitments, to discount ordinary ways of understanding. In fact, quite the opposite is true…
The best of science relies precisely on human personal knowledge, on personal commitments to truth over, say, career success, on a deeply personal entering into investigations, of tacit or intuitive insights, creativity that cannot be systematized, on an appreciation for the beauty and patterning of reality. Good science never fully brackets persons or personhood as threatening to “objectivity” or “universalism.” Good science is always rooted in and grows out of profoundly personal engagements with, knowledge of, and love for the world and for truth.
The Dish 