Philosophy of Social Sciences - Research Article from Encyclopedia of Philosophy

This encyclopedia article consists of approximately 11 pages of information about Philosophy of Social Sciences.

Philosophy of Social Sciences - Research Article from Encyclopedia of Philosophy

This encyclopedia article consists of approximately 11 pages of information about Philosophy of Social Sciences.
This section contains 3,075 words
(approx. 11 pages at 300 words per page)
Buy the Philosophy of Social Sciences Encyclopedia Article

The "philosophy of social sciences" comes in three varieties, as the metaideology, the metaphysics, and the methodology of the disciplines involved. The metaideology looks at how far different, traditional legitimations of social sciences succeed. The metaphysics looks at questions having to do with what social science posits—what things it says there are—and at how far those posits are consistent with more or less commonplace beliefs. And the methodology looks at questions regarding the nature of observations, laws, and theories in social science, the logic of induction and confirmation, the requirements of understanding and explanation, and so on.

Metaideology

The social sciences were conceived and pursued, from the very beginning, under the influence of ideals (particularly of scientific objectivity and progress) deriving from the eighteenth-century enlightenment (Hawthorn 1976). The first social scientists were economists and sociologists, as we would call them today...

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This section contains 3,075 words
(approx. 11 pages at 300 words per page)
Buy the Philosophy of Social Sciences Encyclopedia Article
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Philosophy of Social Sciences from Macmillan. Copyright © 2001-2006 by Macmillan Reference USA, an imprint of the Gale Group. All rights reserved.