scholarly journals RESPONSE FUNCTIONS TO CRITICAL SHOCKS IN SOCIAL SCIENCES: AN EMPIRICAL AND NUMERICAL STUDY

2004 ◽  
Vol 15 (06) ◽  
pp. 809-834 ◽  
Author(s):  
B. M. ROEHNER ◽  
D. SORNETTE ◽  
J. V. ANDERSEN
Keyword(s):  
Social Sciences ◽  
Numerical Study ◽  
Empirical Work ◽  
Natural Sciences ◽  
Large Variability ◽  
Future Evolution ◽  
Damage Spreading ◽  
Exogenous Shocks ◽  
The Social ◽  
The Difference

We show that, provided one focuses on properly selected episodes, one can apply to the social sciences the same observational strategy that has proved successful in natural sciences such as astrophysics or geodynamics. For instance, in order to probe the cohesion of a society, one can, in different countries, study the reactions to some huge and sudden exogenous shocks, which we call Dirac shocks. This approach naturally leads to the notion of structural (as opposed or complementary to temporal) forecast. Although structural predictions are by far the most common way to test theories in the natural sciences, they have been much less used in the social sciences. The Dirac shock approach opens the way to testing structural predictions in the social sciences. The examples reported here suggest that critical events are able to reveal pre-existing "cracks" because they probe the social cohesion which is an indicator and predictor of future evolution of the system, and in some cases they foreshadow a bifurcation. We complement our empirical work with numerical simulations of the response function ("damage spreading") to Dirac shocks in the Sznajd model of consensus build-up. We quantify the slow relaxation of the difference between perturbed and unperturbed systems, the conditions under which the consensus is modified by the shock and the large variability from one realization to another.

Defending the Difference

2017 ◽  
Keyword(s):  
Social Sciences ◽  
Natural Sciences ◽  
Point Of View ◽  
True Nature ◽  
Natural Entities ◽  
The Social ◽  
The World ◽  
Methodological Difference ◽  
The Difference ◽  
The One

Dreyfus argues that there is a basic methodological difference between the natural sciences and the social sciences, a difference that derives from the different goals and practices of each. He goes on to argue that being a realist about natural entities is compatible with pluralism or, as he calls it, “plural realism.” If intelligibility is always grounded in our practices, Dreyfus points out, then there is no point of view from which one can ask about or provide an answer to the one true nature of ultimate reality. But that is consistent with believing that the natural sciences can still reveal the way the world is independent of our theories and practices.

scholarly journals Czy socjologowie są w stanie budować maszyny społeczne? Rekonceptualizacja różnicy między przyrodoznawstwem a naukami społecznymi

2009 ◽  
Vol 53 (1) ◽  
pp. 17-44
Author(s):  
Łukasz Afeltowicz ◽  
Krzysztof Pietrowicz
Keyword(s):  
Social Sciences ◽  
Philosophy Of Science ◽  
Science And Technology Studies ◽  
Science And Technology ◽  
Natural Sciences ◽  
Social Scientists ◽  
Social Phenomena ◽  
Traditional Philosophy ◽  
The Social ◽  
The Difference

The last three decades have witnessed a dynamic development of science and technology studies, which have shown science in a way completely different from that presented by the traditional philosophy of science and methodology of social sciences. The authors accept that the findings of those studies concerning the mechanisms of functioning of science are correct and attempt to address again the problem of the difference between those disciplines and the social sciences. Their analysis concerns: the role and importance of laboratories in the social sciences; the “transition” of social phenomena to those laboratories; the possibility of popularization by the social sciences of technological solutions prepared by those laboratories; an incorrect approach to experiment and the acceptance of false ideas of the function of natural sciences by social scientists.

Rhythm

2018 ◽  
Author(s):  
Lexi Eikelboom
Keyword(s):  
Social Sciences ◽  
Twentieth Century ◽  
Human Existence ◽  
Embodied Experience ◽  
Giorgio Agamben ◽  
The Social ◽  
Contemporary Philosopher ◽  
The Subject ◽  
The Difference ◽  
Theoretical Category

This book argues that, as a pervasive dimension of human existence with theological implications, rhythm ought to be considered a category of theological significance. Philosophers and theologians have drawn on rhythm—patterned movements of repetition and variation—to describe reality, however, the ways in which rhythm is used and understood differ based on a variety of metaphysical commitments with varying theological implications. This book brings those implications into the open, using resources from phenomenology, prosody, and the social sciences to analyse and evaluate uses of rhythm in metaphysical and theological accounts of reality. The analysis relies on a distinction from prosody between a synchronic approach to rhythm—observing the whole at once and considering how various dimensions of a rhythm hold together harmoniously—and a diachronic approach—focusing on the ways in which time unfolds as the subject experiences it. The text engages with the twentieth-century Jesuit theologian Erich Przywara alongside thinkers as diverse as Augustine and the contemporary philosopher Giorgio Agamben, and proposes an approach to rhythm that serves the concerns of theological conversation. It demonstrates the difference that including rhythm in theological conversation makes to how we think about questions such as “what is creation?” and “what is the nature of the God–creature relationship?” from the perspective of rhythm. As a theoretical category, capable of expressing metaphysical commitments, yet shaped by the cultural rhythms in which those expressing such commitments are embedded, rhythm is particularly significant for theology as a phenomenon through which culture and embodied experience influence doctrine.

Guide to Africa Bibliography

2020 ◽  
Vol 2019 ◽  
pp. xxix-xxx
Keyword(s):  
Social Sciences ◽  
Natural Sciences ◽  
Development Studies ◽  
Environmental Sciences ◽  
African Government ◽  
The Social ◽  
To Receive ◽  
Cover Material

This bibliography records publications on Africa of interest to students of Africa, principally in the social and environmental sciences, development studies, humanities and arts. Some items from the medical, biological and natural sciences are included. The criterion used is potential relevance to a reader from a social sciences/arts background. The whole continent and associated islands are covered, with selective coverage of the diaspora. This volume aims to cover material published in 2019 together with items from earlier years not previously listed. The editor is always very glad to hear of any items omitted so that they may be included in future volumes. He would be particularly pleased to receive notification of new periodicals, print or online. African government publications and works of creative literature are not normally listed.

Assessing Contemporary Crises: Aligning Safety Science and Security Studies

2021 ◽  
Author(s):  
Bibi van den Berg ◽  
Ruth Prins ◽  
Sanneke Kuipers
Keyword(s):  
Social Sciences ◽  
Everyday Life ◽  
Natural Sciences ◽  
Security Studies ◽  
Nation States ◽  
The Social ◽  
The World ◽  
Safety Science ◽  
Key Topics

Security and safety are key topics of concern in the globalized and interconnected world. While the terms “safety” and “security” are often used interchangeably in everyday life, in academia, security is mostly studied in the social sciences, while safety is predominantly studied in the natural sciences, engineering, and medicine. However, developments and incidents that negatively affect society increasingly contain both safety and security aspects. Therefore, an integrated perspective on security and safety is beneficial. Such a perspective studies hazardous and harmful events and phenomena in the full breadth of their complexity—including the cause of the event, the target that is harmed, and whether the harm is direct or indirect. This leads to a richer understanding of the nature of incidents and the effects they may have on individuals, collectives, societies, nation-states, and the world at large.

Pluralism in Education and Education in Pluralism

1998 ◽  
Vol 180 (3) ◽  
pp. 67-84
Author(s):  
Stanley L. Jaki
Keyword(s):  
Social Sciences ◽  
Common Sense ◽  
Natural Sciences ◽  
Trojan Horse ◽  
Religion And Theology ◽  
The Social ◽  
Fundamental Understanding ◽  
Rational Thought ◽  
Scientific Ideas ◽  
Theology And Philosophy

The physicist and historian and philosopher of science Stanley L. Jaki first notes that the word “pluralism” has become a euphemism or Trojan horse for relativism. Valid, sound pluralism ought to entail an education in the plurality of subject matters and a respect and understanding for their separate, irreducible integrities and also their rational relatedness to one another. A non-relativist epistemology of universal validity and scope underlies and relates all the great bodies of knowledge and learning—the natural sciences, the social sciences, the humanities, religion and theology, and philosophy itself. Unfortunately the term “pluralism” as now commonly used has confused or obscured this fundamental understanding, the invaluable legacy of rational thought since Plato. The misunderstanding of Einstein's conception of relativity is particularly damaging but typical of the misuse of modern scientific ideas by thinkers in other fields; Einstein's idea of relativity is unfortunately named, as it has nothing to do with epistemological or moral relativism, for neither of which it provides any warrant. All the subsets of rationality—the plurality of subject matters—comprise the universal set of rationality itself, a fact that Plato well understood and that needs to be understood today—perhaps now more than ever. Education need to safeguard and develop the invaluable common-sense human intuitions of the true and good as universal realities.

scholarly journals Guide to Africa Bibliography

2019 ◽  
Vol 2018 ◽  
pp. xxiii-xxiv
Keyword(s):  
Social Sciences ◽  
Natural Sciences ◽  
Development Studies ◽  
Environmental Sciences ◽  
African Government ◽  
The Social ◽  
To Receive ◽  
Cover Material

This bibliography records publications on Africa of interest to students of Africa, principally in the social and environmental sciences, development studies, humanities and arts. Some items from the medical, biological and natural sciences are included. The criterion used is potential relevance to a reader from a social sciences/arts background. The whole continent and associated islands are covered, with selective coverage of the diaspora. This volume aims to cover material published in 2018 together with items from earlier years not previously listed. The editor is always very glad to hear of any items omitted so that they may be included in future volumes. He would be particularly pleased to receive notification of new periodicals, print or online. African government publications and works of creative literature are not normally listed.

The Mathematics of Society: Variation and Error in Quetelet's Statistics

1985 ◽  
Vol 18 (1) ◽  
pp. 51-69 ◽  
Author(s):  
Theodore M. Porter
Keyword(s):  
Social Sciences ◽  
Natural Sciences ◽  
The Political ◽  
Social Sphere ◽  
The Social

“Let us apply to the political and moral sciences the method founded upon observation and upon calculus, the method which has served us so well in the natural sciences.” The social sciences have known no truer follower of Laplace's dictum than Adolphe Quetelet. His mécanique sociale, later physique sociale, was conceived as the social analogue to Laplace's mecanique celeste, and embodied the results of an unswerving commitment not only to the presumed method of celestial physics, but even to its concepts and vocabulary. It is too weak to say that Quetelet's goal was the transmission of the achievements of celestial physics into the social sphere. He aspired to nothing less than imitation.

scholarly journals Hayek, las ciencias y la praxeología

2017 ◽  
pp. 129-152
Author(s):  
Luis Luque Santoro
Keyword(s):  
Social Sciences ◽  
Philosophy Of Science ◽  
Formal Theory ◽  
Human Mind ◽  
Jel Classification ◽  
Natural Sciences ◽  
The Social ◽  
Methodological Principles ◽  
Science Methodology ◽  
Complex Phenomena

This paper includes the main conclusions driven from a thorough com-pilation and interpretation of F.A. Hayek’s most relevant views on the subjects of philosophy of science, epistemology and methodology regarding social scien-ces. The dialogue that Hayek seems to establish between sciences and methods is particularly highlighted. This dialogue might be summarized in two ways: a «bottom-up» connection, by offering an alternative justification for methodologi-cal dualism and the proper methodological principles for the social sciences, from the perspetive of the natural sciences methodological paradigm in which Hayek frames his human mind theory in his work The Sensory Order; and a «top-down» connection, by concluding with respect to the complex phenomena theo-ries of natural sciences that there exist common methodological challenges with the social sciences, which require in both cases to take into account methodolo-gical differences not covered under the orthodox mainstream methodological paradigm. In this sense an interpretation of Hayek’s methodological approxima-tion to economics as an applied or empirical social science is proposed; which intends to offer explanations about concrete reality, as a necessary complement of Mises praxeology which instead only focuses on pure and formal theory. Keywords: Hayek; Philosophy of Science; Methodology; Praxeology; Pure Logic of Choice. JEL Classification: A12, A14, B41, B53. Resumen: En este trabajo se presentan las principales conclusiones de una detenida compilación e interpretación de los planteamientos más importantes de F.A. Hayek sobre temas de filosofía de la ciencia, epistemología y metodo - logía de las ciencias sociales. En particular se resalta el diálogo que Hayek parece plantear entre ciencias y métodos y que se concretaría en dos senti-dos: en una conexión «por abajo», justificando el dualismo metodológico y los principios metodológicos adecuados para las ciencias sociales, desde el paradigma metodológico de las ciencias naturales en el que elabora su teoría sobre la mente humana en El Orden Sensorial; y en una conexión «por arriba» al concluir respecto a las teorías sobre fenómenos complejos de las ciencias naturales la existencia de retos comunes con los que también se enfrentan las ciencias sociales y que requieren dar cabida en ambos casos a diferencias metodológicas no previstas según el criterio ortodoxo dominante. En este último sentido, se propone una interpretación de la aproximación metodoló-gica de Hayek para la economía como una ciencia social aplicada o empí-rica que tiene como objetivo ofrecer explicaciones de la realidad, como el complemento necesario a la praxeología misesiana centrada en la teoría pura formal. Palabras clave: Hayek; Filosofía de la Ciencia; Metodología; Praxeología; Lógica Pura de la Elección. Clasificación JEL: A12 (Relación de la economía con otras disciplinas); A14 (Sociología de la economía); B41 (Metodología económica); B53 (Escuela aus-triaca).

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