Social science skepticism
Scott Erb
want to debate an issue, or if they simply are flame throwers.
I'll state my position in this post.
If you disagree, please state your disagreements in a friendly, productive
manner.
To prove my sincerity here, you can flame me back under the old topic heading
(treating poli-sci...) and I will not respond to those flames. I'll let each
of you get free shots at me to insult or deride as much as you wish. Since I
had insulted you as well, giving you that free shot is hopefully a sign of
good will, that I sincerely would like to increase the quality of this
discussion.
Question: Is Social Science a science?
My argument:
1. Unlike natural sciences, social science has obstacles which make it more
difficult to use the scientific method. This involves the inability to run
controlled experiments (in most cases), and the fact that the involvement of
ethical or value issues brings in a normative aspect which means that the
same data get interpreted differently by different people. (NOTE: each of
this problems may exist in the natural sciences at some level).
2. Some wish to say that this makes social science purely subjective or
interpretive; Xenon argued that this state of affairs allows analysts to
simply twist the data to support their own biases. Indeed, that does happen
too often.
3. However, I see these issues as simply obstacles to overcome in
implementing the scientific method. The key is to find a way to take into
account the interpretive nature of social science (the fact that data all
have some sort of normative as well as material meaning), and to deal with
the fact that experimentation is often impossible -- one usually deals with
evidence from past phenomena.
4. Step one is to ground the hypotheses in observation. Natural science
does this as well, but in social science the inability to control experiments
suggest some care should be taken in choosing which hypothesis to test.
Taking the time and effort to test a weak hypothesis is counterproductive.
One way of doing this is grounded theory. This starts with an inductive
approach in which the social science gathers data and categorizes it, taking
care to note how data are interpreted differently by different people. With
this categorization one notes (perhaps using statistical methods)
correlations and apparent relationships between the data. Using all this,
the analyst constructs an hypothesis.
5. The hypothesis must be carefully worded to avoid normative baggage.
Doing this perfectly is difficult, but due to peer review any wording of the
hypothesis will come under scrutiny. The assumptions of the study
must be laid out clearly (esp. if you plan on using a set of
assumptions that contradict another school of thought). Definitions must be
made which precisely. If normative "baggage" cannot be avoided, then one's
normative assumptions must be stated explicitly.
6. The test of the hypothesis will likely yield inconclusive results.
Because one can only control for outside variables with great difficulty,
there will always be alternative explanations for why you achieved the
results you got. People from another school of thought (e.g., Marxists) may
attack your assumptions. People from your own will question your definitions
or how you measured the variables. All of this is good. It leads to a
revision of the hypothesis and another test, taking into account these
questions and uncertainties.
7. This process continues. As for those who attack the assumptions, that
issue is especially complex. If two groups of social scientists operate
under contradictory assumptions (e.g., different paradigms), neither will
accept the other's results. Paradigmatic conflict like this usually gets
resolved through results -- which set of assumptions provide studies with the
most explanatory and predictive power. Seeing these results is more
difficult in the social sciences than the natural sciences, but the mechanism
is basically the same.
Are there specific disagreements? Reactions? I wrote this rather quickly,
so I'm not claiming it is a perfect, text-book style explanation. However,
if we start with some real position maybe we can crawl out of the flame wars.
I'm doing my part. I've laid out my position. I'll let you flame my last
posts under the old topic heading without responding to you. I'll await your
thoughtful, honest, responses to this topic.
-scott
Jim Rogers
>In article <4a1us2$q...@fcnews.fc.hp.com>, jfr says...
>>
>>scot...@maine.maine.edu (Scott Erb) wrote:
>>...
>>>6. The test of the hypothesis will likely yield inconclusive results.
>>
>>In my book, this alone makes it a pretty damned weak "science."
>
>A fair observation. That is a limitation of social science.
>
>Does this mean it is not a science, in your opinion? Do you think we should
>stop trying to implement the scientific method? Do you have any suggestions
>to the points I posted?
Sure. Don't formulate untestable (or only weakly testable) hypotheses,
but restrict yourself to only those hypotheses that yield themselves to
definitive testability.
Identify pure conjecture as such and don't promote it as being supported
by data which are inconclusive at best, completely uncontrolled at worst.
These two alone will bring it a lot closer to "science" as physical
scientists understand it. I.e., *restrict* your scope, instead of
trying to artificially expand it beyond conclusive bounds.
Jim
Barry Markovsky
> In article <4a1us2$q...@fcnews.fc.hp.com>, jfr says...
> >
> >scot...@maine.maine.edu (Scott Erb) wrote:
> >...
> >>6. The test of the hypothesis will likely yield inconclusive results.
> >...
> >
> >In my book, this alone makes it a pretty damned weak "science."
>
> A fair observation. That is a limitation of social science.
>
> Does this mean it is not a science, in your opinion? Do you think we should
> stop trying to implement the scientific method? Do you have any suggestions
> to the points I posted?
> -scott
Whoa, guys! Not all of social science's hypotheses are unfalsifiable.
True, the bulk of social science research is "damned weak" by physical
science standards. Nevertheless, there are pockets of highly rigorous
theory and research that fully meet the standards of the "harder"
sciences. The work tends to be rather abstract, often not dealing with
phenomena to which the average citizen would "relate." So it gets little
or no play in popular media.
So what's the best way to characterize a field, or a set of fields such
as "the social sciences"? I don't think it's fair to average in the good
with the bad and declare that the mean is low. Much of what goes on is
pretty weak, to be sure. But the fact that rigorous, cumulative research
occurs in some sectors indicates that scientific progress is being made,
although that progress could be much more efficient if our graduate
students were better trained in methods of formal theory construction and
analysis. It also means that you can't dismiss the whole shabang as
unscientific.
BTW, a good deal of my research consists of laboratory experiments. True,
most of the social phenomena that *directly* affect our everyday lives
(which, it seems, is what most people expect of the social sciences)
cannot be studied in the lab. But can't the same be said for the more
rigorous sciences? Certainly when it comes to basic research this is the
case. Perhaps where the social sciences especially fall flat is in the
areas of applied research and "engineering." I attribute much of that to
a lack of emphasis on basic research and rigorous theory. Most of what
you'll read from the "leading" scholars in my own field, for example, is
impressionistic, vague, ad hoc, poorly tested, and politicized hokum. Of
course, my notions about who the leading scholars really are don't
correlate very well with those who would win the popularity contest. I
suppose this is true in many fields.
____________________________________________________________________________
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
Barry Markovsky / Dept. of Sociology / U. of Iowa / Iowa City, IA 52242
Ph: 319.335.2490 Fax: 319.335.2509 E-MAIL: barry-m...@uiowa.edu
Center for the Study of Group Processes: http://www.uiowa.edu/~grpproc
____________________________________________________________________________
xe...@drycas.club.cc.cmu.edu
Jim Rogers <jfr> writes:
>scot...@maine.maine.edu (Scott Erb) wrote:
>....
>>6. The test of the hypothesis will likely yield inconclusive results.
>
>In my book, this alone makes it a pretty damned weak "science."
Not to mention that the inconclusiveness of the results does not
prevent "Political Scientists" from drawing conclusions. I suspect
that most of the conclusions that they draw are based on ideology,
not data -- i.e., it's more like a religion than a science.
- x
Scott Erb
says...
>Not to mention that the inconclusiveness of the results does not
>prevent "Political Scientists" from drawing conclusions. I suspect
>that most of the conclusions that they draw are based on ideology,
>not data -- i.e., it's more like a religion than a science.
You "suspect" something which seems to be more a snide swipe at a field you
don't have much experience with than a reasoned statement based on evidence.
I suggest you examine articles in the American Political Science Review and
comment on the results and methods. Anyone can make snide comments about
other professions and fields. You seem to want to insult and provoke, which
is OK. That's common on the internet. But if you could provide evidence and
examples from the field, you would then actually be making a point.
-scott
Scott Erb
>Sure. Don't formulate untestable (or only weakly testable) hypotheses,
>but restrict yourself to only those hypotheses that yield themselves to
>definitive testability.
The problem is that virtually all hypotheses in the social sciences are
untestable if held to that standard. The problem is that there is no general
agreement on the assumptions (e.g., there are multiple competing paradigms),
and since variables cannot be controlled as in an experiment, results are
open to different interpretations within the same paradigm.
Such tests are useful, however, for helping refine the methods and hypothesis
for the next round of testing. Also, building up slowly like this, even with
inconclusive hypotheses, yields new data which helps distinguish between the
viability of various competing paradigms.
>Identify pure conjecture as such and don't promote it as being supported
>by data which are inconclusive at best, completely uncontrolled at worst.
Pure conjecture is easy to eliminate. You seem to assume something is either
"definitive" or "pure conjecture." Peer review is merciless on people simply
trying to promote their own idiosyncratic ideas. The problem comes about not
because of pure conjecture, but because of difficulties in data
gatering/analysis.
>These two alone will bring it a lot closer to "science" as physical
>scientists understand it. I.e., *restrict* your scope, instead of
>trying to artificially expand it beyond conclusive bounds.
The scope does indeed get drastically restricted in many studies, but at the
same time generalizations between states or across the system are also
feasible. The issues you cite are ones which social scientists are well
acquainted and are working to deal with. I believe that many physical
sciences don't truly understand what being involved in an interpretive
"outside the lab" science means. It creates a new set of obstacles which one
has to work slowly to overcome. Too often physical scientists say, "it's not
like what we do, so it's not science." That kind of looking down ones nose
at the social sciences not only doesn't provide any constructive criticism,
but also shows an ignorance of what social scientists do.
-scott
Scott Erb
says...
> We've
>been over all this before, and none of it has ever sunk into Scott's tiny
>brain, though.
Well, I'm glad to see you are starting out avoiding the silly flames that
have been the mark of these debates. Come on, Dave, there is no need to
start out at the beginning with such insults.
> Since many of my comments are negative, Scott will likely
>dismiss it all as nothing more than an insult.
Oh, is calling someone a "tiny brain" is a negative argument, not a mere ad
hominem.
> ...so Scott has contradicted himself in his first paragraph.
Not really. The social sciences are unlike the natural sciences in terms of
the obstacles they face. The fact I put a paranthetical note that the
natural sciences may have similar problems to some extent doesn't deny this.
> I have
>pointed out many times in the past that his "special problems in social
>science" occur in the natural sciences as well (Who controls the
>weather?), yet at this point, he is only willing to say that such
>problems "may" occur in the natural sciences.
Of course, climatologists can conduct experiments with models of a weather
system. But since I also use the weather as an example, I don't see this as
any major disagreement. So far, you say that my use of "may" is too
tentative. Well, OK. I was comparing the "social sciences" to chemistry and
other sciences with more easily controlled experiments. This doesn't seem to
be a very substantive point though, so I'll move on.
> His argument for "special problems" in the social sciences is based on
>a misunderstanding of the natural sciences.
Really? Special problems is your term. I said there were obstacles that the
physical sciences don't usually run into. (I may not have said usually, so
you're right in pointing out that I made the statement too categorical). OK,
let's move on.
>>2. Some wish to say that this makes social science purely subjective or
>>interpretive; Xenon argued that this state of affairs allows analysts to
>>simply twist the data to support their own biases. Indeed, that does
happen
>>too often.
>
> Gues what? It happens in the natural sciences, too. When it does, it
>gets labelled as "bad science". People are just being consistent when
>they call it "bad science" in the social sciences, too.
I would agree.
Remember, I am not saying that the social sciences are essentially different
than the physical sciences. I'm saying that there are reasons why the way
they are done look different to people like Xenon and Jim, and why they
really are *essentially the same* endeavor. The different appearance comes
from the nature of the obstacles facing social science. It isn't that the
natural science doesn't have these obstacles as well, but they play a less
evident and dramatic role in most physical sciences.
>>3. However, I see these issues as simply obstacles to overcome in
>>implementing the scientific method. The key is to find a way to take into
>>account the interpretive nature of social science (the fact that data all
>>have some sort of normative as well as material meaning), and to deal with
>>the fact that experimentation is often impossible -- one usually deals with
>>evidence from past phenomena.
>
> Here's the argument for the "special case for social science" that
>raises ire. If Scott had a clue as to how this is handled in "natural"
>sciences with the same problems, he'd avoid many a flame war.
The problem I see with the social sciences in this regard is twofold:
1) One can't run controlled experiments. In most physical sciences, one
can. Meterology is a good example of a physical science which runs into
similar problems.
2) The question of norms and values. Social scientific analysis focuses on
issues that are laden with such questions. That happens in the physical
sciences too, but it doesn't get in the way of testing to the same extent.
Again, I'm not arguing for a "special case" for the social sciences. I'm
arguing that it is still the same thing as the physical sciences, but appears
different due to the necessity of dealing with certain problems which aren't
as dramatic in the physical sciences.
>>4. Step one is to ground the hypotheses in observation. Natural science
>>does this as well, but in social science the inability to control
experiments
>>suggest some care should be taken in choosing which hypothesis to test.
>
> Again, the "special case" argument.
Not really. Science is science. I'm explaining to Xenon WHY social science
may look different at times.
>>Taking the time and effort to test a weak hypothesis is counterproductive.
> Scott's problem is that he thinks that this sort of thing doesn't
>happen in the natural sciences.
WRONG! Dave, the social sciences are science. They are essentially the same
sort of endeavor as the physical sciences. It is NOT a "special case"!!!!!
> He's so lost in his "social science"
>jargon that he thinks he's describing a "special case" still. The
No, I'm not! The purpose of this post is to show that the social science is
indeed science LIKE the physical sciences. I'm explaining how the
methodology may make it look different to some casual observors. So far,
you're not disagreeing with me at all, even if you think you are.
>couching of things in jargon only serves to blur the distinction between
>"good" and "bad" science.
I agree with the above two lines completely.
> Yet again, Scott seems to argue for a "special case" for social
>science. Yet again, he seems to misunderstand how the natural sciences
>work.
This assertion is getting old. Since I'm saying the endeavors are
essentially the same, you're really asserting that I'm arguing something I am
not. However...
> "Alternative explanations" are only "alternative" to the extent that
>they claim different observable consequences. If they _have_ different
>observable consequences, then they are testable. The problem with people
>of Scott's ilk is that they want to attach all sorts of significance to
>things that are *not* observable.
My "ilk"? Sigh.
No, the problem with different interpretations is that competing paradigms
can often explain the same results in different ways. The observable
consequences may be the same -- Capitalists and Communists explain why World
War I happened in different ways, yet the result seems to verify their
theories. Note my argument was: 1) most testing involves past evidents
(taking data and trying to determine causes, etc.). 2) these events can be
successfully "explained" by different paradigms in different ways. This
means that two different sets of assumptions lead to two different
explanations. 3) So far, there hasn't been a way to test between different
competing paradigms in a manner to determine which is "right." The long run
success of one will involve the ability to predict future events rather than
merely explain past ones. So far, that goal has proven elusive.
You have not argued against these points.
You assert that I am simply claiming a "special case," or that I'm talking
about things which "aren't observable". (I'm not sure what you mean by that
criticism -- can you explain it?)
> In spite of the poorly-worded, vague
>hypotheses that are difficult or impossible to test, Scott wants to be
>able to claim "explanation" and "knowledge". The rest of us just want to
>call it "bad science".
Huh? That is a rather strange assertion which has nothing to do with my
post. I in fact said that vague hypotheses are to be avoided, and precision
is necessary. You are arguing against positions I didn't take!
>>7. This process continues. As for those who attack the assumptions, that
>>issue is especially complex. If two groups of social scientists operate
>>under contradictory assumptions (e.g., different paradigms), neither will
>>accept the other's results. Paradigmatic conflict like this usually gets
>>resolved through results -- which set of assumptions provide studies with
the
>>most explanatory and predictive power. Seeing these results is more
>>difficult in the social sciences than the natural sciences, but the
mechanism
>>is basically the same.
>
> The familiar "social science is hard" argument. Another old canard. Is
>the problem less apparent in the natural sciences? Likely. However,
>that's because the natural sciences decided a long time ago to just get
>to work and do what was necessary, instead of making excuses forever.
Really? Another assertion, Dave. Do you think social scientists have been
"making excuses forever?" A pretty nasty assault on a bunch of disciplines!
Can you substantiate this attack?
> My thoughtful, honest response is that you haven't learned much of
>anything over the last 2+ years.
I knew you couldn't end this without an insult or two. However, your post
has really been unresponsive to the points I've made, and has basically been
an excuse to launch into insults. I have a rather low opinion of your
willingness to engage in honest debate or work through these issues. I
believe you simply see this as a personal battle. But I'll keep trying in
good faith to debate the issues. You're welcome to join me at any time.
> I see no point in pursuing this further until you make a _real_ change
>in your debating tactics,
yeah, yeah, more insults...sigh...
-scott
Scott Erb
>Scientific methods are certainly plausible, but Scott isn't presenting any,
>and makes repeated demonstrations of hasty, sweeping conclusions from
>inconclusive data.
Since you've never seen any of my research or any of my social science, your
claim is invalid.
You disagreed with the statement that statistically arms buildups don't lead
to a lower incidence of war, with arms buildups being defined as increased
armaments, and a lower incidence of war defined as whether or not conflicts
end in armed conflict or a peaceful resolution.
What these statistics mean is open for interpretation. They do suggest other
hypotheses which can and should be tested.
But that was just my report of what some other social scientists are doing,
and I gave cites in order to let you look it up yourself. It's not my
research.
You haven't really made any attempt to argue against what I said about social
science. I honestly am not sure you really understand the issues involved.
-scott
Barry Markovsky
think Halliwell best expresses my position. I *might* allow that social
sciences have certain "special problems," but only if it is also
recognized that all sciences have their special problems--e.g., observing
very large or very small units of analysis; bracketing complex systems;
vast time-frames, etc.
I believe that there is nothing inherent in the objects of discourse of
social science that warrants non-scientific approaches, or precludes
scientific methods of theory construction and empirical testing. There
just aren't many people doing it. Those of us who do face an uphill
battle. We're branded as enamored of formalization for its own sake, of
doing experiments that lack external validity, of using unnecessarily
abstract language (even though some of us take great pains to provide
explicit definitions), and on and on.
In Sociology, there are perhaps several hundred of us who push hard for
theoretical and empirical rigor, put this push (especially for the
former) has not been going on very long, and it's fruits are not all that
evident. The Journal of Mathematical Sociology, and Social Networks are
perhaps the best exemplars of this direction in Sociology. I know that
other social sciences have comparable journals, well-regarded but not
widely-read. We keep trying.
Some colleagues and I recently launched an electronic journal (Current
Research in Social Psychology--CRISP) that hopes to cater to truly
scientific research in social psychology. The web address is listed
below--the last line of my sig. The papers we published so far may not be
fully self-contained, so some terms may seem like jargon. That's partly
due to the length restriction we place on published articles. In general,
the references point to sources for fuller explications of relevant
theories, including axioms and definitions of terms. I don't know if CRISP
will succeed, but I do believe that the work it publishes qualifies as
scientific.
DaveHatunen
Scott Erb <scot...@maine.maine.edu> wrote:
>In article <4a28ai$2...@fcnews.fc.hp.com>, jfr says...
>
>>Sure. Don't formulate untestable (or only weakly testable) hypotheses,
>>but restrict yourself to only those hypotheses that yield themselves to
>>definitive testability.
>
>The problem is that virtually all hypotheses in the social sciences are
>untestable if held to that standard. The problem is that there is no general
>agreement on the assumptions (e.g., there are multiple competing paradigms),
>and since variables cannot be controlled as in an experiment, results are
>open to different interpretations within the same paradigm.
I know this keeps going over your head, but that is precisely why people
in the real sciences don't consider the social sciences to be sciences.
>Such tests are useful, however, for helping refine the methods and hypothesis
>for the next round of testing. Also, building up slowly like this, even with
>inconclusive hypotheses, yields new data which helps distinguish between the
>viability of various competing paradigms.
And if it got far enough, perhaps it could become a science.
>>Identify pure conjecture as such and don't promote it as being supported
>>by data which are inconclusive at best, completely uncontrolled at worst.
>
>Pure conjecture is easy to eliminate. You seem to assume something is either
>"definitive" or "pure conjecture." Peer review is merciless on people simply
>trying to promote their own idiosyncratic ideas. The problem comes about not
>because of pure conjecture, but because of difficulties in data
>gatering/analysis.
But what if the pure conjecture were widely accepted in the field; then
peer review would encourage it, rather than criticize it.
>>These two alone will bring it a lot closer to "science" as physical
>>scientists understand it. I.e., *restrict* your scope, instead of
>>trying to artificially expand it beyond conclusive bounds.
>
>The scope does indeed get drastically restricted in many studies, but at the
>same time generalizations between states or across the system are also
>feasible. The issues you cite are ones which social scientists are well
>acquainted and are working to deal with. I believe that many physical
>sciences don't truly understand what being involved in an interpretive
>"outside the lab" science means.
I think the physical sciences are willing to accept astronomy and
geology as sciences these days; they are outside the lab.
>It creates a new set of obstacles which one
>has to work slowly to overcome. Too often physical scientists say, "it's not
>like what we do, so it's not science." That kind of looking down ones nose
>at the social sciences not only doesn't provide any constructive criticism,
>but also shows an ignorance of what social scientists do.
Geology was, until recently, not really a science in those terms, but
was able to develop, despite a number of obstacles, into a real
science. Should we ask less of social sciences?
--
********** DAVE HATUNEN (hat...@netcom.com) **********
* Daly City California: almost San Francisco *
* but with parking and lower car insurance rates *
*******************************************************
Jim Rogers
>In the discussion involving Halliwell, Erb, Rogers, Xenon & Hatunen, I
>think Halliwell best expresses my position. I *might* allow that social
>sciences have certain "special problems," but only if it is also
>recognized that all sciences have their special problems--e.g., observing
>very large or very small units of analysis; bracketing complex systems;
>vast time-frames, etc.
Understand that many of us are not disputing social science *per se* as a
science, but disputing Scott's presentation of it as a science. His failures
are uniquely his, I personally don't project them onto a whole field.
Scientific methods are certainly plausible, but Scott isn't presenting any,
and makes repeated demonstrations of hasty, sweeping conclusions from
inconclusive data.
...
>In Sociology, there are perhaps several hundred of us who push hard for
>theoretical and empirical rigor, put this push (especially for the
>former) has not been going on very long, and it's fruits are not all that
>evident. ...
Best of luck in your efforts.
Jim
xe...@drycas.club.cc.cmu.edu
scot...@maine.maine.edu (Scott Erb) writes:
>In article <4a4c69$9...@nntp.club.cc.cmu.edu>, xe...@drycas.club.cc.cmu.edu
>says...
>
>>Not to mention that the inconclusiveness of the results does not
>>prevent "Political Scientists" from drawing conclusions. I suspect
>>that most of the conclusions that they draw are based on ideology,
>>not data -- i.e., it's more like a religion than a science.
>
>comment on the results and methods.
Directing me to read the holy writ again? Why can't you come up
with a counter-example yourself? E.g., an example of "Political
Science" research that adheres to the scientific method and is not
driven by ideology.
>Anyone can make snide comments about
>other professions and fields.
Nothing "snide" about it. I'm a scientist -- you're not.
No brag, just facts.
>You seem to want to insult and provoke, which
>is OK. That's common on the internet. But if you could provide evidence and
>examples from the field, you would then actually be making a point.
You've already provided a sterling example -- your contention that
"arms buildups do not decrease the likelihood of war". Your data
implies nothing with respect to that conclusion, and you don't even
understand why.
- x
Dave Halliwell
>One last attempt to see if Dave Halliwell and Xenon are on the up and up and
>want to debate an issue, or if they simply are flame throwers.
Another standard Erb debating tactic: start a new thread with a new
title, and then do the same things all over again. In spite of my
expectation that Scott has not changed, I'll bite one last time. We've
been over all this before, and none of it has ever sunk into Scott's tiny
brain, though. Since many of my comments are negative, Scott will likely
dismiss it all as nothing more than an insult.
The only reason that I'm doing this is to put one last nail in the
coffin of Scott's claim that his view of social science and mine are the
same.
>Question: Is Social Science a science?
>My argument:
>1. Unlike natural sciences, social science has obstacles which make it more
^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^
>difficult to use the scientific method. This involves the inability to run
>controlled experiments (in most cases), and the fact that the involvement of
>ethical or value issues brings in a normative aspect which means that the
>same data get interpreted differently by different people. (NOTE: each of
>this problems may exist in the natural sciences at some level).
^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^
...so Scott has contradicted himself in his first paragraph. In "the
other thread", Scott has claimed that his view of "social science" is
based partly on things that he and I have discussed in the past. I have
pointed out many times in the past that his "special problems in social
science" occur in the natural sciences as well (Who controls the
weather?), yet at this point, he is only willing to say that such
problems "may" occur in the natural sciences.
His argument for "special problems" in the social sciences is based on
a misunderstanding of the natural sciences.
>2. Some wish to say that this makes social science purely subjective or
>interpretive; Xenon argued that this state of affairs allows analysts to
>simply twist the data to support their own biases. Indeed, that does happen
>too often.
Gues what? It happens in the natural sciences, too. When it does, it
gets labelled as "bad science". People are just being consistent when
they call it "bad science" in the social sciences, too.
>3. However, I see these issues as simply obstacles to overcome in
>implementing the scientific method. The key is to find a way to take into
>account the interpretive nature of social science (the fact that data all
>have some sort of normative as well as material meaning), and to deal with
>the fact that experimentation is often impossible -- one usually deals with
>evidence from past phenomena.
Here's the argument for the "special case for social science" that
raises ire. If Scott had a clue as to how this is handled in "natural"
sciences with the same problems, he'd avoid many a flame war.
>4. Step one is to ground the hypotheses in observation. Natural science
>does this as well, but in social science the inability to control experiments
>suggest some care should be taken in choosing which hypothesis to test.
Again, the "special case" argument.
>Taking the time and effort to test a weak hypothesis is counterproductive.
>One way of doing this is grounded theory. This starts with an inductive
>approach in which the social science gathers data and categorizes it, taking
>care to note how data are interpreted differently by different people. With
>this categorization one notes (perhaps using statistical methods)
>correlations and apparent relationships between the data. Using all this,
>the analyst constructs an hypothesis.
Scott's problem is that he thinks that this sort of thing doesn't
happen in the natural sciences. He's so lost in his "social science"
jargon that he thinks he's describing a "special case" still. The
couching of things in jargon only serves to blur the distinction between
"good" and "bad" science.
>5. The hypothesis must be carefully worded to avoid normative baggage.
>Doing this perfectly is difficult, but due to peer review any wording of the
>hypothesis will come under scrutiny. The assumptions of the study
>must be laid out clearly (esp. if you plan on using a set of
>assumptions that contradict another school of thought). Definitions must be
>made which precisely. If normative "baggage" cannot be avoided, then one's
>normative assumptions must be stated explicitly.
Yet Scott is completely unwilling to do so in his Usenet posts. He
makes a call for clarity in the social sciences, but when he gets flamed
for his repetitive lack of clarity in his posts he claims that his
writing is just fine. If his writing really _is_ just fine in his
"professional career", then it just demonstrates that you can get by in
the social sciences *with* a lot of "normative baggage".
>6. The test of the hypothesis will likely yield inconclusive results.
Then it wasn't much of a test, was it?
>Because one can only control for outside variables with great difficulty,
>there will always be alternative explanations for why you achieved the
>results you got. People from another school of thought (e.g., Marxists) may
>attack your assumptions. People from your own will question your definitions
>or how you measured the variables. All of this is good. It leads to a
>revision of the hypothesis and another test, taking into account these
>questions and uncertainties.
Yet again, Scott seems to argue for a "special case" for social
science. Yet again, he seems to misunderstand how the natural sciences
work.
"Alternative explanations" are only "alternative" to the extent that
they claim different observable consequences. If they _have_ different
observable consequences, then they are testable. The problem with people
of Scott's ilk is that they want to attach all sorts of significance to
things that are *not* observable. In spite of the poorly-worded, vague
hypotheses that are difficult or impossible to test, Scott wants to be
able to claim "explanation" and "knowledge". The rest of us just want to
call it "bad science".
>7. This process continues. As for those who attack the assumptions, that
>issue is especially complex. If two groups of social scientists operate
>under contradictory assumptions (e.g., different paradigms), neither will
>accept the other's results. Paradigmatic conflict like this usually gets
>resolved through results -- which set of assumptions provide studies with the
>most explanatory and predictive power. Seeing these results is more
>difficult in the social sciences than the natural sciences, but the mechanism
>is basically the same.
The familiar "social science is hard" argument. Another old canard. Is
the problem less apparent in the natural sciences? Likely. However,
that's because the natural sciences decided a long time ago to just get
to work and do what was necessary, instead of making excuses forever.
>Are there specific disagreements? Reactions? I wrote this rather quickly,
>so I'm not claiming it is a perfect, text-book style explanation. However,
>if we start with some real position maybe we can crawl out of the flame wars.
If you'd write something that _wasn't_ done quickly, perhaps we'd crawl
out of flame wars. The point has been made by others: your inability to
post material that is clear is evidence of at least one of the following:
- your unwillingness to write clearly
- your _inability_ to write clearly
- your inability to _think_ clearly.
>I'm doing my part. I've laid out my position. I'll let you flame my last
>posts under the old topic heading without responding to you. I'll await your
>thoughtful, honest, responses to this topic.
My thoughtful, honest response is that you haven't learned much of
anything over the last 2+ years.
I see no point in pursuing this further until you make a _real_ change
in your debating tactics, and make an effort to write something that
won't need "clarification" a day or two later.
--
Dave Halliwell I don't speak for my employers, and you
Edmonton, Alberta shouldn't expect them to speak for me.
Dave Halliwell
>In article <4a28ai$2...@fcnews.fc.hp.com>, jfr says...
>>Sure. Don't formulate untestable (or only weakly testable) hypotheses,
>>but restrict yourself to only those hypotheses that yield themselves to
>>definitive testability.
>The problem is that virtually all hypotheses in the social sciences are
>untestable if held to that standard.
...and...
> The issues you cite are ones which social scientists are well
>acquainted and are working to deal with.
From what you post, it appears that the "work" is nothing more than a
*lowering* of standards.
Scott Erb
>
>>The problem is that virtually all hypotheses in the social sciences are
general
>>agreement on the assumptions (e.g., there are multiple competing
paradigms),
>>and since variables cannot be controlled as in an experiment, results are
>>open to different interpretations within the same paradigm.
>
>I know this keeps going over your head, but that is precisely why people
>in the real sciences don't consider the social sciences to be sciences.
OK, I'm going to try to keep your arguments straight here.
You, Xenon, and Jim seem to say that the social sciences are different and
therefore not a science.
Dave Halliwell says the social sciences are a science and not really
different from the physical science. He claims that my explanation is wrong
because I'm supposedly claiming they are different than the physical
sciences.
Actually, Halliwell's position is closer to my own -- the basic differences
between social science and the physical sciences are differences of degree
and pragmatic application. The endeavor is the same. I'm not sure how
different Halliwell and my positions are because he didn't really explain
clearly (he was in flame mode).
I think the point above is also one Halliwell disagreed with me on, though he
wasn't clear. So it seems a central point to you all.
At base: different sets of assumptions yield explanations that each fit the
data. The question: Does the existence of competing paradigms mean that
social science is not a science?
You claim it does. I claim it doesn't, though I will grant that it shows a
limitation on the effectiveness of social science. The goal to me is to
still apply the scientific method and work out ways to test the different
paradigmatic explanations. Predictions about the future will be the best way
to work that out, I think.
>>Such tests are useful, however, for helping refine the methods and
hypothesis
>>for the next round of testing. Also, building up slowly like this, even
with
>>inconclusive hypotheses, yields new data which helps distinguish between
the
>>viability of various competing paradigms.
>
>And if it got far enough, perhaps it could become a science.
I guess our difference here is when a science becomes a science. If the
endeavor is to do what I described above, and if there is some sucess, why
can't we consider it a science? What is that period of scientific inquiry
without having an agreed upon paradigm called?
Kuhn calls "normal science" the science that takes place after a paradigm has
been agreed upon (or, after basic assumptions are generally accepted). We
don't have a "normal science" in many of the social sciences by that
definition. However, is it really not a science?
An aside to Halliwell -- I know you tend to want to flame me, but I do think
your insights on this controversy could be helpful.
>But what if the pure conjecture were widely accepted in the field; then
>peer review would encourage it, rather than criticize it.
But it doesn't. Peer review focuses precisely on eliminating non-scientific
analyses (well, not in all journals, I suppose. But in the ones which are
respected).
>Geology was, until recently, not really a science in those terms, but
>was able to develop, despite a number of obstacles, into a real
>science. Should we ask less of social sciences?
I think we're just quibbling about the definition of what a science is. I'm
saying if we endeavor to practice the scientific method: hypothesize, test,
revise, etc., then we are doing science. You suggest that until we have an
agreed upon set of assumptions we are something of a pre-science. I'm not
sure if that difference of definitions is resolvable. I can live with people
not considering social science a science, even if I disagree.
-scott
DaveHatunen
Barry Markovsky <mark...@blue.weeg.uiowa.edu> wrote:
>In the discussion involving Halliwell, Erb, Rogers, Xenon & Hatunen, I
>think Halliwell best expresses my position. I *might* allow that social
>sciences have certain "special problems," but only if it is also
>recognized that all sciences have their special problems--e.g., observing
>very large or very small units of analysis; bracketing complex systems;
>vast time-frames, etc.
But what isn't made clear is that these "special problems" are
pervasive in the social sciences, while in the natural sciences the
"special problems" occur on the fringes, at the forefront of reasearch,
there already being a large, nay, huge, body of solidly grounded work
behind it, The social sciences can't really be compared to the natural
sciences until they, too, have a large corpus of such solidly grounded
material.
In addition, most of natural science consists of a corpus of knowledge
which is demonstrably interdependent. One does not have an unrelated
experiment here, another there. In the natural sciences there are
well-validated principles which if shown to not be valid would
invalidate the entire body of knowledge, much in the way that rejection
of one of the four uniquely Euclidean axioms would destroy the entire
ssytem of Eucldiean geometry. And each new experiment springs directly
from that body of knowledge.
In fact, much of the fundamental corpus of the natural sciences now
seems so obvious that it is easy to forget how crucial it is. For
isntance if Newton's law that F = dp/dt were ever found to be even a
little bit untrue, cars would stop running.
I must confess, though, that the idea that the social sciences might
actually develop the hardness of the natural sciences scares me a bit
with thoughts of "1984" or "Brave new World".
[...]
Barry Markovsky
> Barry Markovsky <mark...@blue.weeg.uiowa.edu> wrote:
> >In the discussion involving Halliwell, Erb, Rogers, Xenon & Hatunen, I
> >think Halliwell best expresses my position. I *might* allow that social
> >sciences have certain "special problems," but only if it is also
> >recognized that all sciences have their special problems--e.g., observing
> >very large or very small units of analysis; bracketing complex systems;
> >vast time-frames, etc.
>
> But what isn't made clear is that these "special problems" are
> pervasive in the social sciences, while in the natural sciences the
> "special problems" occur on the fringes, at the forefront of reasearch,
> there already being a large, nay, huge, body of solidly grounded work
> behind it, The social sciences can't really be compared to the natural
> sciences until they, too, have a large corpus of such solidly grounded
> material.
>
My comparison was "in principle," i.e., in principle, the presence of
"special problems" does not distinguish social and natural sciences. If
you want to talk about relative sizes of solidly grounded work, no
question.
> In addition, most of natural science consists of a corpus of knowledge
> which is demonstrably interdependent. One does not have an unrelated
> experiment here, another there. In the natural sciences there are
> well-validated principles which if shown to not be valid would
> invalidate the entire body of knowledge, much in the way that rejection
> of one of the four uniquely Euclidean axioms would destroy the entire
> ssytem of Eucldiean geometry. And each new experiment springs directly
> from that body of knowledge.
Well, there are also many auxiliary principles which, if falsified, would
not invalidate the entire body of knowledge--but your point is certainly
correct. However, at least in psychology and sociology there are a few
research *programs* that address various classes of phenomen--information
integration, rational choice, status in small groups, power in social
networks, and others. Each has a series of related, interdependent
experiments, and theories which have evolved through the "copnjecture &
refutation" process. True enough, there is no one unifying
paradigm--although existing programs are not inconsistent with the fabric
of scientific knowledge. The fact that an area is "multi-paradigmatic"
does not make it unscientific; it just makes it less developed than the
natural sciences.
>
> In fact, much of the fundamental corpus of the natural sciences now
> seems so obvious that it is easy to forget how crucial it is. For
> isntance if Newton's law that F = dp/dt were ever found to be even a
> little bit untrue, cars would stop running.
Gee, and I thought most of the wild-eyed relativists were sociologists! :)
I know that you don't mean this literally, but there's a cadre of
sociologists of science (using anything but scientific methods) who argue
that our theories are not merely heuristics for understanding phenomena,
but they create the phenomena for us. Then, I suppose, if you falsify the
theory, the phenomenon would "stop running." Yeh right,
>
> I must confess, though, that the idea that the social sciences might
> actually develop the hardness of the natural sciences scares me a bit
> with thoughts of "1984" or "Brave new World".
Reminder: a bit of scary technology has also developed from knowledge in
the physical sciences.
> ********** DAVE HATUNEN (hat...@netcom.com) **********
> * Daly City California: almost San Francisco *
> * but with parking and lower car insurance rates *
And one long, nasty crack in the ground!
Scott Erb
says...
>Directing me to read the holy writ again?
No Xenon, I'm making a friendly suggestion that if you wish to deride a whole
discipline you should look and see what people in that discipline are doing,
that's all. If you're too lazy to do that, than you really should keep
quiet.
> Why can't you come up
>with a counter-example yourself?
There's no reason for me to. If you want to wallow in your little fantasies
about what you think social science is, then go ahead. It's not worth going
to the effort of explaining things to you, in my opinion.
>Nothing "snide" about it. I'm a scientist -- you're not.
>No brag, just facts.
And I disagree. Your "fact" is your "opinion". My opinion is different.
Tell me, what kind of "scientist" are you? I've honestly had the impression
you are an undergrad at Central Michigan. Am I wrong?
-scott
Jim Rogers
>>and makes repeated demonstrations of hasty, sweeping conclusions from
>>inconclusive data.
>
>claim is invalid.
I haven't seen any of your research, because you haven't presented it here.
So how is that relevant to the validty of what I said?
>You disagreed with the statement that statistically arms buildups don't lead
>to a lower incidence of war, with arms buildups being defined as increased
>armaments, and a lower incidence of war defined as whether or not conflicts
>end in armed conflict or a peaceful resolution.
...
>You haven't really made any attempt to argue against what I said about social
>science. I honestly am not sure you really understand the issues involved.
Perhaps that's because I'm limiting my commentary to those points that I see
as most egregious, and not campaigning against social sciences as a whole.
If Xenon and the Daves bite off a bigger battle, that's their concern.
Jim
Dave Halliwell
>In article <4a4ipk$f...@minotaur.nofc.forestry.ca>, dhal...@nofc.forestry.ca
>says...
>> ...so Scott has contradicted himself in his first paragraph.
>Not really. The social sciences are unlike the natural sciences in terms of
>the obstacles they face. The fact I put a paranthetical note that the
>natural sciences may have similar problems to some extent doesn't deny this.
Yes, it does. Unfortunately, in Erb-speak, it is quite possible for
something that is "unlike" another thing to actually be the same as that
"other thing".
Let's go over this _real_ slow, since that seems to be the only way it
is ever going to sink in. Even then, you'll probably just post reams of
bullshit claiming that your two statements are _not_ inconsistent. In your
original post, you said:
| 1. Unlike natural sciences, social science has obstacles which make it more
| difficult to use the scientific method.
This is a _clear_ and *unconditional* statement. It is presented as if
it is a fact. It is a claim that the social sciences have something that
the "natural sciences" don't.
You then go on, in the same paragraph, to say:
| (NOTE: each of
| this problems may exist in the natural sciences at some level).
Now, you blithering idiot, if your second statement is accurate - that
these obstacles _may_ exist in the natural sciences - then your first
statement cannot be accurate. Your first statement would have to say:
| 1. Unlike natural sciences, social science MAY HAVE obstacles which
| make it more...
If your first statement is an honest expression of your beliefs, then
the second statement would have to say that "each of these problems DOES
NOT exist in the natural sciences..." in order to be consistent.
You started your whole post off with a claim that the "social
sciences" are _different_ from the natural sciences. The whole post that
I am currently responding to is another pack of inconsistencies in which
you attempt to refute your claim that the social sciences are a special
case.
I see no point in _repeating_ the fallacious aspect of your claims.
Dave Halliwell
>In article <4a56k6$1...@fcnews.fc.hp.com>, jfr says...
>>Scientific methods are certainly plausible, but Scott isn't presenting any,
>>and makes repeated demonstrations of hasty, sweeping conclusions from
>>inconclusive data.
I know Scott is too stupid to parse this paragraph properly, so I'll
try to help him.
Jim has pretty clearly made a comment regarding what Scott presents
_here_. Jim's conclusions regarding hasty, sweeping conclusions from
inconclusive data are based on what Scott _posts_.
>Since you've never seen any of my research or any of my social science, your
>claim is invalid.
Now, if Jim were making claims about Scott's *research*, Scott would
have a valid cristicism.
At least Scott has made an honest admission that all his posts
regarding scientific methods, statistical inference and such have
absoulutely nothing to do with research or science.
DaveHatunen
Scott Erb <scot...@maine.maine.edu> wrote:
[...]
>But your paragraph shows one of the defining attributes of social science:
>one can't define away ethical and moral issues, they are part of virtually
>all social science research. This doesn't mean that the scientific method
>can't be applied, nor does it mean that values don't penetrate research in
>the physical science. It does mean that the existence of competing
>paradigms may have a positive impact in keeping us honest about the normative
>content of social science research.
Oh, I wouldn't claim that the social sciences aren't following the
forms of a real science in the research. But form is not substance, and
thus far there is little that a real scientist would recognize as
substance developing out of the use of the forms.
>Oh, and in fields like Political Science there are (depending on the
>subfield) large literatures that reflect a rather basic set of research and
>conceptual agreement. So in that sense it isn't that much different than
>what you describe for the physical sciences.
That's a little bit like saying a Porsche 944 and a Trabant are
basically the same thing.
--
********** DAVE HATUNEN (hat...@netcom.com) **********
* Daly City California: almost San Francisco *
* but with parking and lower car insurance rates *
*******************************************************
xe...@drycas.club.cc.cmu.edu
scot...@maine.maine.edu (Scott Erb) writes:
>In article <4a57cu$i...@nntp.club.cc.cmu.edu>, xe...@drycas.club.cc.cmu.edu
>says...
>
>Tell me, what kind of "scientist" are you? I've honestly had the impression
>you are an undergrad at Central Michigan. Am I wrong?
Yes, you're wrong, as usual. I guess you inferred that I'm an
undergrad from that fact that, unlike you, I don't continually
brag about having a Ph.D., as if that had some relevance to the
validity of one's arguments.
- x
Scott Erb
says...
>
>> The issues you cite are ones which social scientists are well
>>acquainted and are working to deal with.
>
> From what you post, it appears that the "work" is nothing more than a
>*lowering* of standards.
Is this just an attempt at a flame or a real criticism?
If it is the latter, it would be helpful for you to be more specific. Please
define what the standards should be, in your opinion, how I am "lowering"
these standards and, if you really want to be constructive, what needs to be
done to improve these standards.
Thanks.
-scott
Scott Erb
>I must confess, though, that the idea that the social sciences might
>actually develop the hardness of the natural sciences scares me a bit
>with thoughts of "1984" or "Brave new World".
What about Asimov's "psycho-history"?
But your paragraph shows one of the defining attributes of social science:
one can't define away ethical and moral issues, they are part of virtually
all social science research. This doesn't mean that the scientific method
can't be applied, nor does it mean that values don't penetrate research in
the physical science. It does mean that the existence of competing
paradigms may have a positive impact in keeping us honest about the normative
content of social science research.
Oh, and in fields like Political Science there are (depending on the
subfield) large literatures that reflect a rather basic set of research and
conceptual agreement. So in that sense it isn't that much different than
what you describe for the physical sciences.
-scott
Chris Dollin
In article <4a4ipk$f...@minotaur.nofc.forestry.ca>, dhal...@nofc.forestry.ca
says...
> We've
>been over all this before, and none of it has ever sunk into Scott's tiny
>brain, though.
Well, I'm glad to see you are starting out avoiding the silly flames that
have been the mark of these debates. Come on, Dave, there is no need to
start out at the beginning with such insults.
Better tactics would simply have been to delete Dave's comment without
remark.
> Since many of my comments are negative, Scott will likely
>dismiss it all as nothing more than an insult.
Oh, is calling someone a "tiny brain" is a negative argument, not a mere ad
hominem.
It's a ``negative comment''; Dave never claimed that ``tiny brain'' was
an argument.
> ...so Scott has contradicted himself in his first paragraph.
Not really. The social sciences are unlike the natural sciences in terms of
the obstacles they face. The fact I put a paranthetical note that the
natural sciences may have similar problems to some extent doesn't deny this.
Sorry; I don't buy this.
If you say that the social sciences have special obstacles, and then that
the natural sciences may have similar problems, what was special about the
special social science problems? If the natural sciences have those problems,
then there's nothing special about the social sciences. If they don't, why
make the remark. And if there's some graduation, why not say so straight off?
``While the natural sciences share some of the problems of the social sciences
(eg, the difficulty of performing controlled experiments in astronomy and
geology, the moral questions associated with double-blind medical reseach),
they pervade every aspect of the social sciences in a way which cannot be
ignored. For example ...''
[Er, so I didn't wordsmith it; it was the principle I was illustrating.]
> I have
>pointed out many times in the past that his "special problems in social
>science" occur in the natural sciences as well (Who controls the
>weather?), yet at this point, he is only willing to say that such
>problems "may" occur in the natural sciences.
Of course, climatologists can conduct experiments with models of a weather
system.
Sociologists can conduct experiments with models of a social system, too.
> His argument for "special problems" in the social sciences is based on
>a misunderstanding of the natural sciences.
Really? Special problems is your term. I said there were obstacles that the
physical sciences don't usually run into.
The informal term for this is ``special problems''. What's your point?
Oops; guest arrived, must go.
--
Regards, | ``"I can't suit myself," said Weinbaum, a little petulantly.
Kers. | "I work for the Government".'' - Blish, "The Quincunx of Time".
Scott Erb
says...
> Let's go over this _real_ slow, since that seems to be the only way it
>is ever going to sink in.
Sorry Dave, I read fast ;)
> Even then, you'll probably just post reams of
>bullshit claiming that your two statements are _not_ inconsistent. In your
>original post, you said:
It would be nice if you could make an argument without throwing in insults
and snide comments. Oh well, I guess that's your style. Anyway, I'll
continue.
>| 1. Unlike natural sciences, social science has obstacles which make it
> more
>| difficult to use the scientific method.
>
> This is a _clear_ and *unconditional* statement. It is presented as if
>it is a fact. It is a claim that the social sciences have something that
>the "natural sciences" don't.
It is a clear statement that there are obstacles which make it more difficult
(note: not impossible) to use the scientific method (compared to most
phuysical sciences). OK.
> You then go on, in the same paragraph, to say:
>
>| (NOTE: each of
>| this problems may exist in the natural sciences at some level).
>
> Now, you blithering idiot, if your second statement is accurate - that
>these obstacles _may_ exist in the natural sciences - then your first
>statement cannot be accurate. Your first statement would have to say:
Blithering idiot? Sigh.
Dave, you aren't a blithering idiot, but you are simply wrong here. I said
it was more difficult due to these obstacles. The fact that the obstacles
exist at some level in the physical sciences does not deny that the level of
their existence in the social sciences makes social scientific inquiry more
difficult.
You are wrong. Your insults are thus misdirected.
> You started your whole post off with a claim that the "social
>sciences" are _different_ from the natural sciences.
No, I said that some obstacles in the social sciences make application of the
scientific method more difficult. That doesn't mean that the endeavors
aren't essentially the same. It's more difficult to ski down some hills than
others, but that doesn't mean you aren't still skiing. Social sciences just
has a few more mogals and ice patches than the physical sciences.
>The whole post that
>I am currently responding to is another pack of inconsistencies in which
>you attempt to refute your claim that the social sciences are a special
>case.
>
> I see no point in _repeating_ the fallacious aspect of your claims.
Ah, argument by assertion/insult (with no supporting evidence). Typical.
-scott
Scott Erb
says...
> No, you blithering idiot. I say that the problems to be examined in
>"social science" are amenable to investigation by the scientific method
>as generally practised in the natural sciences.
So, Dave Halliwell's "insult du jour" is "blithering idiot." Your posts
would be more enjoyable to read if you'd find some more creative insults.
You just used this at the end of your last post. :)
I certainly agree that the problems to be examined in the social sciences are
amenable to investigation by the scientific method. I do think that
different fields have different problems, and the social science deals with
some obstacles that are not as relevant for the physical sciences. I've
detailed those, and you really haven't responded with any counter argument.
Or is calling me a "blithering idiot" your idea of an argument?
> That is a completely separate issue from whether or not "social
>scientists" actually use those methods. More specifically, what _you_
>present here bears little resemblance to what I consider to be "good
>science". The fact that you seem to think that you are describing
>something that resembles "good science" only tells me that you still
>wouldn't recognize "good science" if it drove over you in a Mack truck.
>As a result, I come to the conclusion that *you* are not a scientist.
Your writing here is very confusing and unclear. Whether social scientists
use those methods (or whether physical scientists use them) is, indeed,
another issue. Why are you bringing it up? What is that has "little
resemblance" to good science? Your vauge "what you present here" claim
doesn't point to anything specific I presented. Also, you are bringing up
the term "good science" here, but attributing it to me (that I think I'm
describing "good science"). You then assert I wouldn't recognize good
science if I saw it. You seem to provide tangential assertions, then use
them to make an insult. Very, very, weak.
BTW, whether or not I'm a scientist hardly depends on the opinion of a few
people on sci.skeptic!
> Fortunately, I know social scientists that *are* "good scientists", so
>I know that "social science" _can_ be done scientifically.
So do I. That is my point. Maybe you can provide an example to Xenon, he
might listen to you.
> Unfortunately, I know a lot of "social scientists" like you, too. They
>_aren't_ scientists, either.
Again, an assertion/insult. Is that the best you can do?
> I also know both "good" and "bad" _natural_ scientists.
So do I. So?
> ...and Scott _repeats_ this claim, in spite of numerous posts from me
>saying that they are not, and numerous posts from _others_ saying that
>they can tell the difference.
Our views are similar Dave, you haven't shown any substantive place where
they are not. Instead, you try to hide the issue by insults and assertions.
You try to assign positions to me which I do not hold. You *still* are
looking at this debate as something personal rather than something pertaining
to the issues.
If you would SOMEDAY meet my challenge of positing clearly what issues we
disagree upon, then I'll respond. That means avoiding simply asserting and
insulting and claiming that proves we disagree. State what your position is,
what you think my position is, and where the difference lies. I'll respond
and we'll see where that brings us.
-scott
Scott Erb
says...
>Instead of putting their noses to the grindstone, as "natural"
>scientists have been doing for hundreds of years, the "social scientists"
>(of the Erb class) spend all their time talking about what a tough job
>they have and how nice it would be to come up with "alternative paths to
>knowledge".
LOL!
Dave, your insult/assertion style is way off the mark here.
I've done a lot of field work, interviews, data collection and analysis. How
can you claim I "spend all my time talking about what a tough job" social
science is. That's silly. I think it's a fun job, and I enjoy it. I just
am realistic about where the science is in its development. In that sense, I
find some of Dave Hatunen's arguments on the mark, though I don't think that
makes social science a non-science.
> They run around claiming "knowledge", and when it is shown
>that this "knowledge" just doesn't stand up to scientific scrutiny, they
>pull out the argument that "the scientific method can't be used for our
>'special problems'".
Run around?...oh geez, Dave, can you get off your high horse and actually
look at what is being said. Main Point: Who is saying that "the scientific
method can't be used"? My point is that it can and should be used! Who is
"running around claiming 'knowledge'? What does that mean? Where are you
getting these wild assertions?
> They claim that their "alternate methods" are "just
>as good", and just never get around to doing anything scientific. As long
What alternative methods are these? Who is making this claim? Remember: I'm
claiming the scientific method should be and is being used in the social
sciences (though some don't use it, I admit).
>as they stick around with like minds, have a constant supply of dollars
>from their "colleagues", and avoid situations where concrete referents can
>display their ignorance, they do just fine. Look at how well Erb [claims
>he] has done.
Well, I personally strongly attack the ivory tower attitude of some in the
field as being impractical and unscientific. I think concrete referents are
absolutely necessary and must not be avoided. Again, you are trying to
assign positions to me which are opposite from my own so you can avoid having
to admit we actually agree. Strange.
> Unfortunately, the Erbs of the world seem to have been taught at an
>early age that all "natural science" is like a high school chemistry
>experiment. They seem to think that because they are doing something
>different from the way it was done in high school chemistry, they're
>doing something different from what is done in _real_ science.
Totally untrue. I'm actually fascinated by and keep myself read in what is
happening in the physical sciences. Obviously I don't do the math and
experimentation, but I'm rather enamoured with science and believe the
scientific method is the best tool in the social sciences as well as the
physical sciences. Of course, you can assert/insult the opposite if you
want. I'll just have to keep correcting you.
-scott
Chris Dollin
In article <4a56k6$1...@fcnews.fc.hp.com>, jfr says...
>Scientific methods are certainly plausible, but Scott isn't presenting any,
>and makes repeated demonstrations of hasty, sweeping conclusions from
>inconclusive data.
Since you've never seen any of my research or any of my social science, your
claim is invalid.
Excuse me, Scott, but this reasoning is incomplete.
It's not necessary for you to have presented any of your own work in order
for you to have made such demonstrations; if you'd said, for example:
Seldon's work on the psychology of Foundation monkey's, which
has results at the 30% significance level, means that we will
attain world peace in the next twenty years,
and similar things several times, you would have done as jfr says.
But that was just my report of what some other social scientists are doing,
and I gave cites in order to let you look it up yourself. It's not my
research.
But that doesn't stop it being ``hasty, sweeping conclusions'' (if they
were; I wasn't pottering here then); and if you'd reported them as best-of-
field (I don't claim you did) it doesn't give us any reason to believe
*your* reasearch is better, does it?
You haven't really made any attempt to argue against what I said about social
science. I honestly am not sure you really understand the issues involved.
You're the expert; explain the issues in language the other chaps have shown
they can handle.
Jim Rogers
>scot...@maine.maine.edu (Scott Erb) writes:
> In article <4a4ipk$f...@minotaur.nofc.forestry.ca>, dhal...@nofc.forestry.ca
> says...
> > ...so Scott has contradicted himself in his first paragraph.
>
> Not really. The social sciences are unlike the natural sciences in terms of
> the obstacles they face. The fact I put a paranthetical note that the
> natural sciences may have similar problems to some extent doesn't deny this.
>
>
>If you say that the social sciences have special obstacles, and then that
>the natural sciences may have similar problems, what was special about the
>special social science problems? If the natural sciences have those problems,
>then there's nothing special about the social sciences. If they don't, why
>make the remark. And if there's some graduation, why not say so straight off?
Because Scott doesn't know how to write. This is called "clarification" or
"explaining fine nuances" and not "contradiction." He hasn't learned how to
say exactly what he means straight off, and expects his audience to always
have to wait for the other shoe to drop.
>``While the natural sciences share some of the problems of the social sciences
>(eg, the difficulty of performing controlled experiments in astronomy and
>geology, the moral questions associated with double-blind medical reseach),
>they pervade every aspect of the social sciences in a way which cannot be
>ignored. For example ...''
>
>[Er, so I didn't wordsmith it; it was the principle I was illustrating.]
Nice revision; the avoidance of self-contradiction provides an actual opinion
to agree or disagree with, rather than a hedge to allow one to deny that one
meant what others read one to mean. If only Scott would write with such
principles in mind, we could figure out his actual arguments.
Strunk&White, Scott. Talk to an English instructor at U.Maine.
Jim
Jim Rogers
...
>If I would see friendly, thoughtful, and honest responses from Xenon and
>Halliwell, I would maybe put more effort into this. So far, they haven't
>proven worth the effort. Instead, they seem to have a schoolyard bully
>mentality -- gang up on the outsider, attack personally, and, of course, Dave
>Halliwell responds to Xenon's posts to add insults about me, etc.
>
>It's sort of interesting being pounced upon from two or three sides but still
>being able to frustrate your opponents.
You have a grandiose opinion of what you're actually accomplishing. I haven't
noticed any of your opposition actually being "frustrated" when your answers
amount to "learn something about the field before criticizing it."
> At base, their arguments are weak
>and no amount of insults can hide that fact.
Scott declares victory. Film at eleven.
Jim
Jim Rogers
>In article <4a76tb$i...@minotaur.nofc.forestry.ca>, dhal...@nofc.forestry.ca
>says...
>>| 1. Unlike natural sciences, social science has obstacles which make it
>> more
>>
>>it is a fact. It is a claim that the social sciences have something that
>>the "natural sciences" don't.
>
>It is a clear statement that there are obstacles which make it more difficult
>(note: not impossible) to use the scientific method (compared to most
>phuysical sciences). OK.
It is *also* a clear statement that this property is "unlike natural sciences."
If you didn't mean it was unlike natural sciences, why did you say it here?
>> You then go on, in the same paragraph, to say:
>>
>>| (NOTE: each of
>>| this problems may exist in the natural sciences at some level).
>>
>> Now, you blithering idiot, if your second statement is accurate - that
>>these obstacles _may_ exist in the natural sciences - then your first
>>statement cannot be accurate. Your first statement would have to say:
>
>Dave, you aren't a blithering idiot, but you are simply wrong here. I said
>it was more difficult due to these obstacles. The fact that the obstacles
>exist at some level in the physical sciences does not deny that the level of
>their existence in the social sciences makes social scientific inquiry more
>difficult.
Except for the tiny fact that you had already claimed that the existence of
these obstacles is "unlike" natural science. That is, by direct implication,
these obstacles are unique to social science. Your "clarification" reads
more like back-pedaling.
Scott, DON'T SAY THINGS YOU DON'T MEAN just to say something close. Emblazon
this notion in high-voltage, flashing lights in your brain.
Jim
Scott Erb
says...
> You haven't really made any attempt to argue against what I said about
social
> science. I honestly am not sure you really understand the issues
involved.
>
>You're the expert; explain the issues in language the other chaps have shown
>they can handle.
Despite the fact I find it a bit annoying that some on this group seem to
think that any sort of language/style contrary to their own is "unclear
writing," I accept that when one writes on a different forum, one must write
to that audience.
I have posted explanations, but I really believe that a lot of respondents
aren't honestly trying to understand what I write -- they have personalized
this "debate" and are going to find some reason to attack regardless of the
content of my posts.
Still, taking your advice, I have posted an offer to send anyone a first
draft of my next paper (probably in January) as an example of how at least I
do social science research. If we could agree to end flame wars and
accusations until people have a chance to read that and respond, that would
be great. (I posted the offer a few minutes ago -- if this one shows up on
your feeder first, the other will follow shortly).
-scott
Jim Rogers
>Since the issues I posted hasn't really caused anyone to respond
>substantively, I will try something else to move this from flame war stage to
>more constructive debate. (That may be difficult because of the "pile on"
>mentality that seems to happen on the newsnet. When someone is flamed by a
>few people, others join in, and soon that person is seen as a caricature of
>themselves based on the way they are described by others. I will try with
>facts and friendly, honest, debate -- and patience/perseverance to overcome
>that).
Scott, you can start by quitting this martyr/persecution-complex crap, and
have the decency to acknowledge that you may be "piled upon" because there
is something substantively wrong with the arguments you present. I resent
the implication that I and others have not responded substantively.
If someone responds with insults, you can simply ignore the insults and go
to the substantive issues; don't rise to the bait. Stop wasting bandwidth
crying about abuse. Parrying about personality is pretty boring debate.
I can certainly take someone calling me a dolt or blithering idiot as a part
of pointing out logical flaws in my arguments (but I expect some sort of
apology if ultimately recognized not to be flaws). It's not polite, but it's
not especially disrespectful, either, because such an insult is a conclusion
from one's displays of inconsistency, at worst, calling attention to them in
an overly colorful manner. Do so without provocation, though, and I tune you
out.
Jim
xe...@drycas.club.cc.cmu.edu
scot...@maine.maine.edu (Scott Erb) writes:
>
>Another proposal:
>
>Let's cease the name calling and flames. Instead, when I finish a paper I'm
>working on I'll send it to anyone who wants to examine it in terms of seeing
>if it is scientific (as an example of social science). I'll take any
>comments seriously, and that way you can see a real example of how I believe
>social science research can be done.
>
>I probably won't have this ready to send until early January, but if you
>e-mail me your name and address, I'll get a copy of the first draft out to
>you and await your comments. That will be a bit of empirical evidence and
>hopefully will allow us to rise from the muck of flame wars.
I have a an idea. Do you have anything else that's already been
published? If, like most of us, you use some kind of word processor
to type up your manuscripts, it shouldn't be too hard to convert
the thing to ascii and post it. I'm sure there are lots of us here
who would love to see it.
- x
Scott Erb
>
>As a biological anthropologist, I would argue that social science is an
>oxymoron! There is damned little, if any, science, especially in areas
>such as culture theory and the like. Most of us feel far more at home in
>biology departments where at least there is an appreciation of empirical
>data.
Is this just an assertion based on prejudice and personal bias, or do you
have evidence to back this up?
DaveHatunen
Barry Markovsky <mark...@blue.weeg.uiowa.edu> wrote:
>This won't resolve many issues in the discussion, but I wanted to provide
>a bit of evidence that (a) at least some of us in the social sciences
>are striving to uphold scientific tenets, and (b) we are often frustrated
>in doing so by people in key positions who fail to uphold those tenets.
>
>This case-in-point concerns a manuscript that I reviewed for one of the
>top two journals in sociology. It had major flaws, which I took the time
>to point out (in a constructive tone), but it was accepted for publication
>without requiring the sorts of changes and corrections I suggested.
>Following are a couple of letters to the Editor of the journal (the second
>containing quotes providing the gist of the Editor's response to the first
>letter) and a brief e-mail exchange. I think her responses are very
>telling. It is no surprise to me that scientists outside of the field
>portray sociology as non-scientific or pseudo-scientific. As I have said
>here, that's probably an accurate portrayal of most of the work in the
>field. It does not accurately describe all of the work, however, and
>these sorts of generalizations should be slung with more caution--or not
>at all.
[Correspondence deleted}
For the life of me, I can't figure out how you got to be a peer
reviewer for a social sciences journal in the first place.
But none of this surpises me in the least.
Jim Rogers
>In article <4a9unq$j...@fcnews.fc.hp.com>, jfr says...
>
>>Except for the tiny fact that you had already claimed that the existence of
>>these obstacles is "unlike" natural science.
>
>create certain difficulties was my claim. The difficulties are greater in
>scope than in the natural sciences. Do you disagree with any of the rest of
>the argument, or are you just nitpicking over the use of the word "unlike"?
If you *meant* that the only difference was one of degree, you should
have *said* that straight out. The way you phrased it reads as if the
existence of such problems is unique to social sciences.
What you really meant was that these difficulties are *very much like*
difficulties other scientific fields encounter, but are *far harder to
deal with* for various reasons, which you could then go on to enumerate.
You did not at all mean to say the problems were "unlike" those in
physical sciences, but only meant to distinguish *degree*.
This isn't "nitpicking," Scott, it's fundamental communication.
Jim
Barry Markovsky
a bit of evidence that (a) at least some of us in the social sciences
are striving to uphold scientific tenets, and (b) we are often frustrated
in doing so by people in key positions who fail to uphold those tenets.
This case-in-point concerns a manuscript that I reviewed for one of the
top two journals in sociology. It had major flaws, which I took the time
to point out (in a constructive tone), but it was accepted for publication
without requiring the sorts of changes and corrections I suggested.
Following are a couple of letters to the Editor of the journal (the second
containing quotes providing the gist of the Editor's response to the first
letter) and a brief e-mail exchange. I think her responses are very
telling. It is no surprise to me that scientists outside of the field
portray sociology as non-scientific or pseudo-scientific. As I have said
here, that's probably an accurate portrayal of most of the work in the
field. It does not accurately describe all of the work, however, and
these sorts of generalizations should be slung with more caution--or not
at all.
==================
Paula England, Editor
American Sociological Review
Department of Sociology
University of Arizona
Tucson, AZ 85721
September 1, 1995
Dear Paula:
I am writing to express my disagreement with the conditions under
which you have decided to publish Ms#94-194(R1), "Risk and Power Use,"
and with the Deputy Editor's portrayal of my review. I am appalled
that the Deputy Editor would brush off my detailed analysis as merely
a "line on things" that for the most part the author is encouraged
to ignore. For you to allow this simply does not accord with the
scientific values that you have claimed (in conversation with me) to
uphold.
It was not some biased, idiosyncratic or capricious set of standards
that I imposed on the manuscript in question. In all of my reviews I
determine whether (i) the terms used to express theoretical ideas are
clearly and consistently defined, (ii) the arguments used to justify
predictions and/or conclusions are logically sound, (iii) the
empirical methods which are employed are appropriate to test the
claims, and (iv) results corroborate predictions. If it is the case
that (i) or (ii) are not satisfied, then (iii) and (iv) become
irrelevant. That is, if the theory is not interpretable due to
ambiguities, contradictions, tautologies, etc., then research findings
cannot be claimed to bear on the theory one way or the other.
I didn't make these things up! While it is clearly the case that not
all sociologists are concerned with clarity and logic, all scientists
are. And because the manuscript purports to combine two theories that
operate within the realm of social and behavioral science, the same
standards must apply to the new work as were applied to the old.
My two reviews of the manuscript in question [I reviewed an initial
version and a revised version] identified numerous instances where
terms were not defined clearly and where theoretical arguments broke
down. It seems quite likely that I studied the terms and arguments in
this paper more thoroughly than did the author and other reviewers.
Please, then, tell me how in good conscience you can ignore these
points and not make addressing them a condition of publication? We're
not talking about intractable philosophical conundra; these are gaps,
ambiguities and errors that can and should be corrected. My goodness,
do you really find no problem with having a series of theoretical
statements variously called "principles," "assumptions,"
"propositions," and "theorems," with no logical or semantic basis for
such distinctions having been provided? Are you really willing to
endorse a piece of work knowing that serious flaws in its theoretical
argument have been identified?
I would welcome further discussion on these issues with you, the
deputy editor, and/or the author. I would especially like to know the
basis upon which author and the Deputy Editor would defend a theory
when it manifests blatant gaps, ambiguities, and tautologies.
Sincerely,
Barry Markovsky
copy: Lynn Smith-Lovin [Deputy Editor]
===========================================
Paula England, Editor
American Sociological Review
Department of Sociology
University of Arizona
Tucson, AZ 85721
October 3, 1995
Dear Paula:
Thank you for responding (9/22) to my letter (9/1) regarding the
handling of my review of Ms#94-194(R1), "Risk and Power Use." I don't
mean to seem belligerent or otherwise troublesome, but I am
simultaneously an Editor, a Deputy Editor, and a frequent referee. I
think about these roles a great deal and take them very seriously.
Your letter still leaves unanswered some important questions.
You wrote "In the final analysis, there isn't much to say except that
we disagree." In general I have no problems tolerating disagreements.
On the other hand, most anyone offering a rationale for his/her
position would be dissatisfied if no rationale were provided by the
other party to the disagreement. You did note that two other
reviewers and a deputy editor recommended publication, but again you
did not address any of the reasons for the disagreement. I summarized
these in my last letter with the sentences
My goodness, do you really find no problem with having a series
of theoretical statements variously called "principles,"
"assumptions," "propositions," and "theorems," with no logical
or semantic basis for such distinctions having been provided?
Are you really willing to endorse a piece of work knowing that
serious flaws in its theoretical argument have been identified?
... I would welcome further discussion on these issues with you,
the deputy editor, and/or the author. I would especially like to
know the basis upon which the author and the Deputy Editor would
defend a theory when it manifests blatant gaps, ambiguities, and
tautologies.
Your letter did not address any of these problems and I still do not
understand how they can be willfully ignored by all involved. Please
explain.
You also wrote "...one can believe that the best way for scientists to
find [the right answers], collectively, is to allow presentation of
differing scientific opinions; ...rigorous people thinking clearly may
still disagree." Of course I agree with these sentiments! As I think
you understand, however, there is nothing in the criteria which I
summarized in my last letter that can be construed as impeding the
presentation of different scientific opinions. (If this was not your
impression in regard to the criteria, then I will elaborate upon
request.) The problem was that, apparently contrary to your
impression, the theoretical exposition in the paper I reviewed was not
rigorous, and it was that lack of rigor--not a disagreement with
scientific opinion--that was the basis of my recommendation.
If you're still inclined to send me papers to review (even after
having to deal with this sort of correspondence), I'll need to know
your answers to my questions and requests for clarifications. Even if
you're not inclined to send me papers, I'd still like to know how you
view these issues.
Sincerely,
Barry Markovsky
===========================================
e-mail copy: Lynn Smith-Lovin
From eng...@u.Arizona.EDUMon Oct 9 13:34:47 1995
Date: Mon, 9 Oct 1995 10:22:15 -0700 (MST)
From: Paula England <eng...@u.Arizona.EDU>
To: Barry Markovsky <barry-m...@uiowa.edu>
Cc: asr <a...@aruba.ccit.arizona.edu>,
smith <smit...@aruba.ccit.arizona.edu>
Barry--I know that you will find this response unsatisfying.
Nonetheless, I am not willing at this point to take the time to get
out the file of the paper you think should not have been accepted and
answer you point by point on where I agree with you and where I don't.
I don't think that is a good use of my time when I have about a dozen
papers on my desk that I need to read. Where my deputy editor thought
you had a good point, in a general way, we asked the author to make
changes in the conditional accept letter. I am not abdicating
responsibility, but there is a limit to how much time I can put in
micro-managing each paper. And once a decision is made, I think it is
not a good use of time to reread the file to argue with a reviewer who
disagreed.
I am really not willing to discuss this case with you anymore.
Despite our interchange on this issue, I have not mentally removed you
from a list of reviewers I would consider using. If you feel that you
are not willing to review for me in the future, you might tell me that
now so that we don't send you papers only to have you send them back.
I thank you for the time and care that has gone into your reviews for
ASR.
Paula England
Department of Sociology
University of Arizona
From mark...@blue.weeg.uiowa.eduMon Oct 9 13:35:05 1995
Date: Mon, 9 Oct 1995 13:34:36 -0500 (CDT)
From: Barry Markovsky <mark...@blue.weeg.uiowa.edu>
To: Paula England <eng...@u.Arizona.EDU>
Cc: Lynn <smit...@aruba.ccit.arizona.edu>
Subject: Re: your mail
On Mon, 9 Oct 1995, Paula England wrote:
> [...] I am not willing at this point to take the time to get out
> the file of the paper you think should not have been accepted and
> answer you point by point on where I agree with you and where I
> don't.
Paula--
I know you're very busy and wouldn't expect you to go through the
paper! I knew that Lynn was planning to do that.
> [...]
> Despite our interchange on this issue, I have not mentally removed
> you from a list of reviewers I would consider using. If you feel
> that you are not willing to review for me in the future, you might
> tell me that now so that we don't send you papers only to have you
> send them back.
>
The questions in my last letter to you were general and required no
reference to the file.
Bottom line: I'll be happy to review papers if we agree on the sorts
of criteria that I noted. If my demand for logical and semantic
coherence in (ostensibly) scientific research represents too high a
standard, then the heart of my reviews will be irrelevant and there's
no point in my writing them. If you do share these standards but must
compromise them in your role as editor, then again my reviews are
irrelevant and I'd rather not devote the hours that each one takes me
to write.
I can certainly understand your wishing to strike compromises among
reviewers' suggestions, but the issues I'm talking about are among the
very few aspects of theoretical work that can be checked in an
objective way. There is no compromise between, for example, "The
argument seems reasonable to me" and "There is a tautology in the
argument" if, in fact, there is a tautology in the argument.
I guess this means you can't keep me on as a potential reviewer.
Barry Markovsky
Dave Halliwell
>In article <4a5c6e$g...@minotaur.nofc.forestry.ca>, dhal...@nofc.forestry.ca
>says...
[in response to this statement from Scott:]
>>> The issues you cite are ones which social scientists are well
>>>acquainted and are working to deal with.
>> From what you post, it appears that the "work" is nothing more than a
>>*lowering* of standards.
>Is this just an attempt at a flame or a real criticism?
>If it is the latter, it would be helpful for you to be more specific. Please
>define what the standards should be, in your opinion, how I am "lowering"
>these standards and, if you really want to be constructive, what needs to be
>done to improve these standards.
Let's see. Scott want me to try to explain to him how his approach to
the social sciences can be improved.
This request for assistance is coming from a person who has, less than
a month ago, been seen to say the following:
| Message-ID: <487f02$u...@sol.caps.maine.edu>
| From: Scott Erb
| Date: Mon, 13 Nov 95 07:56:15 EST
|
| Maybe I
| just don't think it would be worth my time to try to explain something to
| someone who has been insulting and arrogant throughout this debate. It's not
| worth it, you're not here to learn, just to attack and look for
| counter-arguments. I don't want to waste my time on you.
|
|
| No, [name deleted], I just don't feel like hand holding you through
| such a learning process when you've shown no desire to honestly learn. You
| just want to debate and insult. My time is better spent in other pursuits.
| I'll discuss these if you show the effort to learn the issues.
And then, just a week ago, said:
| Message-ID: <49nb9i$t...@sol.caps.maine.edu>
| From: scot...@maine.maine.edu (Scott Erb)
| Date: Fri, 01 Dec 95 11:49:30 EST
|
| I just am not going to waste my time trying to educate you when
| your tactics show that are you basically here to insult and puff up your own
| ego. I have better things to do with my time than educate you.
...and then, just three days ago, said:
| Message-ID: <4a1f0o$17...@sol.caps.maine.edu>
| From: scot...@maine.maine.edu (Scott Erb)
| Date: Tue, 05 Dec 95 07:53:26 EST
|
| Why should I waste
| my time looking up studies, explaining methods, etc., to the likes of him.
There was also an occasion, perhaps two months ago, where Scott
offered to provide an explanation if the person was willing to pay him.
And now he wants free advice from me, regarding how he should be doing
his job?
"I don't think so, Tim."
"hypocrisy (n) a feigning to be what one is not or to believe what one
does not; esp: the false assumption of an appearance of of virtue or
religion."
Chris Dollin
In article <hatunenD...@netcom.com>, hat...@netcom.com says...
>I must confess, though, that the idea that the social sciences might
>actually develop the hardness of the natural sciences scares me a bit
>with thoughts of "1984" or "Brave new World".
What about Asimov's "psycho-history"?
What about it?
First, it was fiction; pure fiction.
Second, in its context it was deployed in forming (or attempting to form)
a ``benevolent dictatorship'' of psychologists. That is, in doing something
that I think (only think, guess; I'm not *certain*) that Dave H would
regard as ``scary''.
So what was your point?
Barry Markovsky
[much snipped]
> [Correspondence deleted}
>
> For the life of me, I can't figure out how you got to be a peer
> reviewer for a social sciences journal in the first place.
>
> But none of this surpises me in the least.
That can be taken two ways (at least). Please clarify.
____________________________________________________________________________
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
Barry Markovsky / Dept. of Sociology / U. of Iowa / Iowa City, IA 52242
Ph: 319.335.2490 Fax: 319.335.2509 E-MAIL: barry-m...@uiowa.edu
Center for the Study of Group Processes: http://www.uiowa.edu/~grpproc
____________________________________________________________________________
Scott Erb
>Except for the tiny fact that you had already claimed that the existence of
>these obstacles is "unlike" natural science.
The key word here is tiny. Unlike the natural sciences, these obstacles
create certain difficulties was my claim. The difficulties are greater in
scope than in the natural sciences. Do you disagree with any of the rest of
the argument, or are you just nitpicking over the use of the word "unlike"?
-scott
Scott Erb
>Because Scott doesn't know how to write.
No, Jim, I write just fine. On the internet I tend not to worry too much if
other people make little grammar or spelling mistakes because its not
professional writing -- I usually can see what people mean. I even read
through loads of flames and unclear writing from Dave Halliwell to appreciate
some of his views.
However, I find one thing absolutely amazing in this attack.
I wrote eight points or so about social science. Everyone is attacking point
one. They are not attacking the substance, they are attacking the use of one
word: "Unlike." I wrote, "Unlike the physical sciences certain obstacles
cause difficulty..." Then later I put in parantheses, as an afterthought,
that the physical sciences also have some of those obstacles, but not to the
same degree.
It is dead obvious what I meant. It was clear from later in that post and in
other posts: the interpretive nature of social science, the normative content
of the issues, etc., create problems which the physical sciences do not have
to deal with to near the same extent.
No one has tried to deal with this issue. No one has denied it, no one has
given a thoughtful reply. Instead, you nitpick on the word "unlike" and the
paranthetical expression afterwards.
What else I can draw from this but that you are acting like vultures, looking
over the text for one error, one misused word. Then you can claim "poor
writing!" and "you're an idiot" and use that as an excuse to ignore the
issues.
Due the apparent dishonesty of the effort, such criticisms carry no weight
with me, even if you can convince each other that they are true. If you
would reply to the substance of the issues at hand, then I'll commend you.
For now, it's not a very good response.
-scott
Carl J Lydick
=In article <4a56k6$1...@fcnews.fc.hp.com>, jfr says...
=
=>Scientific methods are certainly plausible, but Scott isn't presenting any,
=>and makes repeated demonstrations of hasty, sweeping conclusions from
=>inconclusive data.
=
=Since you've never seen any of my research or any of my social science, your
=claim is invalid.
No, Scott. Since he HAS seen the claims you've made here, and the pitiful
excuse for evidence that you cite to support them, his claim is most certainly
valid.
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Carl J Lydick | INTERnet: CA...@SOL1.GPS.CALTECH.EDU | NSI/HEPnet: SOL1::CARL
Disclaimer: Hey, I understand VAXen and VMS. That's what I get paid for. My
understanding of astronomy is purely at the amateur level (or below). So
unless what I'm saying is directly related to VAX/VMS, don't hold me or my
organization responsible for it. If it IS related to VAX/VMS, you can try to
hold me responsible for it, but my organization had nothing to do with it.
Chris Dollin
In article <4a57cu$i...@nntp.club.cc.cmu.edu>, xe...@drycas.club.cc.cmu.edu
says...
>Directing me to read the holy writ again?
No Xenon, I'm making a friendly suggestion that if you wish to deride a whole
discipline you should look and see what people in that discipline are doing,
that's all. If you're too lazy to do that, than you really should keep
quiet.
> Why can't you come up
>with a counter-example yourself?
There's no reason for me to. If you want to wallow in your little fantasies
about what you think social science is, then go ahead. It's not worth going
to the effort of explaining things to you, in my opinion.
The responsibility-for-communicating-clearly lies with the person with the
greater skill in the domain. You're the social scientist; you *know* the
field; *you* have the skill to pick a fine example and to present it to
us. If *we* tried it, we might well pick a bad example, and you'd have to
say ``no, that's a bad example'', and people might then think you were
wriggling even though you were not.
If *you* pick the example, then you can make sure it's a fine example, an
*excellent* example, the *best* example you can find. You show willing.
You say, ``OK, chaps, here's the best example I have to hand.'' If we
can pick holes in it -- real holes, in the best material -- then I think
you'd be honour-bound to say, ``Oh dear, looks like my position isn't as
strong as I thought''. If we can't, then *we* have to say it.
You must anticipate the likely objections. ``That's just one example'',
so there must reasons why other good examples can be found. ``That's not
the method you talked about'', so you must be prepared to show the relation.
Et seq.
On t'other hand, if you're *really* not prepared to try and teach us what
the best material looks like, you should face up to that and admit it. If
you're really *not* trying to educate us, give up. If posting to the s.s
really *is* a drain on your resources, and you can post the content or
even the references of material that's surely the kind of stuff that you'd
give to students, stop it -- it's painful on both sides.
And I've said this before, too: learn to *write*. You keep on making the
one single fundamental mistake that any writer should learn to avoid; you
don't write for your audience. You've been trying for what; two years?; to
make the same broad point; and yet, each time, you fail to anticipate
objections that you should know *will* get raised. You do the same things
over and over again, and get the same complaints over and over again.
It would be better to spend two hours framing one message that made the
point you intend, briefly, compactly, using the terms *that are used here*,
than spend ten minutes one day, twenty the next, ten the next, with several
massages, and replies, and threads splitting, et seq.
DaveHatunen
Scott Erb <scot...@maine.maine.edu> wrote:
>In article <4a9unq$j...@fcnews.fc.hp.com>, jfr says...
>
>>Except for the tiny fact that you had already claimed that the existence of
>>these obstacles is "unlike" natural science.
>
>The key word here is tiny. Unlike the natural sciences, these obstacles
>create certain difficulties was my claim. The difficulties are greater in
>scope than in the natural sciences.
To put it mildly.
>Do you disagree with any of the rest of
>the argument, or are you just nitpicking over the use of the word "unlike"?
A nit is a lousy egg. We're talking picking ostrich eggs here, Scott.
You seem to think that the difference in magnitude is irrelevant.
Scott Erb
substantively, I will try something else to move this from flame war stage to
more constructive debate. (That may be difficult because of the "pile on"
mentality that seems to happen on the newsnet. When someone is flamed by a
few people, others join in, and soon that person is seen as a caricature of
themselves based on the way they are described by others. I will try with
facts and friendly, honest, debate -- and patience/perseverance to overcome
that).
Another proposal:
Let's cease the name calling and flames. Instead, when I finish a paper I'm
working on I'll send it to anyone who wants to examine it in terms of seeing
if it is scientific (as an example of social science). I'll take any
comments seriously, and that way you can see a real example of how I believe
social science research can be done.
I probably won't have this ready to send until early January, but if you
e-mail me your name and address, I'll get a copy of the first draft out to
you and await your comments. That will be a bit of empirical evidence and
hopefully will allow us to rise from the muck of flame wars.
-scott
Dave Halliwell
>In the discussion involving Halliwell, Erb, Rogers, Xenon & Hatunen, I
If you look at the "extended" discussion, which has been going on for
close to three years now, there have been at least a half a dozen more
people that have been arguing with Erb.
>think Halliwell best expresses my position. I *might* allow that social
>sciences have certain "special problems," but only if it is also
>recognized that all sciences have their special problems--e.g., observing
>very large or very small units of analysis; bracketing complex systems;
>vast time-frames, etc.
Over that time period, numerous examples of natural sciences that
can't do controlled experiments, can't repeat experiments, etc., have
been provided. Each time Erb brings up another "thing" that he claims is
restricted to the "social sciences", people gave examples of those in the
natural sciences.
Yet, Erb's first statement in this thread started off "Unlike the
natural sciences...", and then only acknowledged that such obstacles "may
exist" in the natural sciences.
You missed the "free will" argument. Erb claimed that it was not even
necessary to provide an operational definition of "free will", yet
claimed that an assumption of "free will" improved "explanation" in the
social sciences. He never could describe how something that couldn't be
defined could have observable consequences.
>I believe that there is nothing inherent in the objects of discourse of
>social science that warrants non-scientific approaches, or precludes
>scientific methods of theory construction and empirical testing.
Thank you. You are correct in saying that you agree with me. (*Pop*
goes Erb's claim that I instinctively disagree with people that claim
they agreement with me!)
> There
>just aren't many people doing it.
Erb draws the strange conclusion that a claim that it is _possible_ is
the same as a claim that everyone is actually doing it. Thanks for
reinforcing my impressions of the discipline.
>Those of us who do face an uphill
>battle. We're branded as enamored of formalization for its own sake, of
>doing experiments that lack external validity, of using unnecessarily
>abstract language (even though some of us take great pains to provide
>explicit definitions), and on and on.
All I can say is keep at it, and you proceed with my best wishes.
>In Sociology, there are perhaps several hundred of us who push hard for
>theoretical and empirical rigor, put this push (especially for the
>former) has not been going on very long, and it's fruits are not all that
>evident. The Journal of Mathematical Sociology, and Social Networks are
>perhaps the best exemplars of this direction in Sociology. I know that
>other social sciences have comparable journals, well-regarded but not
>widely-read. We keep trying.
Good. Unfortunately, Erb seems to be a product of another mindset, and
the fruits of his labours are all too evident!
My own background is geography. Although I am a "physical scientist", I
have been exposed for many years to the vagaries of conflict in the
"social" side of the discipline. For many years, geography languished in
the idea that every place was unique, and therefore a descriptive approach
was all that could be taken. Every time you became interested in a new
location, you just went out and described it. Sort of like writing travel
brochures. Eventually, more and more geographers took a more scientific
approach, and now there is a lot of good work going on in the discipline.
Changing the system takes time, but I believe that the effort is worth
it. Good luck.
Dave Halliwell
>In Article <4a6qfh$10...@sol.caps.maine.edu>
>scot...@maine.maine.edu (Scott Erb) writes:
>>In article <4a57cu$i...@nntp.club.cc.cmu.edu>, xe...@drycas.club.cc.cmu.edu
>>says...
>>Tell me, what kind of "scientist" are you? I've honestly had the impression
>>you are an undergrad at Central Michigan. Am I wrong?
>Yes, you're wrong, as usual. I guess you inferred that I'm an
>undergrad from that fact that, unlike you, I don't continually
>brag about having a Ph.D., as if that had some relevance to the
>validity of one's arguments.
Although Scott has repeatedly demonstrated that he does not understand
what an ad hominem argument is, he is quite clearly capable of _making_
one.
Actually, I take that back. The fact that his attempt to do a
character assassination on "xenon" has failed suggests that Scott can't
even do an ad hominem properly.
Scott Erb
says...
>
> You missed the "free will" argument. Erb claimed that it was not even
>necessary to provide an operational definition of "free will", yet
>claimed that an assumption of "free will" improved "explanation" in the
>social sciences. He never could describe how something that couldn't be
>defined could have observable consequences.
No, Dave, that is not a fair rendition of the old debate. But I think your
position is telling.
You aren't responding to any of my substantive points.
Instead, you focus on one particular reading of one point -- my use of the
word "unlike" -- and you ignore everything substantive.
Second, you make up something about the way of past debate long ago went in
order to distract from the current issues.
In short: you avoid all substance in order to continue insulting.
Face it, our positions aren't that much different.
If they were, you could actually show how they are different by responding to
substantive claims. If they were, you wouldn't have to hide behind insults
and false renditions of past threads. Aren't you getting tired of keeping up
this personal insult/flame war? Why can't you try to discuss the substance?
As John Lennon would say, give peace a chance.
Scott Erb
says...
>
> This request for assistance is coming from a person who has, less than
>a month ago, been seen to say the following:
>
>
>
>
> ...and then, just three days ago, said:
Funny, Dave, again you avoid responding to substance and quote diverse past
posts from the flame war I am trying to get us out of.
Why?
Apparently you are more comfortable with the flame war. I have publically
renounced the insults I've said in my part, and wish to focus on substance.
But you want to stay in the insult/flame mode. Why? Can't you at least try
to respond to a substantive issue?
-scott
Scott Erb
says...
> Actually, I take that back. The fact that his attempt to do a
>character assassination on "xenon" has failed suggests that Scott can't
>even do an ad hominem properly.
I was not trying to an ad hominem on Xenon. I honestly believed that he was
an undergraduate at CMU. I'm still interested in what kind of science he
does. I'm still trying to move us beyond flames to substantive debates.
So far, Dave, you haven't responded to any substantive issue, and you've
ignored the suggestions I've made on how to crawl out of the mud of insulting
flame wars. Or do you prefer flaming to real discussion?
-scott
Dr. John Lundy
oxymoron! There is damned little, if any, science, especially in areas
such as culture theory and the like. Most of us feel far more at home in
biology departments where at least there is an appreciation of empirical
data.
John Lundy, PhD
Scott Erb
>forms of a real science in the research. But form is not substance, and
>thus far there is little that a real scientist would recognize as
>substance developing out of the use of the forms.
Again, I'd say we have to simply disagree on this point. It depends on how
you define "real scientist" and "science," as I noted in my post. The fact
that results aren't as impressive at this point doesn't make it less of a
science, in my opinion. I define science by the method used.
-scott
Scott Erb
>Scott, you can start by quitting this martyr/persecution-complex crap, and
>have the decency to acknowledge that you may be "piled upon" because there
>is something substantively wrong with the arguments you present. I resent
>the implication that I and others have not responded substantively.
You've done pretty well, much better than Halliwell and Xenon. They seem to
be in flame mode. But when people start claiming that I am an unfair grader,
that my classes are taught poorly and other things which are not only untrue
but something people can't know, well, I get the feeling that people are
starting to attack an image of me which exists only in their mind rather than
attacking my arguments.
I also think that if you look at the quality of Dave Halliwell's posts,
you'll see that even if you think you agree with his basic position (I
actually think I agree with his substantive position), he mixes in so many
insults and snide comments that it is very unclear what is being proposed. I
am not claiming I am a martyr or anything, but you need to maybe look at what
people are posting and ask yourself if I'm really off base in considering
that rather unfair.
>If someone responds with insults, you can simply ignore the insults and go
>to the substantive issues; don't rise to the bait. Stop wasting bandwidth
>crying about abuse. Parrying about personality is pretty boring debate.
Jim, if you've noticed my responses, I've been avoiding stooping to the level
of responding to insult with insult. I've made two attempts to try to turn
this into a more substantive debate. The first was mostly ignored, so in the
post you are responding to I tried another attempt -- to offer to send a bit
of my own social science research to those who want to look at it as an
example. Each of these attempts were designed to move from innuendo and
insult to substance. Again, look carefully at the responses of Hatcher,
Lydick and Halliwell especially. Think about whether or not the post they
were responding to really warranted the type of response they gave. Think
about what you would do if attacked like that. My response is to point out
when I think they are lying about me or making unfair attacks, and then to
try to find a way to turn the debate to substantive issues.
Also, I don't want to completely ignore Halliwell. Although he seems locked
in flame mode, I think he has some good ideas and it would be nice if he
could put aside his personal animosity for me and try to discuss the issues.
He may find that it would end up being more enjoyable and beneficial for
each of us than constant flame wars.
You never did say what you thought of my offer to send a copy of my research
and let you or whoever is interested in assessing its scientific value
respond. I believe that was the offer I made in the post to which you are
responding.
-scott
DaveHatunen
Barry Markovsky <mark...@blue.weeg.uiowa.edu> wrote:
>On Fri, 8 Dec 1995, DaveHatunen wrote:
>[much snipped]
>> [Correspondence deleted}
>>
>> For the life of me, I can't figure out how you got to be a peer
>> reviewer for a social sciences journal in the first place.
>>
>> But none of this surpises me in the least.
>
>That can be taken two ways (at least). Please clarify.
I would, but I'm trying to not irritate Scott Erb anymore than I
already have....
Scott Erb
>
>You have a grandiose opinion of what you're actually accomplishing.
Actually, I'm accomplishing alot. Hearing criticisms about social science
from "natural" science helps me critique my own field and think about
different ways of approaching it. Sometimes if one stays in their own field
they get stuck in a certain mind set. It's even worth slashing through the
insults to accomplish this.
-scott
Scott Erb
says...
>
>scot...@maine.maine.edu (Scott Erb) writes:
>
> In article <hatunenD...@netcom.com>, hat...@netcom.com says...
>
> >actually develop the hardness of the natural sciences scares me a bit
> >with thoughts of "1984" or "Brave new World".
>
> What about Asimov's "psycho-history"?
>
>What about it?
>
>First, it was fiction; pure fiction.
Chris, hold on a second.
If you look at Dave's examples, they were both fiction. I was purposefully
putting a different fictional example to complement his list. I should have
put a smiley there. It wasn't an argument and it definitely was not meant to
counter Dave's fear of what could happen if social science becomes hard
science! Actually, Dave's fear is what drives philosophers like Feyerabend
and post-modernists like Foucault, Derrida to question all of science. (And
I don't subscribe their views, though Feyerabend makes some intriguing
criticisms).
-scott
Carl J Lydick
=In article <4a28ai$2...@fcnews.fc.hp.com>, jfr says...
=
=>Sure. Don't formulate untestable (or only weakly testable) hypotheses,
=>but restrict yourself to only those hypotheses that yield themselves to
=>definitive testability.
=
=The problem is that virtually all hypotheses in the social sciences are
=untestable if held to that standard.
I.e., social scientists like Erb are unwilling to work on laying the groundwork
for making social science a science. Instead, they work on unfalsifiable grand
theories of everything and then bitch about the fact that real scientists don't
take them seriously.
=The problem is that there is no general
=agreement on the assumptions (e.g., there are multiple competing paradigms),
Fine. Then it's time to figure out how those paradigms differ, and put them to
the test.
=and since variables cannot be controlled as in an experiment, results are
=open to different interpretations within the same paradigm.
Same's true of meteorology, Scott.
Scott Erb
>
>I would, but I'm trying to not irritate Scott Erb anymore than I
>already have....
I'm pleased somebody actually wants to be considerate to me ;)
However, I really don't mind substantive attacks on social science. And I
think that the input of "natural" scientists can help the social scientific
endeavor greatly (one main reason I keep up this thread despite some
unpleasant exchanges with a couple people). There are some real anti-science
ideologues in the social sciences, and I find them as irritating as anyone.
-scott
Scott Erb
>Better tactics would simply have been to delete Dave's comment without
>remark.
Perhaps. But why do you criticize my tactics and not Dave's tactics at
insulting?
>If you say that the social sciences have special obstacles, and then that
>the natural sciences may have similar problems, what was special about the
>special social science problems?
I believe I've explained that in other posts: the normative nature of social
science problems, the fact social science is an interpretive enterprise, the
inability to run many controlled experiments, and the fact that these
difficulties lead to many competing paradigms with no way yet of discovering
how to test which of the competing paradigms is correct.
I'm amazed that while all of you like to jump on whether it was proper to say
"unlike" the physical sciences instead of "not to the same extent" as the
physical sciences (a rather minor point), you TOTALLY IGNORE the substantive
issues described briefly above and in more depth in other posts.
-scott
Carl J Lydick
=scot...@maine.maine.edu (Scott Erb) wrote:
=....
=>If I would see friendly, thoughtful, and honest responses from Xenon and
=>Halliwell, I would maybe put more effort into this. So far, they haven't
=>proven worth the effort. Instead, they seem to have a schoolyard bully
=>mentality -- gang up on the outsider,
Gee. Now Scott's deteriorated to the point of fantasizing some conspiracy
against him. No, Scott, nobody's ganing up on you. It's just that when you
post your usual utter bullshit, some folks are unwilling to let it go
unchallenged. There's no plot to gang up on you.
Carl J Lydick
=>Oh, and in fields like Political Science there are (depending on the
=>subfield) large literatures that reflect a rather basic set of research and
=>conceptual agreement. So in that sense it isn't that much different than
=>what you describe for the physical sciences.
=
=That's a little bit like saying a Porsche 944 and a Trabant are
=basically the same thing.
So Scott's back to his "a theory is validated by reaching a concensus"
bullshit, eh? Apparently he's forgotten again (or never really understood,
though he at one point claimed to) that in the physical sciences, the test of a
theory is NOT how many people you can get to agree with you, but comparison of
the predictions of the theory with the real world.
Dave Halliwell
>Also, I don't want to completely ignore Halliwell. Although he seems locked
>in flame mode, I think he has some good ideas and it would be nice if he
>could put aside his personal animosity for me and try to discuss the issues.
> He may find that it would end up being more enjoyable and beneficial for
>each of us than constant flame wars.
I've stayed out of you arguments with others for periods of up to a
month, waiting for you to demonstrate that you can post _anything_ that
is not inconsistent with other posts (or other parts of the *same* post),
and that you can carry on a discussion with someone without ending up in
a flame war.
You haven't been able to do that in over 2-1/2 years, and you show no
signs of being able to do it in the near future. You constantly end up in
battles where you have to keep "explaining" and "clarifying" (which the
rest of us see as backtracking).
Why should I waste my time in a discussion where you'll never hold to
any consistent position?
Dave Halliwell
>In article <4a9uvm$k...@minotaur.nofc.forestry.ca>, dhal...@nofc.forestry.ca
>says...
>> Actually, I take that back. The fact that his attempt to do a
>>character assassination on "xenon" has failed suggests that Scott can't
>>even do an ad hominem properly.
>I was not trying to an ad hominem on Xenon. I honestly believed that he was
>an undergraduate at CMU. I'm still interested in what kind of science he
>does. I'm still trying to move us beyond flames to substantive debates.
Well, you deleted the part where I said you don't know what an ad
hominem attack is. Thanks for making it clear in your post that you
don't, though.
Regardless of whether xenon is an undergrad, grad, prof, or janitor,
his(*) arguments should stand on their own merits. Regardless of what
"science" he(*) does, the same applies.
If you were "just curious", you could have asked in email. The way you
did it, it looked as if you were attempting to undermine his credibility,
based on something that has nothing to do with what xenon posts.
That makes it an ad hominem attack: a public declaration of a
character attribute that has nothing to do with the disscussion.
(*) given that "xenon" posts with nothing more than a userid, we don't
even have a name to be able to infer that he is even a "he". When
responding to a post in which he has been referred to as a "he", it's
hard not to continue calling him a "him". Of course, none of this has any
effect on the validity of "his" arguments.
Dave Halliwell
>As I noted, I am willing to send you a copy of the first draft of my next
>paper for you to comment on whether it is "science" of a sort. That may be
>the best way to solve this; I would rather spend time finishing that up than
>to go find some articles from the APSR, explain their methodology and results
>on the net, and then try to defend someone else's research. That seems to be
>what at least Xenon is demanding. Would you be interested in that?
Someone else has suggested that you post something that _you_ have
already completed. Your offer to provide a copy of your "next" paper
implies that there are previous ones.
Do you, in fact, have any papers that demonstrate your research skills
that have appeared in any widely-distributed journals? If so, you should
be able to either post or email the electronic versions, or provide a
reference so that people can look them up in the library.
Dave Halliwell
>In article <4aa61p$j...@fcnews.fc.hp.com>, jfr says...
>>What you really meant was that these difficulties are *very much like*
>>difficulties other scientific fields encounter, but are *far harder to
>>deal with* for various reasons, which you could then go on to enumerate.
>>You did not at all mean to say the problems were "unlike" those in
>>physical sciences, but only meant to distinguish *degree*.
>No, that's not really what I meant. There are two real differences in types
^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^
>of obstacles social sciences faces:
> 1) it is an interpretive endeavor
> 2) issues of values and ethics are part of the endeavor
>By noting that at some level the physical sciences may deal with these
^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^
>issues, I did not mean that it was simply "harder" in the social sciences.
Great.
After taking Scott to task about how his statement "unlike..." was
inconsistent with later parts of his post, and after Scott giving
"clarifications" that he had _not_ intended to mean that the social
sciences are different from the natural sciences, and having Scott
claim that his "unlike" statement was an inconsequential part of his
argument, Scott is back to claiming that social sciences and natural
sciences are indeed different in a major way.
He's even been internally inconsistent again; making an unqualified
statement that the differences are real, followed by a conditional
implication that these "differences" may not actually be differences!
Of course, _both_ his differences are things that are _not_ exclusive
to the "social sciences", once again demonstrating Scott's cluelessness
as to what consitutes "natural science".
The only consistency in Scott's posts is his _inconsistency_.
Dave Halliwell
>In article <4a9unq$j...@fcnews.fc.hp.com>, jfr says...
>>Except for the tiny fact that you had already claimed that the existence of
>>these obstacles is "unlike" natural science.
>The key word here is tiny. Unlike the natural sciences, these obstacles
>create certain difficulties was my claim. The difficulties are greater in
>scope than in the natural sciences. Do you disagree with any of the rest of
>the argument, or are you just nitpicking over the use of the word "unlike"?
Another typical Erb tactic. When his original statement is shown to be
unjustifable, he tries to dismiss it as an insignificant part of his
argument. He then goes on to imply that the _rest_ of his argument must
be sound, and his opponents are ignoring it.
Unfortunately for Scott, his post that began this thread had, as its
very _first_ statement, the phrase "Unlike the natural sciences,..."
Now we have him claiming that he started the whole thread with
something of insignificant importance. What a waste...
Dave Halliwell
>So what's the best way to characterize a field, or a set of fields such
>as "the social sciences"?
Well, to start with, it would be a good idea if social scientists
didn't start discussions of this sort with phrases such as "unlike the
natural sciences..." when they really intended to show how the social
sciences are _similar_ to the natural sciences.
Now, before you take my comment facetiously, I'll point out that
you're not the one that did that. However, the person that _did_ do that
was automatically lumping all the "natural sciences" into one group, and
all the "social sciences" into another.
>I don't think it's fair to average in the good
>with the bad and declare that the mean is low.
Agreed. Each sub-discipline has its own character, and each individual
within a discipline deserves to be judged on his or her own merits.
>Much of what goes on is
>pretty weak, to be sure. But the fact that rigorous, cumulative research
>occurs in some sectors indicates that scientific progress is being made,
>although that progress could be much more efficient if our graduate
>students were better trained in methods of formal theory construction and
>analysis. It also means that you can't dismiss the whole shabang as
>unscientific.
Alas, this becomes problematic when certain individuals who are rather
low on the totem pole keep talking about how great the view is from the
top...
>BTW, a good deal of my research consists of laboratory experiments. True,
>most of the social phenomena that *directly* affect our everyday lives
>(which, it seems, is what most people expect of the social sciences)
>cannot be studied in the lab. But can't the same be said for the more
>rigorous sciences?
The example that has been constantly brought up here is "weather".
Controlled experiments with the entire system are close to impossible
(although certain groups seem to be insisting that we continue with one
regarding greenhouse gases, but that's another topic...). What can be
done is to do controlled experiments on small _parts_ of it, observe the
rest "in nature", and build models that try to mimic the system that
can't be controlled.
Another example is biological systems. You can run controlled
experiments on rats and fruit flies (and even that is subject to
increasing ethical controls), but in the real world all organisms live in
complex interacting systems. At least with humans you can have some sort
of communication with them (even if you don't trust them to be truthful).
Last time I looked, I didn't notice anyone asking sharks why they
sometimes attack bathers... Maybe people have tried, but just haven't
managed to write up the results yet...
>Certainly when it comes to basic research this is the
>case. Perhaps where the social sciences especially fall flat is in the
>areas of applied research and "engineering." I attribute much of that to
>a lack of emphasis on basic research and rigorous theory.
I'm not sure just where you think it "falls flat". There seems to be no
shortage of people willing to _claim_ that they know what to do about the
economy (or war - if I want to inflame Erb). If you are saying that such
"experiments" are not based on reasearch and rigorous theory, I'd tend to
agree.
>Most of what
>you'll read from the "leading" scholars in my own field, for example, is
>impressionistic, vague, ad hoc, poorly tested, and politicized hokum. Of
>course, my notions about who the leading scholars really are don't
>correlate very well with those who would win the popularity contest. I
>suppose this is true in many fields.
Of course, if the purpose of such "research" is to gain fame and
fortune, then I'd have to argue that they are showing success....
Dave Halliwell
>In article <4a9ur6$k...@minotaur.nofc.forestry.ca>, dhal...@nofc.forestry.ca
>says...
>> This request for assistance is coming from a person who has, less than
>>a month ago, been seen to say the following:
>> And then, just a week ago, said:
>> ...and then, just three days ago, said:
>Funny, Dave, again you avoid responding to substance and quote diverse past
>posts from the flame war I am trying to get us out of.
Right. Three days ago technically _is_ "the past".
>Why?
...because it demonstrates what a hypocrite you are. You claim to want
a discussion of substance, yet you're running around saying you see no
point in trying to explain things to people. You seem to feel that it
is appropriate to ask me to do something that you have clearly said that
you are unwilling to do yourself.
>Apparently you are more comfortable with the flame war. I have publically
>renounced the insults I've said in my part, and wish to focus on substance.
>But you want to stay in the insult/flame mode. Why? Can't you at least try
>to respond to a substantive issue?
...because you still haven't demonstrated an ability to write anything
that is internally self-consistent, or won't need "clarification" a few
days later.
How can I respond to "substance" that will be retracted, contradicted,
denied, or claimed to be trivial a few days later?
Carl J Lydick
=In article <KERS.95D...@cdollin.hpl.hp.com>, ke...@hplb.hpl.hp.com
=says...
=
=> You haven't really made any attempt to argue against what I said about
=social
=> science. I honestly am not sure you really understand the issues
=involved.
=>
=>You're the expert; explain the issues in language the other chaps have shown
=>they can handle.
=
=Despite the fact I find it a bit annoying that some on this group seem to
=think that any sort of language/style contrary to their own is "unclear
=writing," I accept that when one writes on a different forum, one must write
=to that audience.
No, Scott. We complain that when you say, for example, that "common" and "rare"
are synonyms, you're abusing the language. When you contradict yourself and
claim that your two statements meant the same thing, we claim that your writing
is unclear. When you argue for a position for weeks, then deny ever having
taken that position, we call you a liar.
Earl Curley
>In article <4a9o7n$1a...@sol.caps.maine.edu>, scot...@maine.maine.edu (Scott Erb) writes:
>=3Dsays...
>=3D
>=3D> You haven't really made any attempt to argue against what I said about
>=3Dsocial
>=3D> science. I honestly am not sure you really understand the issues
>=3Dinvolved.
>=3D>
>=3D>You're the expert; explain the issues in language the other chaps have shown
>=3D>they can handle.
>=3D
>=3DDespite the fact I find it a bit annoying that some on this group seem to
>=3Dthink that any sort of language/style contrary to their own is "unclear
>=3Dwriting," I accept that when one writes on a different forum, one must write
>=3Dto that audience.
>
>No, Scott. We complain that when you say, for example, that "common" and "rare"
>are synonyms, you're abusing the language. When you contradict yourself and
>claim that your two statements meant the same thing, we claim that your writing
>is unclear. When you argue for a position for weeks, then deny ever having
>taken that position, we call you a liar.
>--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
>Carl J Lydick
Carl you're full of shit. Everybody is a liar to you except yourself. Look in the mirror little man. There you'll see the real bo=
ogey-man which haunts you all the time.
Earl Gordon Curley
psy...@passport.ca
http://www.passport.ca/~psychic/
Robert Grumbine
Scott Erb <scot...@maine.maine.edu> wrote:
>In article <4a4ipk$f...@minotaur.nofc.forestry.ca>, dhal...@nofc.forestry.ca
>says...
>
>> I have
>>pointed out many times in the past that his "special problems in social
>>science" occur in the natural sciences as well (Who controls the
>>weather?), yet at this point, he is only willing to say that such
>>problems "may" occur in the natural sciences.
>
>Of course, climatologists can conduct experiments with models of a weather
>system.
And social scientists have conducted experiments with models of
social systems. So where's the distinction for you?
For me, the distinction is that many of those social scientists
experimenting with models weren't doing science and hadn't built
a model. Per my earlier note, you can't have a model until you have
variables to model _with_. Your description of science skips the
importance of the observables.
It is certainly possible for a social scientist to construct a model;
Richardson did in his 'other' war book (Statistics of Deadly Quarrels
being the primary, ?Arms and Armaments being the 'other') How good
a model it has turned out to be, I'm not sure.
>The problem I see with the social sciences in this regard is twofold:
> 1) One can't run controlled experiments. In most physical sciences, one
>can. Meterology is a good example of a physical science which runs into
>similar problems.
Both meteorology and social sciences _can_ run controlled experiments.
In both cases you can't experiment on the total system. In both cases
you _can_ find reduced systems which have sufficient similarity to the
real one to draw interesting conclusions.
> 2) The question of norms and values. Social scientific analysis focuses on
>issues that are laden with such questions. That happens in the physical
>sciences too, but it doesn't get in the way of testing to the same extent.
Climate change research has that problem. And since the congress is
cutting and redirecting funds regarding that research I think it is fair
to say that value issues are getting in the way of testing.
--
Bob Grumbine rm...@access.digex.net
Sagredo (Galileo Galilei) "You present these recondite matters with too much
evidence and ease; this great facility makes them less appreciated than they
would be had they been presented in a more abstruse manner." Two New Sciences
Robert Grumbine
Scott Erb <scot...@maine.maine.edu> wrote:
>In article <4a9u6d$j...@fcnews.fc.hp.com>, jfr says...
>
>However, I find one thing absolutely amazing in this attack.
>
>I wrote eight points or so about social science. Everyone is attacking point
>one. They are not attacking the substance, they are attacking the use of one
>word: "Unlike." I wrote, "Unlike the physical sciences certain obstacles
>cause difficulty..." Then later I put in parantheses, as an afterthought,
>that the physical sciences also have some of those obstacles, but not to the
>same degree.
That commentary has focussed on point 1 does not mean that 2-N are
unquestioned. I did actually comment on most of the others, but it
would have been sufficient to stop with 1. If you want to say that
social science is harder than physical or biological, then say it.
Don't start by saying 'unlike' the physical sciences and then in the
same paragraph say that the physical sciences have these problems too.
If you want to see some commentary on some of your other points, which
(as with the present post) is not flaming you (though I do fluently, I
hope, disagreeing with you), go back to my first message in this thread.
Answer the substantive points, and get on with it.
>It is dead obvious what I meant. It was clear from later in that post and in
>other posts: the interpretive nature of social science, the normative content
>of the issues, etc., create problems which the physical sciences do not have
>to deal with to near the same extent.
Even if true, so what? If you want to do science, then do so. If the
results aren't as global as you want due to this limitations, live with it.
Just keep doing science and you'll eventually get to the global results.
Keep talking about how hard it is and you'll get nowhere. Try to make
global results without laying the groundwork and you'll get the bad
image you have for not doing science. All of these have applied to
various of the natural sciences in their development as well.
Scott Erb
>>It is dead obvious what I meant. It was clear from later in that post and
in
>>other posts: the interpretive nature of social science, the normative
content
>>of the issues, etc., create problems which the physical sciences do not
have
>>to deal with to near the same extent.
>
> Even if true, so what? If you want to do science, then do so. If the
>results aren't as global as you want due to this limitations, live with it.
>Just keep doing science and you'll eventually get to the global results.
I'm not sure about the last point; social science may have to be happy with
context dependent generalizations. However, I agree that it is science, and
that the limitations are not of the sort that make it something other than
the natural sciences.
My post was directed at those who say that the social sciences are not
science. I was explaining why it may not look at first glance like science
to those on the outside. It wasn't an attempt to say it's "harder" (those
words are claimed by other people), only that it looks a bit different due to
the nature of the issues. Chemistry looks different than biology too.
Social science has some differences that may be of a sort some natural
scientists aren't used to seeing. By pointing them out, I'm arguing
precisely that it is a science and should be done like a science.
Carl J Lydick
=In Article <4a6qfh$10...@sol.caps.maine.edu>
=scot...@maine.maine.edu (Scott Erb) writes:
=>In article <4a57cu$i...@nntp.club.cc.cmu.edu>, xe...@drycas.club.cc.cmu.edu
=>says...
=>
=>Tell me, what kind of "scientist" are you? I've honestly had the impression
=>you are an undergrad at Central Michigan. Am I wrong?
=
=Yes, you're wrong, as usual. I guess you inferred that I'm an
=undergrad from that fact that, unlike you, I don't continually
=brag about having a Ph.D., as if that had some relevance to the
=validity of one's arguments.
Not only that, but Scott's just demonstrated that he's too damned stupid even
to read the headers of your posts. Had he done so, he'd've realized that CMU
stands for Carnegie Mellon University, not Central Michigan University.
Here's a hint Scott: Take a look at the Organization: line in Xenon's posts.
Carl J Lydick
=On Tue, 5 Dec 1995, Scott Erb wrote:
=
=> In article <4a1us2$q...@fcnews.fc.hp.com>, jfr says...
=> >
=> >scot...@maine.maine.edu (Scott Erb) wrote:
=> >...
=> >>6. The test of the hypothesis will likely yield inconclusive results.
=> >...
=> >
=> >In my book, this alone makes it a pretty damned weak "science."
=>
=> A fair observation. That is a limitation of social science.
=>
=> Does this mean it is not a science, in your opinion? Do you think we should
=> stop trying to implement the scientific method? Do you have any suggestions
=> to the points I posted?
=> -scott
=
=Whoa, guys! Not all of social science's hypotheses are unfalsifiable.
=True, the bulk of social science research is "damned weak" by physical
=science standards. Nevertheless, there are pockets of highly rigorous
=theory and research that fully meet the standards of the "harder"
=sciences.
But you don't understand: Scott wants to deny the existence, or even the
possibility of those pockets, since by doing so he thinks he can somehow
justify the sort of bullshit that HE does.
=The work tends to be rather abstract, often not dealing with
=phenomena to which the average citizen would "relate." So it gets little
=or no play in popular media.
Well, at least in parts of microeconomics, the work can get quite concrete.
=BTW, a good deal of my research consists of laboratory experiments. True,
=most of the social phenomena that *directly* affect our everyday lives
=(which, it seems, is what most people expect of the social sciences)
=cannot be studied in the lab.
Again, parts of microeconomics are a notable exception.
Robert Grumbine
Aside: A couple years ago, when last I was reading sci.skeptic, I
was present for Scott Erb's arrival. With that dubious distinction
noted:
In Message-ID: <4a1j6e$o...@sol.caps.maine.edu>
scot...@maine.maine.edu (Scott Erb) writes:
[deletia]
>Question: Is Social Science a science?
Right off, one needs to note that not all of the things which get
called science (by some people) are science. The question isn't/can't
sensibly be 'Is social science a science' (what _is_ social science,
exactly), but rather 'How does one tell _which_ things which may be
called (by some) social science really are science.'
>My argument:
>
>1. Unlike natural sciences, social science has obstacles which make it more
>difficult to use the scientific method.
Already special pleading. If you aren't using the scientific method,
you aren't doing science. To the extent you _do_ use the scientific
method, you are doing science.
Is it possible for social scientists to use the scientific method?
Yes. Do they do so always? No.
>This involves the inability to run
>controlled experiments (in most cases), and the fact that the involvement of
>ethical or value issues brings in a normative aspect which means that the
>same data get interpreted differently by different people. (NOTE: each of
>this problems may exist in the natural sciences at some level).
Several of the natural sciences involve work with processes which cannot
be done as controlled experiments. While controlled experiments can be
nice, they are neither a necessary nor a sufficient condition for doing
science.
>2. Some wish to say that this makes social science purely subjective or
>interpretive; Xenon argued that this state of affairs allows analysts to
>simply twist the data to support their own biases. Indeed, that does happen
>too often.
?'this' what? This = no controlled experiments? (Even that is a
false statement. A friend does research in social science and most
definitely does run controlled experiments.) This = harder to apply
scientific method? Not applying scientific method means you're not
doing science. Whether it means that you're being subjective etc. because
of it is moot.
[point 3 deleted]
>4. Step one is to ground the hypotheses in observation.
Step one is to observe. Refine that -- Step one is to attempt
to observe something which other people can observe in the same
way. Much of the non-science 'social science' jumps directly
to the hypotheses without ever bothering to define observables.
(If you and I can 'observe' something and get significantly
different observations, then it isn't a proper observable.)
>Natural
>science does this as well, but in social science the inability to
>control experiments suggest some care should be taken in choosing which
>hypothesis to test.
You don't have your observables yet, so you can't test any
hypotheses.
[point 5 deleted]
>6. The test of the hypothesis will likely yield inconclusive results.
Especially since you (as you are outlining your version of social
science) don't have any observables with which to test them.
[rest deleted]
The importance of 'observables first' is hard to overstate. Physics,
and mechanics in particular, is now a type case for 'hard' science. Let
us run back the clock, though. Go back to Galileo (preferably, read
Two New Sciences for yourself).
There are many ways of describing his contribution to dynamics, but
the standard school textbooks leave out the most fundamental point
because it is now so obvious as to sound ludicrous that it took someone
to discover it. That is, he defined fundamental observables for
mechanics - position, rate of change in position (velocity), and rate
of change in velocity (acceleration). He further showed (or started
along the way) that position was a relative variable rather than being
measured from some preferred location (the Aristotelean idea).
Given that base, he further showed that acceleration due to the earth's
gravity was not a function of the objects' mass. (actually one can
argue about how thoroughly he did that).
From there, it becomes easy to develop the addition of mass as a
fundamental variable -- contributing to the two conservation laws of
momentum and energy. The grand laws, though, don't make sense,
and can't even be understood, until you understand that position,
mass, velocity, and acceleration are the fundamental variables.
(Modern types, please refrain here, I realize that we've contracted
things in the last few hundred years.)
Social science, when it is not being science, seeks to skip the
step of finding fundamental variables and go directly to the grand
laws.
It isn't a necessary feature of social science that it make that
skip. L. F. Richardson started studying war in the 1930's, and
published his books on it after WW II (papers were out in the
30's and 40's). But, rather than skip to the grand hypotheses about
war and its causes (leaving it unclear exactly what a 'war' was),
he decided to be much more modest (to start with). He studied
conflicts in which people died. Period. Whether it was called
a war, or was a single homocide, civil war, international, 'uprising',
'insurrection', etc. etc. was irrelevant. Those labels are a mess
to apply. One man's civil war is another's failed international
war. (By the way, I'm paraphrasing Richardson here; he was quite
aware of the difficulties of attempting to do social science.)
Given the fundamental variable of number of dead (which he allowed
might not be the best possible one), Richardson first looked at
whether there was some regularity in the rate of conflicts in which
X people were killed versus the number killed. Astonishingly,
there was.
Since he had this data set of number killed in conflicts, he
further examined whether there were any regularities in terms of
the attributes of the participants in the conflicts. Again there
were some (relating to religion, number of boarders, and a couple
other things).
And so on. It is really quite amazing, first that there were
such relations derivable, and second that it seems that his work
has been almost entirely dropped. Perhaps the natural science
types won't be surprised to hear that Richardson was a natural
scientist (meteorologist) by original training. If anyone knows
whether his work was continued, disproved, etc. please do write
me (with references if possible).
Try to get hold of Richardson, L. F., Statistics of Deadly Quarrels.
In it, I contend, social science was definitely done as a science.
It was not, however, done in the manner that Mr. Erb outlines as
Mr. Erb never gives primacy to observables. Instead he starts with
hypotheses.
Scott Erb
> If you aren't using the scientific method,
>you aren't doing science. To the extent you _do_ use the scientific
>method, you are doing science.
Agreed.
> Is it possible for social scientists to use the scientific method?
>Yes. Do they do so always? No.
Agreed. The social sciences aren't unique in that point, of course.
> Several of the natural sciences involve work with processes which cannot
>be done as controlled experiments. While controlled experiments can be
>nice, they are neither a necessary nor a sufficient condition for doing
>science.
Agreed.
> ?'this' what? This = no controlled experiments?
No, the "this" equalled people using the interpretive nature of social
science to rig the results to reflect their own views. That happens alot --
far too often -- in the social sciences. To me, that's not good science.
>>4. Step one is to ground the hypotheses in observation.
>
> Step one is to observe. Refine that -- Step one is to attempt
>to observe something which other people can observe in the same
>way. Much of the non-science 'social science' jumps directly
>to the hypotheses without ever bothering to define observables.
Quite right. A lot of so-called social scientists base their theories on
assumptions about reality (libertarians making radical capitalist
assumptions, socialists assuming Marxian beliefs, etc.) That isn't science.
That is happening less in political science than in the past; in fact, there
is a lot of 'good' science being done in poli-sci.
>(If you and I can 'observe' something and get significantly
>different observations, then it isn't a proper observable.)
Ah, but the problem that I claim is a bit more extreme in social sciences is
the fact that all observations must be interpreted (that is only logical --
you have to communicate your observation, this means interpreting it to
communicate it.) In many natural sciences, that interpretation can be tested
by others (you simply run the same experiment). In the social sciences, the
fact that events are often ones that aren't repeated in the same context,
this becomes more difficult. So you're partially right, but you shouldn't
ignore the importance of interpretation of observation.
>>6. The test of the hypothesis will likely yield inconclusive results.
>
> Especially since you (as you are outlining your version of social
>science) don't have any observables with which to test them.
Since I said that one bases hypotheses on observation (grounding them, as I
put it), I don't see how you can say there are no observables. Observation
is of course primary to any scientific inquiry.
> Social science, when it is not being science, seeks to skip the
>step of finding fundamental variables and go directly to the grand
>laws.
Exactly.
> It was not, however, done in the manner that Mr. Erb outlines as
>Mr. Erb never gives primacy to observables. Instead he starts with
>hypotheses.
I clearly said you start with hypotheses grounded in observation. That means
that observation has to come first (how else could your hypotheses be
grounded in it?) This seems to be the crux of your criticism, but it's
inappropriate if applied to me. The heart of my research is: observe,
hypothesize, test, revise the hypothesis.
-scott
Carl J Lydick
=In article <4a57cu$i...@nntp.club.cc.cmu.edu>, xe...@drycas.club.cc.cmu.edu
=says...
=
=>Directing me to read the holy writ again?
=
=No Xenon, I'm making a friendly suggestion that if you wish to deride a whole
=discipline you should look and see what people in that discipline are doing,
Why, then, Scott, didn't you cite specific references? I've seen you use this
scam before, shit-for-brains: You cite something vague. Someone looks at what
you cited, and points out that it doesn't support your claims. You then claim
that they didn't read the right part. But you never cite anything specific
enough that it wouldn't take someone years of reading to come across something
that MIGHT support your bullshit.
=that's all. If you're too lazy to do that, than you really should keep
=quiet.
Gee. He doesn't want to spend the next couple of years looking for one of the
handful of papers that MIGHT support your claims, so he's lazy, eh? Scott, you
are the self-styled expert. You ought to be able, if your claim is valid, to
provide a number of SPECIFIC citations without much effort. And you call Xenon
lazy? You're either a couple of orders of magnitude lazier than he is, or
you're a flat-out liar. Most likely the latter.
Dave Halliwell
scot...@maine.maine.edu (Scott Erb) writes:
>In article <4a5c6e$g...@minotaur.nofc.forestry.ca>, dhal...@nofc.forestry.ca
>says...
>>> The issues you cite are ones which social scientists are well
>>>acquainted and are working to deal with.
>> From what you post, it appears that the "work" is nothing more than a
>>*lowering* of standards.
>Is this just an attempt at a flame or a real criticism?
>If it is the latter, it would be helpful for you to be more specific. Please
>define what the standards should be, in your opinion, how I am "lowering"
>these standards and, if you really want to be constructive, what needs to be
>done to improve these standards.
With regard to "standards", Scott has posted the following:
|Subject: Re: Social science skepticism
|Message-ID: <4a421u$19...@sol.caps.maine.edu>
|From: scot...@maine.maine.edu (Scott Erb)
|Date: Wed, 06 Dec 95 07:30:40 EST
|In article <4a28ai$2...@fcnews.fc.hp.com>, jfr says...
|>Sure. Don't formulate untestable (or only weakly testable) hypotheses,
|>but restrict yourself to only those hypotheses that yield themselves to
|>definitive testability.
|The problem is that virtually all hypotheses in the social sciences are
|untestable if held to that standard.
So, if you don't mean that the social sciences shouldn't be held to
the same standards, then why are you claiming that the social sciences
are science when you admit that they _don't_ meet the standards?
Scott Erb
says...
> How can I respond to "substance" that will be retracted, contradicted,
>denied, or claimed to be trivial a few days later?
Other people have. All you do is insult and act holier than thou. Oh well.
I'll keep trying to post the substantive points, and my offer about sending
the paper when its done in January still stands. Unless you're afraid that
real evidence might show the silliness of having an insult war, what's there
to lose?
-scott
Scott Erb
says...
> Why should I waste my time in a discussion where you'll never hold to
>any consistent position?
Why should I waste time explaining my position when you just insult and
assert that the position is inconsistent without providing evidence.
Yet I do continue to waste my time that way. And you continue to waste your
time with your replies.
We must both be having fun, otherwise it would be irrational to keep doing it
;)
-scott
Scott Erb
says...
> It is dead obvious what I meant.
>
>Wrong.
Chris, you're very good at lecturing on what you think I should do, however,
you fail to respond to anything of substance. Namely:
1) The only point people claim is unclear is that the first word says
"unlike" the physical sciences there are particular difficulties in the
social sciences. I point out directly afterwards that the physical sciences
may have to deal with similar issues. However, that doesn't deny the
difference in the nature of the difficulties. It was no contradiction.
More importantly: you seem to ignore the fact that the meaning was clear and
there were substantive points that others have dealt with, but the couple who
focus on insults want to ignore. I think the evidence is that they are more
concerned with character assassination rather than honest debate.
>And *this* is a much better paragraph. It says what you meant. We might want
>to argue with it, but it's much clearer than what you started with. And this
>is what I meant in a previous post about spending time in advance, crafting
>the article in expectation of the likely responses; had you written *that*
>first, we'd have been nearer ...
You're lecturing again.
And you are not adding anything of substance to the debate
Your post boils down to: there was confusion in one paragraph in an internet
post which dealt with rather complex issues. Therefore, based on that
confusion I can't write, people are justified in simply flaming and insulting
that paragraph, ignoring the rest of the post, and, well, most of what you
wrote seemed to be rambling and if I may risk a minor flame, it seemed a bit
self-indulgent on your part.
If you simply want to lecture me, send me a private e-mail. If you have
something to respond to in terms of the substantive issues of the debate,
that would be welcome.
-scott
xe...@drycas.club.cc.cmu.edu
rm...@access2.digex.net (Robert Grumbine) writes:
>
>In Message-ID: <4a1j6e$o...@sol.caps.maine.edu>
>scot...@maine.maine.edu (Scott Erb) writes:
>
>[deletia]
>
>>
>>1. Unlike natural sciences, social science has obstacles which make it more
>>difficult to use the scientific method.
>
> Already special pleading. If you aren't using the scientific method,
>you aren't doing science. To the extent you _do_ use the scientific
>method, you are doing science.
>
> Is it possible for social scientists to use the scientific method?
>Yes. Do they do so always? No.
I think that essentially sums up Dave Halliwell's position, and mine
too. Scott, who is always accusing others of "not seeing the grey",
thinks that I have been claiming that social science can _never_ be
a science, whereas he thinks Halliwell has "admitted" that social
science is _always_ a science regardless of whether or not its
practioners adhere to the scientific method.
[...]
>>2. Some wish to say that this makes social science purely subjective or
>>interpretive; Xenon argued that this state of affairs allows analysts to
>>simply twist the data to support their own biases. Indeed, that does happen
>>too often.
>
> ?'this' what? This = no controlled experiments? (Even that is a
>false statement. A friend does research in social science and most
>definitely does run controlled experiments.) This = harder to apply
>scientific method? Not applying scientific method means you're not
>doing science. Whether it means that you're being subjective etc. because
>of it is moot.
I don't know what Scott intended to be the antecendent to "this", but
the "state of affairs" to which I referred was Scott's own contention
that tests of hypotheses in the social sciences are generally inconclusive
and subject to "multiple interpretations" according to any number of
coexisting, mutually contradictory social science "paradigms".
[...]
>(If you and I can 'observe' something and get significantly
>different observations, then it isn't a proper observable.)
>
>>Natural
>>science does this as well, but in social science the inability to
>>control experiments suggest some care should be taken in choosing which
>>hypothesis to test.
>
> You don't have your observables yet, so you can't test any
>hypotheses.
>
>[point 5 deleted]
>
>>6. The test of the hypothesis will likely yield inconclusive results.
>
> Especially since you (as you are outlining your version of social
>science) don't have any observables with which to test them.
That's the point I was trying to make when Scott claimed that social
scientists have observed no correlation between arms buildups and
"less war". Given a reasonably rigorous definition of "war", one
can observe whether or not a war has taken place -- but to be able
to observe "less war" would require that one be able to discern
situations where a war would have taken place except for the fact that
the parties in question forgot to arm themselves -- in effect it would
requires an "interpretation" that assumes correctness of the hypothesis
that is supposedly being tested.
It's probably hard to get funded for work like that , because it
has no apparent practical value as a political tool. I suspect
that it is much easier to get funding for "research" with
implications that are favorable to the public policy of the
political party in power.
- x
DaveHatunen
Scott Erb <scot...@maine.maine.edu> wrote:
>In article <4add2n$n...@minotaur.nofc.forestry.ca>, dhal...@nofc.forestry.ca
>says...
>
>> Why should I waste my time in a discussion where you'll never hold to
>>any consistent position?
>
>Why should I waste time explaining my position when you just insult and
>assert that the position is inconsistent without providing evidence.
Ooooh, Scott...
Halliwell frequently provides quotations from your previous posts to
back up his claim that you are being inconsistent. Are you saying that
your own words can't be used as evidence of your inconsistency?
--
********** DAVE HATUNEN (hat...@netcom.com) **********
* Daly City California: almost San Francisco *
* but with parking and lower car insurance rates *
*******************************************************
DaveHatunen
Scott Erb <scot...@maine.maine.edu> wrote:
>In article <4adco9$m...@minotaur.nofc.forestry.ca>, dhal...@nofc.forestry.ca
>says...
>
>> Unfortunately for Scott, his post that began this thread had, as its
>>very _first_ statement, the phrase "Unlike the natural sciences,..."
>
>
>There are also differences between chemistry and geology and geography.
>
>Pointing out differences is legitimate. What do you claim it refutes my
>whole argument? Perhaps because you can't think of anything substantive to
>reply to the rest of the post? Ah, that explains it.
Because the differenes between chemistry and geology and geography are
more apparent than real. Underneath they all partake of the thing
called "science", and are really very alike. Until you understand this
similarity, and stop being hung up on the layman's view of the
difference between chemistry and geology the entire concept of what a
science really is will continue to go right over your head.
The social sciences try very hard to look like the real sciences on the
surface, but the real science is missing down at the level where
chemistry and geology are much alike.
Jim Rogers
>
>No, Jim, I write just fine. On the internet I tend not to worry too much if
>other people make little grammar or spelling mistakes because its not
>professional writing -- I usually can see what people mean. I even read
>through loads of flames and unclear writing from Dave Halliwell to appreciate
>some of his views.
Scott, congratulations, you've just earned a seat on my list of posters to
broadly ignore. How ingracious of you to praise your own writing when your
audience universally objects to it. What I was pointing out to you is *not*
"little grammar...mistakes" but writing completely the opposite of what you
mean and subsequently "clarifying" what you really meant.
>I wrote eight points or so about social science. Everyone is attacking point
>one. They are not attacking the substance, they are attacking the use of one
>word: "Unlike."
I'll comment on what I damned well please, thank you. Perhaps I don't have a
strong opinion on "the substance." Perhaps I have trouble figuring out what
your "eight or so points" really are. I am under no obligation to carefully
consider your entire thesis and render an opinion on it all.
> I wrote, "Unlike the physical sciences certain obstacles
>cause difficulty..." Then later I put in parantheses, as an afterthought,
>that the physical sciences also have some of those obstacles, but not to the
>same degree.
Your "afterthought" contradicts your earlier statement, though! The example I
chose was just the most recent of many. It's not the "one word: unlike" that
is wrong, it is the way you compose your writing. We (readers) can't trust
*any* particular statement you write until we read the whole damned essay and
see if you back-pedaled anything "in parentheses, as an afterthought." At that
point we must choose which exactly it is you meant to say. Was the original
statement more important ("social sciences have difficulties that are unlike
physical sciences") or is the "parenthetical afterthought" more important
("physical sciences also encounter these problems")? As it turns out in *this*
case, your "parenthetical afterthought" was supposed to rule the thesis. Not
much of a thesis, occurring in parentheses, as an afterthought, eh?
>It is dead obvious what I meant.
Bullshit. Dead obvious only to you. Your duty as writer is to make it dead
obvious to your readers.
> It was clear from later in that post and in
>other posts: the interpretive nature of social science, the normative content
>of the issues, etc., create problems which the physical sciences do not have
>to deal with to near the same extent.
=======================
This very crucial final point of "extent" was your "parenthetical
afterthought." You didn't say ANYTHING at all about "extent" when you
initially made your points, but made absolute statements implying that these
problems were UNIQUE to social sciences.
>No one has tried to deal with this issue. No one has denied it, no one has
>given a thoughtful reply. Instead, you nitpick on the word "unlike" and the
>paranthetical expression afterwards.
...
>Due the apparent dishonesty of the effort, such criticisms carry no weight
>with me, even if you can convince each other that they are true. If you
>would reply to the substance of the issues at hand, then I'll commend you.
>For now, it's not a very good response.
I'll just go away and stop reading you, Scott. I'm accomplishing nothing
here if I can't get through your wooden head that fundamental communication
is not "nitpicking," and I resent that you call me "dishonest" for ignoring
substance I can't easily decipher. Go to hell.
Jim Rogers
>In article <4a7kcv$n...@fcnews.fc.hp.com>, Jim Rogers (jfr) writes:
...
>>Perhaps that's because I'm limiting my commentary to those points that I see
>>as most egregious, and not campaigning against social sciences as a whole.
>
>In view of the ferocity with which you have campaigned against the
>science of parapsychology, which is subject to the same acceptability
>constraints as the social sciences, I sincerely hope that you will not
>treat them any differently, else I might suspect you of discrimination.
I don't share your opinion that the two broad disciplines are all that
similar, in methods, in limitations, or in acceptability, nor do I
consider ommission of commentary to imply substantive opinion. Sorry to
disappoint.
Jim
Jim Rogers
>In article <4aa61p$j...@fcnews.fc.hp.com>, jfr says...
>
>>What you really meant was that these difficulties are *very much like*
>>difficulties other scientific fields encounter, but are *far harder to
>>deal with* for various reasons, which you could then go on to enumerate.
>>You did not at all mean to say the problems were "unlike" those in
>>physical sciences, but only meant to distinguish *degree*.
>
>No, that's not really what I meant. There are two real differences in types
> 1) it is an interpretive endeavor
So are astronomy, archaeology, paleontology,...
> 2) issues of values and ethics are part of the endeavor
As they are for *most* medical research.
There you go again: absolute statements that there are "real differences in
types" -- this DOESN'T imply *degree*, it is a qualitative difference, of TYPE.
>By noting that at some level the physical sciences may deal with these
>issues, I did not mean that it was simply "harder" in the social sciences.
Then what the hell do you mean?! "At some level" -- indeed. At this point you
are retracting your claim that the "types" of problems are not unique at all,
but occur at a different "level."
>In fact, I'd say that the average physical scientist has on a daily basis a
>harder job than many social scientists. Rather, we haven't developed what
>Kuhn calls "normal science" yet. The above two problems cause there to be
>competing paradigms which can explain the same issues, and the lack of the
Most sciences deal with "competing paradigms" to explain the same issues; this
is called "theory." Realizing that you probably know this, and thus are not
really saying what it looks like you're saying, I'm still seraching for what
your point actually is.
>ability to run controlled experiments means that testing between paradigms is
>very tricky. In some cases, we haven't figured out how to do it yet.
Ah, so is your point that social science is mainly speculation, with little
basis in empirical data? You've denied this weeks ago, so that must not be. So
I'll try to decipher it again.
Does this trickiness not imply that the obstacles are harder? Isn't that what
I suggested you meant last week? How are they harder for "the average physical
scientist"? That suggestion seems to go against your "very tricky" claim.
>Even though "at some level" these problems may also face the physical
>sciences, it is much easier to figure out a way around them in most of the
>natural sciences.
>
>I still haven't seen any real argument against these substantive points.
After a few weeks of trying to make your points, but not yet managing to
write them in a non-contradictory way, I can't see what's to argue. So sorry
not to oblige.
Jim
DaveHatunen
Scott Erb <scot...@maine.maine.edu> wrote:
>In article <4adfmn$n...@minotaur.nofc.forestry.ca>, dhal...@nofc.forestry.ca
>says...
>
>> Well, you deleted the part where I said you don't know what an ad
>>hominem attack is. Thanks for making it clear in your post that you
>>don't, though.
>
>An ad hominem attack is to attack the argument by attacking the person making
>the argument rather than the substantive points of the argument.
>
>Perhaps you believe you never do this.
>-scott
Well, firstly, Scott, an insult is not a use of logical ad hominem.
And secondly, as near as I can see, Halliwell almost always addresses
the substance of what you said after he's called you a blithering
idiot.
Perhaps you are letting the insult blind you to the rest of the post.
Scott Erb
Scott Erb
says...
> Someone else has suggested that you post something that _you_ have
>already completed.
So?
The fact is my offer is for the next one. If I'm going to put my stuff out
there to potentially be criticized, debated, etc., I want to get some
potential gain. If I send my first draft (a few have already requested it --
ironically people not involved actively in the debate), then I can read the
criticisms about its scientific value or whatever, and make changes for the
final draft. Also, I am dissatisfied with aspects of old papers (esp.
relating to some of the issues at hand) and feel that the new one will best
reflect my current work in the field.
However, I'm not surprised that you would find fault with any offer I would
make. If I'm really a "bad" social scientist who can't write, etc., the
paper should provide you ample evidence to prove your point. If it doesn't,
then perhaps our opinions are wrong. If you are so sure you are right, what
have you got to lose?
-scott
scott_erb
>Scott, congratulations, you've just earned a seat on my list of posters to
>broadly ignore. How ingracious of you to praise your own writing when your
>audience universally objects to it.
I guess it depends on how seriously I take different audiences. I ignore
your criticisms basically because I have enough success with my writing in
other venues to leave me rather self-confident. Sorry.
>I'll comment on what I damned well please, thank you.
Fine, and I'll criticize you when I damn well please, thank you.
Your point?
>I'll just go away and stop reading you, Scott. I'm accomplishing nothing
>here if I can't get through your wooden head that fundamental communication
>is not "nitpicking," and I resent that you call me "dishonest" for ignoring
>substance I can't easily decipher. Go to hell.
Sounds like you realize that you don't have any substantive argument and your
frustrated that I want to focus your attention on the argument and not on the
use of the word "unlike" in point 1 of the eight points. So instead of deal
with the arguments and think, you get in a huff and walk away.
Why am I not surprised?
Scott Erb
> effort -- why should I do any work on that issue? I have better thans to
do.
>
>Doesn't this contradict your earlier claims that you were going (and here
>I paraphrase) to forgive and forget the flame wars and concentrate on
>substance?
No. One can forgive flames, but that doesn't mean one can't rationally
decide a particular course of action is a waste of time. I think going
through old studies and explaining their methodology would be a waste of
time. However, providing a copy of my new paper is a way to achieve the end
Xenon wants without risking simply wasting my time.
-scott
DaveHatunen
>In article <4ahml6$1...@fcnews.fc.hp.com>, jfr says...
>
>>Scott, congratulations, you've just earned a seat on my list of posters to
>>broadly ignore. How ingracious of you to praise your own writing when your
>>audience universally objects to it.
>
>I guess it depends on how seriously I take different audiences. I ignore
>your criticisms basically because I have enough success with my writing in
>other venues to leave me rather self-confident. Sorry.
And so we turn another full circle. Since almost all of us object to
the dense style and lack of clarity in your writing, you must be saying
that you do not take us seriously. This takes us back to your post
three years ago that you were only poking fun at us.
>>I'll comment on what I damned well please, thank you.
>
>Fine, and I'll criticize you when I damn well please, thank you.
But will you mean it seriously, or will you be frivoulous to see our
reactions?
>Your point?
>
>>I'll just go away and stop reading you, Scott. I'm accomplishing nothing
>>here if I can't get through your wooden head that fundamental communication
>>is not "nitpicking," and I resent that you call me "dishonest" for ignoring
>>substance I can't easily decipher. Go to hell.
>
>Sounds like you realize that you don't have any substantive argument and your
>frustrated that I want to focus your attention on the argument and not on the
>use of the word "unlike" in point 1 of the eight points. So instead of deal
>with the arguments and think, you get in a huff and walk away.
Scott, up there above you already told us that you don't take us
seriously. So why on earth would we want to pay a whole lot of
attention to your complaints, which are not to be taken seriously.
>Why am I not surprised?
Because you don't take us seriously.
DaveHatunen
[...]
>Yes -- the problem is how to make distinctions between paradigms and move
>forward. The solution is, of course, to use the scientific method, but given
>the limitations I discussed, that takes time and effort.
In other words, don't use science. Taht's what we've been saying all
along; the social sciences don't practice science.
>The key is to work
>on small questions and work up, rather than starting from a set of
>theoretically rather than empirically derived assumptions.
But no scientific method, right?
[...]