Sociology

Sociology

The social world is changing rapidly , especially through the engine of globalization . A myriad of social problems are robbing people of their livelihoods , dignity , quality of life , and their lives . The events of September 11 , 2001 that culminated in attacks upon the World Trade Center and the Pentagon in the United States served to highlight threats of international terrorism . Sound social science is needed to help us decide what to do to solve these problems . Some social scientists (including the writer ) would say that the main object of social science is

the study of such dysfunctions and malfunctions , just as the medical scientist is mainly concerned with disease . But disease cannot be studied without understanding what constitutes good health . The counterpart of this in social science is that it is necessary to employ some notion of the criteria of a healthy system of social organization This means that the social sciences are closely connected with that branch of philosophy called `ethics ' - the study of what should be regarded as `good ' and `bad ' in the moral sense of these terms . A great deal of the history of social science has been concerned with ethical issues . In Habits of the Heart , the authors described some key features of science and how these might relate to studies of the social world . I believe that `humanities , `natural science ' and `social science ' are simply synonyms for the disciplines that study nature and society . In the appendix the authors considered the historical importance of the development of the natural sciences in preparing the way for the later emergence of the social sciences . The emphasis there was on features of the `scientific attitude ' that are characteristic of the whole field of science , not unique to any one science or group of sciences . The object of this is to examine the relation between Social Science , the Humanities , and Natural Science . In this work we will also examine an important aspect of the intellectual history of the American Society , to evaluate the social science by comparison with the natural sciences or by reference to general criteria of scientific philosophy

In the modern university the field of study is typically divided into various `departments ' such as Mathematics , Astronomy , Philosophy Economics , Biology , English , History , and so on . In many universities one finds that some of these departments are grouped together as a `division ' or `faculty ' called `Social Sciences ' or `Social and Behavioral Sciences . If our world were very neat , and static , we would have little difficulty in determining what is `social science , or its various branches we would only have to examine the curricula and research programs of the social science departments . But our world is not neat . If an extraterrestrial being were preparing a report on our scholarly and scientific activities , he might start by looking at our university organization , but he would very quickly run into difficulties . He would find , for example , that the study of crime is carried on , not only in the School of...