The Puzzle of Predictability

2021 ◽  
pp. 1-16
Author(s):  
Wayne C. Myrvold
Keyword(s):  
Social Sciences ◽  
Nineteenth Century ◽  
Probabilistic Reasoning ◽  
Large Population ◽  
Statistical Regularity ◽  
Reliable Prediction ◽  
James Clerk Maxwell ◽  
The Social ◽  
Statistical Regularities

This chapter begins with a puzzle: how is it that reliable prediction is ever possible, in physics? The reason that this is puzzling is that, even if the systems we are making predictions about are governed by deterministic laws that are known to us, the information available to us is a minuscule fraction of what might in principle be required to make a prediction. The answer to the puzzle lies in the phenomenon of statistical regularity, first identified in the social sciences. In a sufficiently large population, reliable predictions can be made about the total number of events that, taken individually, are unpredictable. Aggregate order arises out of individual disorder. This means that, as James Clerk Maxwell perceived already in the nineteenth century, all observed regularities are statistical regularities. To understand these requires the use of probabilistic concepts. This means that probabilistic reasoning is required even in our most certain predictions. Probability permeates physics, and we are going to have to make sense of it.

The Rise of Statistical Thinking, 1820-1900

2020 ◽  
Author(s):  
Theodore M. Porter
Keyword(s):  
Social Sciences ◽  
Nineteenth Century ◽  
Twentieth Century ◽  
Statistical Models ◽  
Social Scientists ◽  
Statistical Tools ◽  
James Clerk Maxwell ◽  
The Social ◽  
History Of ◽  
History Of Statistics

This book explores the history of statistics from the field's origins in the nineteenth century through to the factors that produced the burst of modern statistical innovation in the early twentieth century. The book shows that statistics was not developed by mathematicians and then applied to the sciences and social sciences. Rather, the field came into being through the efforts of social scientists, who saw a need for statistical tools in their examination of society. Pioneering statistical physicists and biologists James Clerk Maxwell, Ludwig Boltzmann, and Francis Galton introduced statistical models to the sciences by pointing to analogies between their disciplines and the social sciences. A new preface looks at how the book has remained relevant since its initial publication, and considers the current place of statistics in scientific research.

scholarly journals The “Table of mineral classification” by Oscar Nerval de Gouvêa: mineralogy and medicine in Brazil

2021 ◽  
Vol 28 (2) ◽  
pp. 491-508
Author(s):  
Silvia Fernanda de Mendonça Figueirôa
Keyword(s):  
Social Sciences ◽  
Nineteenth Century ◽  
Rio De Janeiro ◽  
Classification Systems ◽  
The Social ◽  
The World ◽  
Different Parts

Abstract Oscar Nerval de Gouvêa was a scientist and teacher in Rio de Janeiro, Brazil, whose work spanned engineering, medicine, the social sciences, and law. This paper presents and discusses a manuscript entitled “Table of mineral classification,” which he appended to his dissertation Da receptividade mórbida , presented to the Faculty of Medicine in 1889. The foundations and features of the table provide a focus for understanding nineteenth-century mineralogy and its connections in Brazil at that time through this scientist. This text was Gouvêa’s contribution to the various mineral classification systems which have emerged from different parts of the world.

The Political Science Discipline in Argentina: The Political Scientist's National Association's Role

2009 ◽  
Vol 42 (03) ◽  
pp. 616-618
Author(s):  
Diego Mazzoccone ◽  
Mariano Mosquera ◽  
Silvana Espejo ◽  
Mariana Fancio ◽  
Gabriela Gonzalez ◽  
...  
Keyword(s):  
Social Sciences ◽  
Nineteenth Century ◽  
Political Science ◽  
Political Thought ◽  
Scientific Method ◽  
The Political ◽  
Nation State ◽  
Science Discipline ◽  
The Social ◽  
The One

It is very difficult to date the birth of political science in Argentina. Unlike other discipline of the social sciences, in Argentina the first distinction can be made between political thought on the one hand, and political science in another. The debate over political thought—as the reflection of different political questions—emerged in our country in the nineteenth century, especially during the process of constructing the Argentine nation-state. Conversely, political science is defined in a general way as the application of the scientific method to the studies on the power of the state (Fernández 2001).

Introduction. Theories of Myth

2015 ◽  
Author(s):  
Robert A. Segal
Keyword(s):  
Social Sciences ◽  
Nineteenth Century ◽  
Subject Matter ◽  
The Social ◽  
Origin Function ◽  
Modern Era

The ‘Introduction’ examines and compares modern theories of myth by applying them to the famous myth of Adonis. It is only in the modern era—specifically, only since the second half of the nineteenth century—that these theories have purported to be scientific, for only since then have there existed the social sciences. Of these, anthropology, psychology, and sociology have contributed the most to the study of myth. Each discipline harbours multiple theories of myth, but what unites them is the questions asked: those of origin, function, and subject matter. Is myth universal? Is myth true? Along with these other questions, it defines myth as a story.

History in the Classroom An Undisciplined Subject

2015 ◽  
Vol 70 (01) ◽  
pp. 173-184
Author(s):  
Laurence De Cock
Keyword(s):  
Social Sciences ◽  
Nineteenth Century ◽  
National Culture ◽  
Scientific Knowledge ◽  
History Teaching ◽  
The Social ◽  
Pedagogic Knowledge ◽  
The Relationship

Abstract This paper argues that a discipline taught in schools is more than a mere copy of scientific knowledge. It investigates the relationship between scholarly and pedagogic knowledge from the end of the nineteenth century, when the teaching of history was tasked with participating in the construction of a shared national culture. In fact, it is only by mobilizing tools from the social sciences that the complexity of history teaching can be understood. The repeated accusations directed at the teaching of history in schools therefore reflect a trite and hackneyed understanding of its nature and mission.

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