h2g2 The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy: Earth Edition

Entry: Will the Social Sciences sell its soul or lose its balls? - A857694
Author: My Profane Evil Twin, Beryl - U206676

hope this works....
fingies crossed...

b

A Good Entry, IMO. I have made the same argument many times, although it may not look like it at first. If you're bothered, go to my home page and look at the journal entry entitled "What is reality?" To establish the common points between that argument and this one is left as an exercise for the student!

There are some typos, and one or two missing words, but they're just details. This theme is the most important one in our entire intellectual universe. It should be nurtured wherever it springs up.

Pattern-chaser

"Who cares, wins"

I think this is written with too many big words. I lost interest in it before I had finished it. What exactly is the point you are making? What are the Social Sciences? Are they students, practitioners, Governments employees? Who are you talking about? Are you saying that the Social Sciences should assume God exists unless they can prove otherwise? That would be a very strange view, in my opinion.

sorry to be negative, but i feel i must:

"I think this is written with too many big words. I lost interest in it before I had finished it."

I wanted to say the same thing, word for word, with the distinction that i would be referring to the first sentence only...

sorry
maybe i'll try again soon...

spiff

hi again,

ok, ok, i regret being so purely and (can you make an adverb out of 'unadulterated? unadulteratedly? nah!) negative there.

i apologise.

so, on a more friendly may i just say 'welcome to h2g2'!

This is a great site for anyone who enjoys writing, and it looks as if you are hoping to enjoy doing just that. One of the great things about it is that there are others here who also enjoy writing and discussing each other's efforts. That's what the forums are all about, and what these threads are all about. so if i'm not telling you anything you don't already know, . what i mean to say is...

Don't Panic!

negative feedback (or in the case of my own little posting 'facetious comments') is part and parcel of the review process. And it's not the main part; not at all. You will find lots of friendly and helpful responses to all kinds of questions and comments.

so, just to say 2 simple things really: sorry for the flippancy, and Don't Panic!

spiff

Just a token message to confirm that I will be back - this time to the right place (write place?).

I love this entry, and suggested to My Evil Twin (isn't that a GREAT name, btw?) that sie put it in here for review.

I have to agree that the first three paragraphs are the weakest part of the entry, they feel like the paras you write when you are getting into your stride. And Gnomon is right, it could do with an explanation of who or what Social Sciences are.

A bit of backstory: I asked MYT to write on this subject for the University Project on Belief - (A853751). And the main thesis of the entry - "For the Social Sciences to presume that someone will not question the foundations of their Atheistic hypotheses, and not allow them the arena nor the right to challenge their tenet based on lack of proof, puts them firmly and squarely within the hypocrisy of a Science demanding faith" - is a good point, and one which I want to include in the project.

Hopefully the rigours of the Writing Workshop will help turn a good entry into a really good one. I love MYT's pacy style of writing, (though I agree some of it would be even better if it was tightened up and simplified, cutting up some of the sentances and adding a few more full stops might help).

And if any of y'all want to contribute to the project, please amble along there, and join in the fun.

B

I think maybe what this peice needs is some actual examples of the sort of bias the author has in mind.
Are the social sciences atheistic, rather than merely agnostic?
Is an atheistic/theistic dichotomy being confused with a materialist/ spiritual dichotomy? (This is not the same thing as a Buddhist called Ben should be able to spot.)
How should social science be encouraged to question the implicit (unstated) assumptions it makes about society?

Noggin

I'm back! Typo on line 2 'Athism'. Here and more generally - does this and some of the other capitalised inital letters need to be?

The social sciences have nothing to say either way about any 'higher power'. Neither do they make any assumptions concerning same. Just as physics doesn't concern itself with the psychology of physicists.

"Atheists demand explanations, proof and science." Are there no arty athiests then? Rest of para: science does NOT demand proof (unless you include maths). It does demand evidence. The same IS demanded of psychology. Don't you include that in social science? Doesn't economics require something similar?

The social sciences require students to use appropriate methodology and to conform to institutional practices. They do NOT make assumptions about the minds of students.

"As an deduction, this is completely."! Completely what? I thought it was a presumption, not a deduction! There is no harm in using scientific method in considering the existence of God. Swinburne has based a career on it. He concludes that God exists.

Social sciences require no faith other than the kind involved in reasoning in almost any academic disciple, such as the method of induction, for example.

As so frequently happens 'begs the question' is misused. I won't go into what it means but the required phrase is 'raises the question' or similar. The social sciences, psychology at least, are prepared to consider the psychology of religious belief. It makes no judgement as to whether there is any truth in it - just why and how some people come to have it and what the consequences are for them.

Otherwise, theology is firmly outside our frame of reference as social scientists.

Sorry about the 'disciple'! It should be 'discipline' of course.

As an athiest, I was wondering where all these athiestic social scientists are. What conspiracy are you writing about? The quest to eliminate God I thought was more in the realm of hard science with its evolution and astronomy. Maybe if there was more about what social scientists are actually up to. I am not in academia, and actually have only briefly walked on college campuses, so maybe there's more to this than I realize.

er... toxxin, what is your connection with the author, exactly? It looks as if you may *be* the author...

if not, we haven't heard from MPETB recently...

if you are, then perhaps you could define 'the Social Sciences' (the phrase is used close to ten times in this relatively short text - always capitalised and usually in the kind of context you usually see the name of a political party!

nonetheless, in spite of my own ideas about what 'social sciences' may mean, I'm not sure what you're referring to here.

Oh? I thought that induction - drawing general conclusions from specific events - was not accepted as being objectively valid. This being the case, I think that faith might be *exactly* what was required to accept the use of induction as a reliable scientific tool.

Pattern-chaser

"Who cares, wins"

That is precisely what I meant. Score max points for comprehension.

More, later.

B

"Throughout university, students are required to cite studies and research, to analyse statistics and find alternate explanations for phenomena they draw conclusions from and comment upon. Why is the same short leash not demanded of the Social Sciences?"

I don't know of any english students who are asked to analyse statistics. I also know of a lot of social sciences who do (see http://www.socstats.soton.ac.uk/dept/deptprofile.html for starters)

So far as social sciences go...UCAS ( http://www.ucas.com/higher/fui/jacs/index.html )codes them as:

L100 Economics
L200 Politics
L300 Sociology
L400 Social Policy
L500 Social Work
L600 Anthropology
L700 Human and Social Geography
L900 Others in Social studies

So psychology doesn't come into it (it is generally considered and taught as a biological science (C800)) except where it crosses over into sociology, anthropology, politics etc etc.

The title made me think this would be an article about the ethics of funding/objectivity in social sciences (economics and politics strike me as too subjects where the priority is skewed by external forces (making money and political beliefs)).

I'm curious as to how this will end up...

I may be a bit out of date, but I thought that the ESRC (Economic and Social Research Council) funded postgrad psychology. Hmmmmm. I guess there's really no correct answer to this one anyway.

I may be a bit out of date, but I thought that the ESRC (Economic and Social Research Council) funded postgrad psychology. Hmmmmm. I guess there's really no correct answer to this one anyway.

I think it's an in-betweener. I know it's usually taught *within* social sciences but a degree is almost always a BSc/BS and so a full science degree, as I understand it, it is becoming more and more scientific in approach with developements in cognition, the biology of the brain and physiology. I would say the funding situation is a relic of its past (there used to be two courses a BSc and a BA (same as with human and physical geography) and a tribute to its interactivity with sociology (social psychology) and other social sciences.

Right. I did my PhD in cognitive science, essentially. Funded by the ESRC. Psychology is an enormous subject. A collection of subjects really. I started with a BA just because I did the 3 year degree. If I'd done an optional intro year it would have been a BSc. That was the only difference so the A or Sc is meaningless in some unis anyway.