Readings in the Philosophy of Social Science
by Michael Martin and Lee C. McIntyre (Eds.)Format: Paperback
Pub. Date: 1994-03-22
Publisher(s): Bradford Books
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Summary
This is the first comprehensive anthology in the philosophy of social science to appear since the late 1960s. Covering all of the major areas in the discipline, it will serve as the standard source for scholarship in the field and could be used as the basis for an entire course. The anthology offers one complete, convenient, and well-chosen selection of readings, plus three specially commissioned articles that encompass the entire range of topics in the field and cover both sides of currently hot debates about explanation, methodological individualism, and the special sciences. The introductions to each section provide a map through the discipline. Michael Martin is Professor of Philosophy at Boston University. Lee C. McIntyre is Assistant Professor of Philosophy at Colgate University. Sections cover: Explanation, Prediction, and Laws. Interpretation and Meaning. Rationality. Functional Explanation. Reductionism, Individualism, and Holism. Objectivity and Values. Problems of the Special Sciences. Commissioned articles: Taylor on Interpretation and the Sciences of Mani Michael Martin. Microfoundations of Marxism, D. Little. Evidential Constraints: Pragmatic Empiricism in Archaeology, A. Wylie.
Table of Contents
| Acknowledgments | |
| Introduction | |
| Sources and Acknowledgments | |
| Are the Social Sciences Really Inferior? | p. 5 |
| What Would an Adequate Philosophy of Social Science Look Like? | p. 21 |
| The Function of General Laws in History | p. 43 |
| The Theory of Complex Phenomena | p. 55 |
| A Possible Distinction between Traditional Scientific Disciplines and the Study of Human Behavior | p. 71 |
| Psychology as Philosophy | p. 79 |
| General Laws and Explaining Human Behavior | p. 91 |
| Defending Laws in the Social Sciences | p. 111 |
| Complexity and Social Scientific Laws | p. 131 |
| Reflexive Predictions | p. 145 |
| Human Nature and Human History | p. 163 |
| The Rationale of Actions | p. 173 |
| Interpretation and the Sciences of Man | p. 181 |
| Thick Description: Toward an Interpretive Theory of Culture | p. 213 |
| Hermeneutics and the Hypothetico-Deductive Method | p. 233 |
| Another Look at the Doctrine of Verstehen | p. 247 |
| Taylor on Interpretation and the Sciences of Man | p. 259 |
| Some Problems about Rationality | p. 285 |
| The Status of Rationality Assumptions in Interpretation and in the Explanation of Action | p. 299 |
| The Nature and Scope of Rational-Choice Explanation | p. 311 |
| The Principle of Charity and the Problem of Irrationality (Translation and the Problem of Irrationality) | p. 323 |
| The Logic of Functional Analysis | p. 349 |
| Function and Cause | p. 377 |
| Functional Explanation: In Marxism | p. 391 |
| Functional Explanation: In Social Science | p. 403 |
| Assessing Functional Explanations in the Social Sciences | p. 415 |
| Social Facts | p. 433 |
| Historical Explanation in the Social Sciences | p. 441 |
| Methodological Individualism Reconsidered | p. 451 |
| Methodological Individualism and Social Explanation | p. 459 |
| Microfoundations of Marxism | p. 479 |
| Reduction, Explanation, and Individualism | p. 497 |
| Social Science and the Mental | p. 515 |
| "Objectivity" in Social Science and Social Policy | p. 535 |
| Neutrality in Political Science | p. 547 |
| The Value-Oriented Bias of Social Inquiry | p. 571 |
| The Philosophical Importance of the Rosenthal Effect | p. 585 |
| Psychology Constructs the Female | p. 597 |
| Reasoning about Ourselves: Feminist Methodology in the Social Sciences | p. 611 |
| A Method for Critical Research | p. 625 |
| The Methodology of Positive Economics | p. 647 |
| If Economics Isn't Science, What Is It? | p. 661 |
| Actions, Reasons, and Causes | p. 675 |
| Special Sciences (or: The Disunity of Science as a Working Hypothesis) | p. 687 |
| Narrative Explanations: The Case of History | p. 701 |
| The Autonomy of Historical Understanding | p. 713 |
| On the Possibility of Lawful Explanation in Archaeology | p. 733 |
| Evidential Constraints: Pragmatic Objectivism in Archaeology | p. 747 |
| Bibliography | p. 767 |
| Index | p. 773 |
| Table of Contents provided by Blackwell. All Rights Reserved. |
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