• @frezik@midwest.social
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    1 month ago

    That’s pretty much where I was going. What are soft sciences supposed to do when experimental methods are either impractical or unethical? Give up?

    If anything, fields like physics are in a privileged position where they can do the scientific method to the letter. Acting snooty about it is simply insulting and unhelpful.

    • @exocrinous
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      11 month ago

      What are soft sciences supposed to do when experimental methods are either impractical or unethical?

      Same thing astronomy did.

      • @frezik@midwest.social
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        1 month ago

        Astronomy has roughly a 400 year head start on most of these. Thousands of years if you’re counting astrology (which was good observations mixed together with nonsense).

        • @exocrinous
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          11 month ago

          That’s irrelevant. Astronomy and polsci can both only test their hypotheses through observation.

          • @frezik@midwest.social
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            1 month ago

            And Astronomy has had much, much longer to make those observations. They can also gather potentially millions of data points instead of five.