Why the social sciences won't become high-consensus, rapid-discovery science
Bibliographic Data
| ID | 8046847 |
|---|---|
| Authors | Randall Collins (University of California, Riverside, corresponding author) |
| Year | 1994 |
| Volume | 9 |
| Issue | 2 |
| Pages | 155-177 |
| Publication date | 1994-06-01 |
| Peer Reviewed | Yes |
| Open Access | Yes |
| Type | ARTICLE |
| Venue | Sociological Forum (JOURNAL) |
| Journal identifiers | ISSN: 0884-8971 • E-ISSN: 1573-7861 |
| Publisher | Wiley (PUBLISHER • GB) |
| DOI | 10.1007/bf01476360 |
| OpenAlex | W2051924434 |
| Language | EN |
| Citations received | 95 |
| References cited | 41 |
A research front of rapid discovery, leaving a trail of cognitive consensus behind it, is characteristic of natural sciences since about the 17th century in Europe. The basis of this high-consensus, rapid-discovery science is not empiricism, since empirical research existed in the natural sciences before the 17th century. The key is appropriation of genealogies of research technologies, which are pragmatically manipulated and modified to produce new phenomena; high consensus results because there is higher social prestige in moving ahead to new research discoveries than by continuing to dispute the interpretation of older discoveries. The social sciences have not acquired this pattern of rapid discovery with high consensus behind the research front. Their fundamental disability is not lack of empirical research, nor failure to adhere to a scientific epistemology, nor the greater ideological controversy that surrounds social topics. What is fundamentally lacking in the social sciences is a genealogy of research technology, whose manipulation reliably produces new phenomena and a rapidly moving research front. Unless the social sciences invent new research hardware, they will likely never acquire much consensus or rapid discovery. Possibilities may exist for such development stemming from research technologies in microsociology and in artificial intelligence
Appropriation · Embeddedness · Empiricism · Social research · Language and cultural evolution · Philosophy and History of Science · scientometrics and bibliometrics research
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Exploratory Research
Claiming Novelty, Claiming Authority
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Scientific Truth in a Post-Truth Era
Are Most Published Criminological Research Findings Wrong? Taking Stock of Criminological Research Using a Bayesian Simulation Approach
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The Significance of Method
University teaching in “hard” and “soft” sciences
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Erleben, Erleiden, Erfahren
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What's wrong is right
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Hard Sciences" e "Social Sciences
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The Structure of a Social Science Collaboration Network
Formalism, Behavioral Realism and the Interdisciplinary Challenge in Sociological Theory
Social Problems
Challenges for a Global Sociology
Against Reflexivity as an Academic Virtue and Source of Privileged Knowledge
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Sociology
A Canadian rejoinder
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What is on a Demographer's Mind
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Sociology's misfortune
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Facets of Taoism
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Derek Price's Puzzles
The Adaptation of Babylonian Methods in Greek Numerical Astronomy
Booing
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A Comparative Analysis of Complex Organisations
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Dimensions of Citation Analysis
Toward a Theory of Intellectual Change
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Facets of Taoism
A Simplest Systematics for the Organization of Turn-Taking for Conversation
Scientific Consensus and Academic Status Attainment Patterns
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| Unique citing works | 95 |
|---|---|
| Citations per year | 3,06 |
| Citation span | 1995 - 2026 (32) |
| Citation velocity | current |
| Highly cited | No |
| Citation types | Neutral: 95 |