The Top Scientist
-
"Nelson is not the first social scientist to have a top job at the OSTP — Thomas Kalil, a political scientist, was deputy director for policy at the agency under former president Barack Obama."
Social Science isn't.
Neither is Political Science, for that matter.
-
@george-k said in The Top Scientist:
Social Science isn't.
You mean social science isn't science?
I would agree that many people who call themselves "social scientist" shouldn't, and that activism instead of science is rampant in that domain. But I also think that there is such a thing as social science: You can study societies using the scientific method.
-
I don't consider them scientists in the true sense of the word.
Always remember, Operation Valkyrie was an act of sedition.
Warning: I post things that interest me. Read and comment at your own discretion. -
I don't know the extent to which the post is just symbolic.
It's not like it sets NIH priorities.
-
Back in the day, we even looked down a bit on chemists as basically being glorified chefs.
Obviously, not any more, since about 95% of my job is social science, and the rest is a careful application of Ohm's Law.
-
@klaus said in The Top Scientist:
But I also think that there is such a thing as social science: You can study societies using the scientific method.
But is studying societies what people normally think of when they use the term "social science"?
-
There were times when the President probably needed a rocket scientist or a nuclear scientist (particle physicist?) or a organic chemist to advise him on matters of national importance. In the days of COVID-19, it might make sense to speculate that the President would need a medical science expert to advise him, perhaps an epidemiologist, but Biden has already got Fauci for that. While I also do not consider “social science” a hard science, as long as this “social scientist” don’t get in Fauci’s way (or get in other real scientists and cyber security experts’ way), I suppose I can let this one slide. Commenting on the societal impact of science related policies is fine, just don’t try to tell the scientists that they got the science wrong.
-
@jolly said in The Top Scientist:
I don't consider them scientists in the true sense of the word.
Let's take a concrete example. Recently a PhD student of mine finished her thesis, which was mostly a social science thesis, on the topic of education. She did a couple of studies on the most effective ways to teach computer science stuff to kids. There's a model that let's you come up with hypotheses. You can do all kinds of experiments to validate or reject hypotheses. The hypotheses are falsifiable. In what sense is such work not "scientific"? (unless you make the a priori assumption that the 'natural sciences' comprise the entirety of science)
I'd say anyone who investigates a topic using the scientific method is a scientist.
-
@klaus said in The Top Scientist:
@george-k said in The Top Scientist:
Social Science isn't.
You mean social science isn't science?
I would agree that many people who call themselves "social scientist" shouldn't, and that activism instead of science is rampant in that domain. But I also think that there is such a thing as social science: You can study societies using the scientific method.
I think that economics as a discipline strives to be that.
-
I think it was George Stigler who, when speaking to a group of economics grad students, said “there is only one social science and you are it’s practitioners”.
Having said that, I agree with Klaus.
-
@klaus said in The Top Scientist:
I'd say anyone who investigates a topic using the scientific method is a scientist.
I'm a scientist of photos of naked women.
