Objectification of life

Yeees? What about it?

Herein lays the reason why human relationships cannot be intellectually embraced in the same manner as is physical relationships.

It seems to me that most people wonder why human problems cannot be solved as efficiently as are objective problems. Most people think that "science" is the way to solve all problems. Not coprehending either the meaning of 'science' or the difference between natural and human sciences.

I hate to say it, but I've never been overly impressed with the soft sciences as being very deserving of the word science.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Soft_science

I think I agree with chumly.

Also, I am not sure science has ever solved anything but it's own puzzles, which wouldn't be there were it not for science.

Wiki says about Philosophy of Science

Philosophy of science studies the philosophical assumptions, foundations, and implications of science, including the formal sciences, natural sciences, and social sciences. In this respect, the philosophy of science is closely related to epistemology and metaphysics. Note that issues of scientific ethics are not usually considered to be part of the philosophy of science; they are studied in such fields as bioethics and science studies.

In particular, the philosophy of science considers the following topics: the character and the development of concepts and terms, propositions and hypotheses, arguments and conclusions, as they function in science; the manner in which science explains natural phenomena and predicts natural occurrences; the types of reasoning that are used to arrive at scientific conclusions; the formulation, scope, and limits of scientific method; the means that should be used for determining when scientific information has adequate objective support; and the implications of scientific methods and models, along with the technology that arises from scientific knowledge for the larger society.

I hate to say it, but the philosophy of science reminds me of the theory of music, in that the music came first (for a large variety of reasons) and the music theory came afterward, to try and rationalize the musical structures.

I agree that the social sciences lack the rigour of the physical sciences. But it is also true that a sociology of the physical sciences removes much of the veneer of "objectivity"--as seen in many works, the most famous of which is The Structure of Scientific Revolutions by Thomas Kuhn.

Dilthey, Max Weber, Alfred Shutz and the resulting fields of qualitative sociology and social cultural anthropology employ epistemological assumptions commensurate with the nature of their subject matter. To reduce human (meaningful) behavior to variables and numbers in the pursuit of rigour is to violate its nature. This violation results in little more than rigour mortis.

It might purport to remove much of the veneer of objectivity in terms of intent, and perhaps even to some degree the methodology, but I seriously question its efficacy in significantly affecting the results.

IOW it would not matter whether a green hued, tentacled jelly blob from the planet Nabob did the test, hydrogen and oxygen will combust once a given and specific set of conditions are met.

As a pragmatist when it come to science I could care less (figuratively) if a discovery was based on pure luck or years of structured investigations.

My music theory lessons did not reduce music's meaning to variables and numbers and thus violate its nature. Why should the specific analysis of human action, interaction, response etc? After all, like it or no, we are organic machines, and with enough knowledge and ability, we can both be programmed and predicted like any other machine.

As an amusing partial aside, although I kind'a doubt you've read Asimov's Foundation Series, there is a character called Hari Seldon. In his capacity as mathematics professor, he developed psychohistory, which presumably, but not necessarily wholly convincingly, allows him to predict the future in probabilistic terms.

Then again what the hell do I know? I'm just one poster with some points of view. In any case I always appreciate your input.