Editor's Note and the List of Acknowledgment and Appreciation

From the summer of 2006, when the First International Journal Conference of EASTS was held in Taipei, to the end of 2010, we have spent five long years preparing, editing, and publishing East Asian Science, Technology and Society: An International Journal (EASTS). Nourished by the recent and continuing expansion in East Asian STS communities and activities, and also kindly supported by the larger traditions of international STS communities, our bold project, an international quarterly journal primarily based in Taiwan, Japan, and South Korea, has not only survived but has also been carrying on strongly. For the first publication period of three and a half years starting in September 2007, EASTS has published a total of fourteen issues, with the following ten subjects as special issues (including one double issue), plus three more issues containing only independent articles.

Public Participation in Science and Technology (vol. 1, no. 1)

Colonial Sciences in Former Japan's Imperial Universities (vol. 1, no. 2)

The Hwang Scandal and Human Embryonic Stem-Cell Research (vol. 2, no. 1)

Constructing Intimacy: Technology, Family, and Gender in East Asia (vol. 2, no. 2)

Gender and Reproductive Technologies in East Asia (vol. 2, no. 3)

The Globalization of Chinese Medicine and Meditation Practices (vol. 2, no. 4)

Emergent Studies of Science and Technology in Southeast Asia (vol. 3, nos. 2&3)

Biotechnology in East Asian Societies: Controversies and Governance (vol. 4, no. 1)

Specialist Traditional Knowledge (vol. 4, no. 2)

Engaging Science/Engaging Publics in Australia, New Zealand, and Japan (vol. 4, no. 4)

The ten main subjects of these eleven issues give us a rough idea of where our current EASTS was coming from and where it is heading. If I can also use the "preliminary report" by Ryuma Shineha and colleagues in vol. 4, no. 1—a report about the "STS issues" in the abstracts of articles published in EASTS—our main issues are colonial science, medical history, expert and local knowledge, the EASTS concept/topics, bio/ medical science and feminism, and medicine and globalization. Interestingly enough, if we read through the main subject articles of this current issue, "The Challenging Relationship between Philosophy of Science and STS in East Asia," we find that "philosophy" has not only played an important role in the development of international STS but has also played and is still playing a critical role in the emerging East Asian STS communities. This special role of philosophy is emphasized by our guest editor, Ruey-Lin Chen, in his introduction to the main subject of the present issue. However, the issue of how philosophy is related to STS is largely implicit and tacitly embedded in the development of East Asian STS. As a former philosopher of science myself, I am glad to see philosophy listed as a primary topic in the biographies of STS and EASTS.

Thanks to the generally good responses and impressions, and the good download rates in Springerlink internationally, EASTS is firmly supported by Taiwan's National Science Council. One of our articles in vol. 3, no. 1 (2009), the essay by Wen-Hua Kuo, is to win the 2011 Edge Award from 4S. And beginning with the present issue, EASTS is changing publishers, moving from the megapublisher Springer to Duke University Press. Moreover, two prestigious STS scholars, Gregory Clancey and Michael Fischer, are together assuming the associate editorship of EASTS and responsibility for our OEA (Outside East Asia) section. We very much appreciated Warwick Anderson's help and work as the former OEA associate editor of EASTS over the previous fourteen issues, especially for his great guest editorship of the double issue "Emergent Studies of Science and Technology in Southeast Asia." There is also, of course, another former associate editor to thank: Chia-Ling Wu, my longtime EASTS associate since 2006, was the associate editor of EASTS (Taiwan section) for the first nine issues and has guest edited two EASTS issues: "Public Participation" (with Dung-Sheng Chen) and "Gender and Reproductive Technologies" (with Adele Clarke and Azumi Tsuge). Also, I much appreciate Pingyi Chu's great assistance in taking the responsibility of Taiwan's associate...