How does the social context of scientific work affect the methods and findings of science?

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Physical Sciences

How does the social context of scientific work affect the methods and findings of science?

        

The world society is in a constant state of fluidity regarding everything from social customs and slang to technology and inventions.  With even more abundance, scientific understanding and questioning evolve as time progresses.  As the human race changes and grows, scientific knowledge of the world and universe must expand to accommodate the growth.  To a large extent, the social situations surrounding the scientific work affect the specific sciences that are investigated.  

        Historically, the use of science to explain natural phenomenon has existed for many centuries.  Ancient establishments such as Stonehenge and Mayan temples demonstrate that these otherwise underdeveloped cultures had accurately grasped such scientific concepts as astronomy and its effect on the sun, weather, and the tides.  Just as this science was a necessity for the Mayans, for example, to regulate crops based on the measured passage of time, more modernizing societies have an inevitable demand for modernizing scientific acquisitions.

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        Scientific explorations result from the desire or requirement to explain certain unknowns.  Scientists recognized or studied today are those that were once able to elucidate scientific mysteries, such as Pavlov’s illumination of behavioral response or Mendel’s simple explanation of genetic inheritance.  In these situations, the outcome of the investigation had significant social implications. People later recognized the importance of such findings, and pressed for more information. This resulted in the continuation, even to present-day, of research in the fields of behavioral psychology and genetics.  Therefore, societal and social interest in early scientific examinations provides the building blocks that support modern ...

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