  The intellectual organization of the sciences cannot be appreciated
sufficiently unless the cognitive dimension is considered as an independent
source of variance. Cognitive structures interact and co-construct the
organization of scholars and discourses into research programs, specialties,
and disciplines. In the sociology of scientific knowledge and the sociology of
translation, these heterogeneous sources of variance have been homogenized a
priori in the concepts of practices and actor-networks. Practices and
actor-networks, however, can be explained in terms of the self-organization of
the cognitive code in scientific communication. The code selects knowledge
claims by organizing them operationally in the various discourses; the claims
can thus be stabilized and potentially globalized. Both the selecting codes and
the variation in the knowledge claims remain constructed, but the different
sub-dynamics can be expected to operate asymmetrically and to update with other
frequencies.
