Prologue: “The Most Primitive Question”

System ◽  
2016 ◽  
Author(s):  
Clifford Siskin
Keyword(s):  
Social Sciences ◽  
Quantum Mechanics ◽  
Fundamental Question ◽  
Social Sciences And Humanities ◽  
The Social ◽  
The World

The Prologues argues that the question “What is a system?” is a fundamental question across the disciplines, from quantum mechanics to the social sciences and humanities. To answer the question we need to see system not as an “idea” needing a definition but as a genre—a form that works physically in the world to mediate our efforts to know it. We can then identify features of that genre, such as scalability, that explain why system came to play such a central role in efforts to know the world for so long. We can also count systems and account for their becoming something to blame, as in “blaming the system,” and for the role they play in constituting infrastructure. The Prologue then begins this tale of how system has mediated knowledge by turning back to Galileo’s discovery of Jupiter’s lunar system, the entry of “system” into English, and a discussion of the role of The Re:Enlightenment Project’s touchstones—past and present, mediating technologies, connectivities—in shaping this book.

scholarly journals Historiography within the structure of history of political and legal doctrines: subject field, objectives, tasks, and functions

2020 ◽  
pp. 126-137
Author(s):  
Sergei Vladimirovich Kodan
Keyword(s):  
Social Sciences ◽  
Scientific Discipline ◽  
Historical Science ◽  
Subject Field ◽  
Social Sciences And Humanities ◽  
Key Characteristics ◽  
The Social ◽  
History Of ◽  
Scientific Context

The scientific context of studying the historiography of the history of political and legal doctrines is associated with its positioning within the structure of the indicated historical legal science, and represents a challenging problematic that orients the researcher towards understanding the processes of development of this science through the prism of historiography as a reflection of its history. This necessitates to determine the subject field, objectives, tasks, and functions of historiography within the structure of the indicated science, which is the key vector of this research. At the same time, the analysis of these questions leans on universal vision of the development of historiography in the social sciences and humanities. The scientific novelty is defined by the fact that the historiographical problematic in the history of political and legal doctrines is studied insufficiently; therefore, this article is the first attempt to position historiography as a scientific discipline of historical legal trend, and present an original perspective on the topic. Emphasis is placed on examination of the key characteristics of historiography as part of history of political and legal doctrines: subject matter, objectives, tasks, and functions. At the same time, the author relies on the historiographical developments in social sciences and humanities, namely in the historical science, based on which presents an original perspective on the role of historiography as a part of history of political and legal doctrines is.

Synergetic scientism and social picture of the world

10.12737/3395 ◽  
2014 ◽  
Vol 3 (1) ◽  
pp. 29-37 ◽  
Author(s):  
Карпин ◽  
Vladimir Karpin
Keyword(s):  
Social Sciences ◽  
Fundamental Problem ◽  
Social Systems ◽  
Research Field ◽  
Nonequilibrium Systems ◽  
Evolutionary Mechanisms ◽  
Social Sciences And Humanities ◽  
The Social ◽  
The World ◽  
Special Scientific

The paper discusses possible ways of solving the fundamental problem of the community of scientific knowledge – the integration of natural and social sciences and humanities. Attempts to find common patterns of special scientific pictures of the world, in particular, biological and social, have led to a discussion of an interdisciplinary science as sociobiology which attempts to explain the social behavior of living beings by set of certain advantage generated in the course of evolution. Research field of sociobiology intersects with the study of evolutionary theory, zoology, genetics and other disciplines. In the field of social sciences it is close to evolutionary psychology exploring the behavior theory. Attempts to explain such behaviors as altruism, aggression are made using evolutionary mechanisms. Today we are witnessing the birth of the third, synergetic paradigm based on emerging, formation, development and change (evolution) of complex open nonlinear nonequilibrium systems. The theory of self-organization claims to interdisciplinarity and universality, including in the field of creation of the modern social picture of the world. The central problem under the consideration is the fact that synergy deals with the collective, mass processes, with complex social systems and is the most rational key to this problem solving.

scholarly journals The BRICS Countries Grouping: Promise of a New Thematic and Methodological Research Focus in the Social Sciences and the Humanities

2020 ◽  
Vol 7 (5) ◽  
pp. 3-13
Author(s):  
Charl Wolhuter ◽  
Oxana Chigisheva
Keyword(s):  
Social Sciences ◽  
Social Science ◽  
Potential Role ◽  
Global South ◽  
Social Sciences And Humanities ◽  
Brics Countries ◽  
The Social ◽  
Global North ◽  
Science Community

The aim of this research, as part of this Special Issue on the thematic and epistemological foci of social science and humanities research emanating in the BRICS countries, is to investigate and to assess the value of such research— firstly, for the BRICS countries mutually, then for the rest of the Global South as well as for the global humanities and social science community at large. The rationale of this research is that the BRICS countries have come to assume a growing gravitas in the world, not only on strength of geography, demography and economy; but also because of the diversity contained in each of these BRICS countries. These diversities offer opportunities to learn a lot from each other, in addition the rest of the gamut of countries in the Global South as well as the nations of the Global North can benefit much from learning from the experience of the BRICS countries. The research commences with a survey of the most compelling societal trends shaping the 21st Century world, which will form the parameters of the context in which scholarship in the social sciences and humanities are destined to be conducted. The state of scholarship in the humanities and the social sciences and the imperatives of context will be the next topic under discussion. Within this landscape, the potential role of research on BRICS soil is then turned to. The BRICS countries are surveyed, then a conclusion is ventured as to their potential as a fountainhead for social sciences and humanities research.

scholarly journals Science between and against disciplines in the social sciences and humanities

2020 ◽  
Vol 6 (2) ◽  
pp. 5-8
Author(s):  
Aleksander Kobylarek
Keyword(s):  
Social Sciences ◽  
Research And Development ◽  
Scientific Community ◽  
Scientific Communities ◽  
Interdisciplinary Science ◽  
Social Sciences And Humanities ◽  
The Social ◽  
New Ideas ◽  
Closed Pattern

The article describes the role of interdisciplinarity in the process of making science.  Two patterns of research and development of discipline are presented: the closed pattern which concentrates  on specialization and the open pattern  which fosters interdisciplinary science. The key to success is always openness for new scientific experiences and communities. The conclusion of the article is a proposal for  finding new scientific communities, which could be interested in new ideas, research  and thoughts where interdisciplinary analyses are not acceptable to the local scientific community.

scholarly journals An Overview of the Current State of Human Issues in Horticulture in the United States

2000 ◽  
Vol 10 (1) ◽  
pp. 27-33 ◽  
Author(s):  
Virginia I. Lohr ◽  
Paula Diane Relf
Keyword(s):  
Social Sciences ◽  
United States ◽  
Well Being ◽  
The United States ◽  
Public Gardens ◽  
Current State ◽  
The Social ◽  
The World ◽  
Plant Sciences

Throughout history, plants have been used to benefit people. In the United States, formal research to document the impacts of plants on people was not published until the 1970s, when papers from social and medical scientists began to appear. In the 1990s, symposia, including the first on “The Role of Horticulture in Human Well-being and Social Development,” brought people together from around the world to share and expand their knowledge in this emerging field. Symposium participants have included researchers in the social sciences and plant sciences, practitioners in horticultural therapy, teachers in colleges and public gardens, industry representatives applying the knowledge, and more. This has formed the basis for current activities in research, teaching, and practice throughout the United States. Examples from research that now documents a variety of beneficial impacts of plants on people are discussed.

The Role of Instrution in SLA

1993 ◽  
Vol 15 (2) ◽  
pp. 143-145 ◽  
Author(s):  
Patsy M. Lightbown ◽  
Nina Spada ◽  
Lydia White
Keyword(s):  
Social Sciences ◽  
Second Language Acquisition ◽  
University Of Illinois ◽  
University Of Toronto ◽  
Social Sciences And Humanities ◽  
The Social ◽  
Concordia University ◽  
Mcgill University ◽  
The Government

The papers in this issue were presented at a colloquium on The Role of Instruction in Second Language Acquisition held at Concordia University in Montreal, Canada, in July 1991. Participants in the Colloquium were the following:Birgit Harley, OISE, University of TorontoPatsy M. Lightbown, Concordia UniversityMichael Long, University of HawaiiManfred Pienemann, Sydney UniversityBonnie Schwartz, University of DurhamMichael Sharwood Smith, Utrecht UniversityNina Spada, McGill UniversityBill VanPatten, University of IllinoisLydia White, McGill UniversityThe Colloquium was sponsored by Concordia University and McGill University as well as by research grants from the government of Quebec through its Fonds pour la formation de chercheurs et l'aide à la recherche and from the Social Sciences and Humanities Research Council of Canada.

scholarly journals Speculative Empiricism, Nature and the Question of Predatory Abstractions: A Conversation with Didier Debaise

2021 ◽  
pp. 026327642110520
Author(s):  
Didier Debaise ◽  
Thomas P. Keating
Keyword(s):  
Social Sciences ◽  
The Social ◽  
The World ◽  
The Relationship

In conversation 1 with Didier Debaise, this piece thinks transversally across Nature as Event (2017a) and Speculative Empiricism (2017b) to explore some of the key stakes in his philosophy, namely: the relationship between the task of thinking a speculative empiricism and the problem of the bifurcation of nature. Engaging with the themes of nature, abstraction, dualism, pragmatism, and the role of stories in dramatizing our sensitivity to the world, the conversation develops Debaise’s contribution to theorising alternative modes of knowledge and experience capable of admitting those infra-sensible, inaudible, or imperceptible qualities of events. Distinctly, Debaise introduces here the problem of ‘predatory abstractions’ as one way to understand the problem of bifurcation. Ethically, the question of predatory abstractions makes new demands on the social sciences: to story new abstractions capable of deepening our experience of nature.

scholarly journals Sanitation under challenge: contributions from the social sciences

Water Policy ◽  
2011 ◽  
Vol 13 (6) ◽  
pp. 797-809 ◽  
Author(s):  
Bas J. M. van Vliet ◽  
Gert Spaargaren ◽  
Peter Oosterveer
Keyword(s):  
Social Sciences ◽  
Technical Change ◽  
Belief Systems ◽  
Technical Issue ◽  
Sanitation Services ◽  
Dead End ◽  
The Social ◽  
The World ◽  
Social Scientific

This paper reviews the contribution the social sciences can make to the challenge of providing access to sustainable sanitation services and infrastructures for billions of people, in both the over- and underdeveloped parts of the world. The paper reviews and discusses three particular social scientific topics relevant for the sanitation challenge: the nature of socio-technical change, the issue of multilevel governance, and the role of the citizen-consumer. It is argued that sanitation is as much a social as it is a technical issue, and that the role of social scientific knowledge needs to be strengthened and given more attention in this context. The key contribution from the social sciences is to be found in its capacity to help widen the narrow, technical definitions of sanitation by including actors and their needs and belief systems, and by highlighting the alternative socio-technical tools and governance arrangements that are instrumental in moving beyond some of the dead-end roads of traditional water engineering and sanitation provision.

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