An Introduction to the Social Sciences: Chapter One
Social Science and its Methods (pg 1-31)
What are the Social Sciences?
The scientific study of human beings
the humanities – using what we are to expand outwards….
Study using scientific method;
Quantifiable, observable, testable, falsifiable
Example: Do ants love their children?
“its not you, its me”
The Sciences
The Natural sciences (TU-xxx)
The Biological Sciences (TU-xxx)
The Humanities (TU many)
The Social Sciences (TU-120)
The Social Sciences:
The study of humans and human societies
Anthropology, Sociology, History, Geography, Economics, Political science, Psychology
The social Sciences:
Anthropology: The study of where we came from and who are; conditioned from both biological and learned characteristics: Ancient humans and ancient societies. Both physical and cultural anthropology exist. How to test?
Fossil record, old texts, genetics, hill tribes
Example: Margaret Mead in the south pacific
Sociology: The study of how we interact with each other. A key assumption is that our choices are all dependent on the setting we are in, society molds us at least as much as any of us mold it. Functionalism, Conflict and Interactionism all exist as subfields. How to test?
Statistics and observation
Theories of behavior, and changes
Example: Broken Windows
Geography: Our natural environment determines much of our behavior.
Formerly a much more important science then today…
Example: Chili, the flood season…
History: The study of the past. “he who does not study history is doomed to repeat it”. Serves as a basis for much of what we know in the other social sciences. As a science in and of itself, has many things in common with the humanities.
The historian tries to figure out what the key facts are, and to bring order and understanding to the past. Very hard to test historical data though…
Example: American Indians and Cambodians
Political Science: The study of social arrangements within a society, specifically the government. Differs from Sociology in that it is explicitly concerned with choice; we can influence the government we have.
Example: John and Sam…
Example: Squeegee men
Economics: (American Economy, British Economy, World Economic History) The study of how people act with regard to scarcity, and within markets. Assumes rationality to a far greater degree then other social sciences. Typically divided into Macro (inflation, unemployment) and Micro (individuals) fields. Currently the dominant social science (says the economist).
Example: Do you love rich men?
Psychology: The study of the human mind. Why do we do the things we do? What is the basis of our desires and wishes (note, economics treats them as a given, sociology says we are taught them).?
Example: “love is blind”
Why are babies cute?
I: Social Science:
Why study the social sciences?
The social sciences briefly considered
Assumptions, methodologies, strengths and weaknesses
-Social Science as a System of Rules
Why rules?
Principles one can apply to everything
Testable and falsifiable – i.e. they yield predictions
Rules can be learned, everything can’t be…
Finally, rules are theory; facts without theory are often worthless
Example: Drinking causes lung cancer: to be continued….
-The scientific method and its application
Curiosity
Skepticism
Objectivity
-Nature of the Scientific Method
Universal cause and effect
Observable differences are Explainable
No “allah insalah, god wills it, mai ben rai”
Question: Do humans do a cost-benefit analysis?
-The experimental method and its limitations
Hold all but one thing constant, then systematically vary it…
Difficult to do in the social sciences – Example: Midway
Still, some experiments are conducted
Natural Experiments
Example: Asian Financial Crises, fixed/floating exchange rates
Computer experiments
Problem of assumptions/encoding….
-Methodology and the social sciences
Paradigm Shifts
Schools of thought/Research programs
“no methodology”
What isn’t a social science
Fortune telling…
II: The Methods of Social Sciences
Inside the system, outside the system
An electron and a Positron
A Student and a Million Dollars
Electrons have no preferences
Humans do, and change the rules, and behavior, constantly
A brief outline of methodology
Observe, and define problem
Review literature and Data, gather more as needed
Observe some more, and form a hypothesis
Choose research design, collect data
Analyze results and draw conclusions
Book example: Joseph Holz’s study of teen pregnancy
Homework: What is wrong with Holz’s theory?
-Social Science approach to problems
-Alternative Approaches (different assumptions about world)
The functionalist Approach
All social problems (systems) are interconnected
They exist for a reason
Example: Why are women sluts, and men virule?
The Exchange theory approach
Society as the result of individual choices (constraints)
Example: Shopping
The Conflict Theory approach
Society as how different groups use force or power
Example: War
The Symbolic interaction approach
Reality follows ideas, stresses the irrational (non-rational)
Example: Paris Hilton
-Alternative Methods (different assumptions about how to learn about world)
Historic methods
Case Methods
Comparative and Cross-Cultural methods
-Common sense in the social sciences
Example: Copernicus and the Sun
Example: Female Cops
-The Use of Statistics
Lies, dammed lies, and statistics
How many people like Thaksin?
Causation and Correlation
Lung cancer and Alcohol
-Interdisciplinary approach
III: Social Science and Society
Positive science vs. normative science
Policy implications of natural vs. social science
-Agreeing on policy
Agreement about general goals
Disagreements about methods
-Values, Terminology and Rhetoric
Jargon, assumptions, methods
An Introduction to the Social Sciences: Chapter Two
Human Origins (Anthropology, Biology, History)32-53
I: The Origins of the Human Species
Where we came from
Africa, 5-7 million years ago
-Darwin and the Theory of Evolution
-Natural Selection
-Mutation
-Genes (dominant and recessive alleles)
-Limitations of Natural Selection
Examples: The panda’s thumb, Male nipples
-Recent developments in Genetics
The Human Genome Project
Cloning
-Some Implications of Recent Developments
-Should species be rearranged
-Sociobiology
-Punctuated Equilibrium vs. Gradual change
II: The evolution of Human Beings
-Science, Faith and Controversy
-Predecessors of Modern Humans
½ billion years ago; single celled organisms became multi-celled
End of the dinosaurs (70 million years ago)
Early primates (65-70 million years ago)
Our ancestors 22-38 million years ago
Hominids (standing on two legs) appeared in Africa 6-10 million years ago
Fossils record vs. Molecular biology
The brain
Homo Erectus (disappeared 500,000 years ago)
Tools appeared about 1.6 to 2 million years ago
Hominids to Homo Sapiens
Cro-Magnon
Neanderthals
An Introduction to the Social Sciences: Chapter Three
The origins of Western Society (Anthropology, History)
Pg 54-76
I: From Stone Age to the Agricultural Revolution
The agricultural revolution
Significantly changed how people lived
Villages, Pottery, Food storage, Population Density
Physical characteristics, range, lifestyle, property rights, religion
Jared Diamond: The Eurasian hypothesis: The domestication of animals, the cultivation of plants
Realities of primitive life
“nasty, brutish and short”
II: Early Civilizations (the Biblical and Classical Ages)
Cradle of Modern Civilization: Mesopotamia & Egypt (Indus, Yellow, Americas)
Began about 3,000 b.c.
Writing, Irrigation
The beginning of defined classes; peasants, priests, soldiers (nobles)
Urban Life: the early cities
Very hierarchical; administratively run
A supreme ruler, based on use of force
The constraints of neighboring groups
Urban and rural life
The Code of Hammurabi – The Sumerians
The Semites (Hittites, Egyptians, Sea Peoples, Assyrians)
Geographic Determinism: The Egyptians and the Semites
Development of Greek Civilization
Crete: Minoan Civilization (tsunami, volcano, earthquake)
Greek civilization: The polis (city-state)
Coins and Markets
Democracy, tyranny, new forms of Government
A cultural and scientific revolution
The Persian Empire
The first world empire
A very decentralized system of government: Federalism (sorta)
New religious thoughts (mono-theism)
Xerxes, Sparta and Athens: then the Peloponnesian wars
Alexander the Great: the Successors
The Successors: Greeks in the new Persian Empire
The Roman Empire
Rome a collection of huts in 1,000 b.c.
Founded circa 750 b.c.
By 450, a dominant city on Italian Peninsula, social changes
By 200, master of the western Mediterranean (defeat of Carthage)
Became empire by 30 B.C.
Became Christian aprox. 300 A.D., Western empire fell 476
Why Rome?
Administrative and architectural ability
Warlike capability, “the legions”
Legal system,
Political system
Rome vs. China….
The fall of Rome
Barbarians, or
Internal Decadence
III: The Middle Ages
Europe after the fall of Rome
Political and social regression
Technological and theocratic advancement
The triumph of Christianity in Europe
The Emergence of Islam in the Middle East
Feudalism – the Manorial System
Lords as estate managers
Property rights, feudalism, agricultural advancement
About 1000 A.D., the emergence of towns
Religion and commerce; the crusades and trade.. (end of isolation).
Growth of towns, growth of nations; emergence of high culture
The role of the church
The Black death
The fragmented nature of European society
Question: were the dark ages “dark”? Economists vs. Historians
Political fragmentation and technological advancement
IV: The Renaissance
Named for the rediscovery of Greek and Roman Thought
The protestant reformation; the counter-reformation
The age of discovery
The emergence of the nation state, middle class,
The rest of the world, circa 1600
V: The Development of Modern Economic and Political Institutions
The end of Serfdom (the black death)
Conflict approach: competing classes
Exchange approach: relative price changes
Symbolic Interpretation approach: everybody is dying.
Mercantilism; markets to organize society
But the markets were heavily influenced by the state (when possible)
Continued warfare between European states
Question: did warfare lead to a Darwinian dynamic in Europe?
Did warfare increase, or retard, European expansion?
The Emergence of Nation-States
Why did they emerge?
The Industrial and Political Revolutions of the 1750s and 1850s
The industrial revolution – a revolution in technology
Which led to much different patterns of organization/living
Growth of urbanization, transportation, vast increases in output
End of the Malthusian crises….
Also, political changes…
The American Revolution (1776)
The French Revolution (1789)
The wars of the French Revolution, the Napoleonic Wars
The rise of the middle class, (Marx), parliament vs. absolute monarchy
The colonial age, the imperial age
World war I, the emergence of communism
Fascism, the great depression
WWII, the cold war
The fall of the soviet Union (1989-91)
Today…
Last Modified; November 16, 2007