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Abstract
The aim of the paper is to evaluate if the knowledge based on natural sciences is more precise and correct as compared to the knowledge created by the social sciences. Concepts like Theory dependence, paradigms, probabilism, and peer review would be used to veloute the statement. There are debates on the results of work in social sciences like sociology and economics. Although decades of research in science and technology are deemed essential to address the issues of the planet, the social and nature scientists should bring information and understandings of biophysical and social systems to the intellectual table.
Introduction
Whether social scientists are less capable, or the natural scientists are more knowledgeable about their fields, is a debatable topic for many. Generally speaking, the knowledge gained from the natural sciences is considered to be more reliable as it makes use of logic and reason after analysing data from controlled experimental practices. However, it could be argued that natural sciences are no more reliable than the social sciences as there are just as many problems. The esoteric knowledge possessed by the social scientists, on the other hand, doesn’t decode directly into practical understanding of the world.
The natural and social sciences are more than the give-and-take of relevant information. The perspectives and experiences of the scholars influence the ideas on the very same topic. The intellectual interdisciplinary needs to be reconfigured in order for the interdisciplinary knowledge to be generated. Compared to the natural sciences, social sciences are portrayed as poorly developed in their theoretical foundations and less developed than the natural sciences in terms of theory, method, and tradition. Social scientists are known to work with of the greater variety and on lesser precision. Thus, there is lesser consistency in social science than the natural sciences. According to Silviu (2013, p. 925), the first classification of sciences into theoretical, practical and productive was done by Aristotle. He brought into question the distinction between theoretical sciences and practical sciences. When one looks into the ancient Greek, the disagreement between natural and social sciences is seen in the presentation of theoretical and practical sciences. Before Aristotle, man and nature were common objects under science. Aristotle introduces the opposition and before him man and nature were common objects.
Natural and Social Sciences
Natural science is the study of naturally occurring objects or phenomena, such as a human body, celestial bodies, light, objects, matter, etc. These sciences can be further classified into physical sciences, life sciences, etc. Physical sciences are made of physics, chemistry, and astronomy while the Earth sciences relate to geology. Life sciences contain science of human bodies and plants. Social science is the science of people or groups, societies, or economies, and their individual or collective characteristics and behaviours. Social sciences are classified as sociology, psychology, economics, etc.
The natural sciences vary from the social sciences in being precise, deterministic and independent of the individual making scientific observations. For example, research in physics or chemistry, under the same controlled conditions will always yield the same results, irrespective of the person doing the experiment or time or place of the experiment. However, the same cannot be assumed for the social sciences that tend to be unambiguous and less accurate. For example, it is not possible to get an accurate value of a person’s happiness as the same person might feel happier or sadder on different days, or during different times the same day. Furthermore, there is no one instrument to measure a person’s happiness (Bhattacherjee 2012). Thus, in comparison to natural sciences, there is a high degree of estimation error in the social sciences. In the case of natural scientists, you will not find them disagreeing on the speed of light or other scientific aspects. However, in case of social scientists, there might be different views and solutions proposed to issues like global terrorism or saving economy from a recession. The high variability of social objects gets reflected in the higher levels of ambiguity, uncertainty, and errors that follow the social sciences.
The learning techniques of natural sciences and social sciences students A study was done to examine the different learning techniques of the students of natural sciences and social sciences at graduate level. A standardized questionnaire was given to 130 students; age ranged 18 to 22 years. Results show that the learning styles varied among student. The learning styles of male students were group whereas female students preferred individual studies. Students of social sciences favoured visual and group learning styles as compared to students of natural sciences who preferred Auditory learning styles. Learning styles play an important role in deciding the levels of academic achievement (Khurshid & Mahmood 2012, p. 672). Study of different learning styles also helps the professors and teachers in offering a better teaching methodology. The learning styles also reflect how a student of natural and social sciences react and interact in the classroom. Science students have been found to more curious by temperament. Findings of the research also facilitate student’s self-understanding and understand their subject better.
Conflict between social and natural sciences
There are central theoretical issues that concern the relationship between society and its academic disciplines. A common view held today is if the cultural phenomena is begin attacked by the natural sciences and technology. Is the progress of natural science creating a crisis of the humanities? The universities are more inclined towards natural sciences because of their applicability, and the humanities are no longer recognized for their social value. Scholars stress that the humanities offer protection to democratic societies from radical economization.
There have been close ties between the experimental sciences and industrialization that have shaped the modern societies. Disciplines such as physics, chemistry, and medicine have gained recognition and legitimacy in the academic and social fields (Sala 2013, p. 83-97). The conflict between social and natural sciences need to be looked into. The social sciences having established an alternative paradigm, where it challenges the humanities as a scientific discourse. Traditional arguments authorize the obvious existence of separate spheres of science and, therefore, continue the crisis. There is a need to reflect on the science as a whole and opt for a more unified view of science. This will lead to a reconsideration of the question of the social relevance of academia from a new perspective. An exclusive “scientific method” does not establish a precondition in the humanities and social sciences. The scholars should give importance to the personal experience, and interpretation in an experiment for the advancement of knowledge, and with regard to all disciplines, even if there is a lack of legitimacy as scientific tools.The Exactness in Natural and Social Sciences
The methodologies and the exactness in social and natural sciences have often been evaluated. Clearly, each set of sciences carries different components and applies different methods, and this is because the nature of social sciences is decisively different from the natural sciences. The methodology used in the human sciences is based more on understanding rather than explaining. Does that mean that social sciences should follow the methodology of the natural sciences? It is universally accepted that various phenomena will need different methods of studying. Research in social sciences focuses on using qualitative research methods. The Economy studies economic systems based on mathematical models, while Archaeology studies the past. There are no reliable rationality or ways to analyse social sciences. A range of methods, such as interviews, conceptual analysis, questionnaires, narrative analysis, are followed.
According to Ingthorsson, (2013 pp. 13),, natural science, designs and uses methodologies in accordance to the study of the objects, and this is a rational thing to do. These studies are entirely ruled by natural laws and are mind-independent and aim to discover the nature of unconscious physical matter in all its forms.
The social sciences do study humans but not the physical bodies, but the experiences, social interactions, attitudes, etc. They focus on structures created by the humans like the businesses, languages, education systems, literature, music and art, etc. These things are social
Constructions and the intentional acts of human beings. The social sciences ultimately study the meaningful phenomena in our lives.
The research in natural sciences can be a social enterprise as it involves a range of ideas from different researchers. In other words, the research is partly made by the contents of the minds, but, the results are objectively real. The natural sciences study is mind-independent and is unlike the social sciences which are dependent on the contents of the minds. In that perspective, it is natural for the question to arise whether some of the subjects studied under social sciences are ‘for real’ as they are not independent of thoughts.
The core natural sciences have achieved a well-established status that is still to be attained by even the best-developed social sciences such as economics. The strength of the natural sciences lies in the predictive power as compared to even the most highly developed social sciences (Gutting). Natural sciences are based on carefully designed experiments, mathematical equations, empirical data, etc. The natural sciences can make detailed and precise predictions that the social sciences are not able to. The reason behind is that the predictions and results under social sciences require controlled experiments, and this is seldom possible as people are involved. This is why the social science research and its results always far short of the natural sciences.
For both the natural scientists - physicists, chemists, and biologists and social scientists the primary concerns that remain are the sources of evidence and ideas. The fundamental questions include the major product of inquiry that relate to the prediction, explanation, or description of a phenomenon. The inferences are based on the sources of evidence, and the degree of control over the conditions are important. There are three components behind every intellectual effort, and these are a set of unquestioned premises, analytical tools for gathering evidence, and the set of concepts making the core of explanations (Guerrero 2009, p. 101). Natural scientists stress upon the material processes, minimizing the impact of historical and cultural contexts, as well as their related ethical values. These concern with the connections between a concept and the observations. Social scientists rely heavily on semantic networks and their studies are based on the relations among a set of semantic terms.
Conclusion
Overall, one finds greater similarities than the differences between the social and natural sciences. Both employ the same kind of balanced scrutiny of the rationality and reliability of its methods and conclusions are drawn on the basis of that reasoning. The natural sciences are exact as long as the subject matter allows it to be. One should distinguish between a world that is independent of minds and how to obtain an accurate knowledge of the world. There is a need to enhance the synthetic potential of interdisciplinary between social and natural sciences based on intersecting knowledge, achieving greater depth and clarity. The ideas as well as the social factors of cooperation, trust and are a key to interdisciplinary success. These issues are not just confined to the design and execution of the research, but themselves into peer review and professional appointments. The onus lies on the practicing scientists as to identify the situation and deal with the issues transparently. The natural sciences are certainly more accurate than social sciences, but the two can work together to increase credibility and accuracy.
Work cited
Bhattacherjee Anol 2012, Social Science Research: Principles, Methods, And Practices, University of South Florida.
Fauzia Khurshid & Naveeda Mahmood 2012, "Learning Styles Of Natural Sciences, Social Sciences And Humanities Students At Graduate Level",Interdisciplinary Journal of Contemporary Research In Business, vol. 3, no. 9, pp. 672.
Guerrero, E. 2009, "Jerome Kagan, The Three Cultures. Natural Sciences, Social Sciences, and the Humanities in the 21st Century", Nexos: Sociedad, Ciencia, Literatura, vol. 31, no. 384, pp. 101.Gutting, Gary, (2012) How Reliable Are the Social Sciences? Opinionator. [Online] Available from: http://opinionator.blogs.nytimes.com/2012/05/17/how-reliable-are-the-social-sciences/Ingthorsson, R., Theoretical Philosophy, Faculties of Humanities and Theology, Lund University, Humaniora och Teologi, Teoretisk filosofi, Humanistiska fakulteten Historisk- filosofiska sektionen, Department of Philosophy, Lunds universitet, Faculty of Arts History and Philosophy Section & Filosofiska institutionen 2013, "The Natural vs. Human Sciences: Myth, Methodology, and Ontology", Discusiones Filosófikas, vol. 22, no. 1, pp. 13.
Morgan, M.S. 2013, "Nature’s Experiments and Natural Experiments in the Social Sciences", Philosophy of the Social Sciences, vol. 43, no. 3, pp. 341-357.
"Paradigms and problems: The practice of social science in natural resource management", 1998, Society & Natural Resources, vol. 11, no. 3, pp. 279-295.
Sala, R. 2013, "One, Two, or Three Cultures? Humanities Versus the Natural and Social Sciences in Modern Germany",Journal of the Knowledge Economy, vol. 4, no. 1, pp. 83-97.
Silviu Serban 2013, "ARISTOTELIAN DISTINCTIONS BETWEEN SOCIAL AND NATURAL SCIENCES",Contemporary Readings in Law and Social Justice, vol. 5, no. 2, pp. 925.
