Furthermore, the production of social science knowledge is shaped by three key criteria of evaluations such as coherence, empirical adequacy and comprehensiveness, while the aspects of claims must be descriptive, explanatory or normative. Social scientist process of using evidence entails the following:
- What do want evidence of?
- How can you get it and by what method?
- Who are your subjects?
- How can you organise and present evidence?
- How to interpret evidence? And
- Are there problems with the methods and the evidence in general?
Theories, Evaluation and Claims
Evaluation of theories can be undertaken by subjecting them to a series of tests, namely coherence, comprehensive, supporting evidence, and political and moral implications. Coherence of a theory involves test of clarity of its key claims and concepts, logic of its chain of reasoning, and plausibility and accuracy of assumption behind the concept and chain of reasoning. While comprehensiveness of a theory involves a generalized explanation of all areas of social life interconnections and the applicable restricted range of social phenomena.
Religion, Evidence and Knowledge
Social research claims that religion has become less important in contemporary society than at earlier times. The question is “how do we know? There are several major causes of this sense of threat to religion. The first is the secularization of social function that was once performed by organized religion, such as welfare and education have been formally taken over by the state. The second is the decline in involvement in organized religion as other lifestyle and leisure activities have successfully competed for people’s time and attention. The third is the relative decline in the authority of religious thinking compared with other forms of thoughts, especially science. The debate about the decline in religion has come to be known as the “secularization thesis”.
This is a debate in social science about the phenomenon of secularization, an argument and claim that the process of secularization is taking place. Religion can be seen as concerning what is set apart as sacred, marked off from the routine and ordinary practices of human life. The definition of religion can help use to understand the secularization thesis. The three main definitions of religions offers contrasting approaches: substantive approaches, which focus on content, such as those based on Weber’s views, are more likely to stress the decline of religion in modern society. By using the substantive definition of religion, such as surveys and opinion polls it is relatively easy to gather statistics that appear to show increasing secularization in modern societies. The functionalist approaches emphasize the purpose which is served by religion; the content and form may change, but religion can still unite people and provide a sense of belonging to a community. While, the phenomenological approaches focus on the meanings which religion has for individuals.
One of the ways social scientists attempt to investigate the initial question of secularization was to produce evidence of church attendance. Social scientist use different methods in gathering evidence which they use to support or refute the claims they make. The methods chosen are also based on the different assumption about what constitutes knowledge and the relationship between knowledge and the world. Religions knowledge has presented a problematic area of enquiry for social scientists based on its different definitions. Thus, social scientist have resorted use two approaches to support their claim the “positivist and the interpretative”. The positivist approaches is based on the assumption that we can only learn about the world and about people and social relations through observation of what people do. This method measure and quantifies human behaviour and draws conclusions from this in order to establish structural explanations. Positivism has been challenged by interpretative approaches which seek to interpret human action and focus on understanding the meaning which people give to their own action. The interpretative approaches involve a view of areas of enquiry in the social sciences as different from the natural sciences, and reject positivists’ claim that the physical sciences should be the model for all investigations. For example, in the case of religion, more interpretative approaches allow people to give voice to what religion or spirituality may mean for them, rather than having to fit their responses into pre-given categories. This approaches include other factors such as gender and religion; ethnicity and religion; and new Age beliefs and practices e.g. the new ecology. The specific example of gender and religion offers a more complex picture of religious knowledge.
Modern Societies, Science, Evidence and knowledge
Amongst the many competing voices that have tried to account for the changing nature of knowledge in modern societies and its practical impacts on the world. Many believe that an old order is passing and a new one is coming into being, social scientists therefore, uses the coherence and comprehensiveness theories to evaluate the claim that the world is entering into a knowledge society, fragmented society or a risk society.
In the aspect of science, sociologist have attempted to design model of how scientist produce scientific knowledge by spending “ extended periods” of time in actual laboratories observing scientists work or by using the constructivists view which states that any theory cam be maintained in the face any evidence, provided one makes sufficiently radical adjustments elsewhere in one’s belief. The converse is that there are always, alternative theories which are equally consistent with the evidence and which might reasonably be adopted. Sociologist have interpreted this thesis as opening the door to including social factors among those which need to be considered as the possible factors controlling acceptance of a theory of a set of experimental results. Finally, social scientist also uses political ideologies to evaluate claims. Modern political incorporates a notion of progress based on scientific knowledge and application of technology to produce economic growth. This notion of progress is questioned on the grounds that science may not be able to provide answers in complex and uncertain circumstances.
CONCLUSION
The role of social sciences in the all forms of knowledge has a great impact in the systematic and organized body of concepts, theories, information and evidence about the social world. In medical science, for example, the role of social science and social explanations of illness and health is contrasted with that of the natural sciences and some difficulties and virtues of combining social scientific and medical thinking. Likewise, the exploration of religious change in the Western societies since the Second World War, attempts to look at the different ways in which various traditions within the social sciences explore the same social phenomenon.
The social sciences both in analysing the world and providing a means for intervention in the world have changed and transformed objects of study in unintended and unacknowledged ways that make their original account problematic. The attitude to the process of social change in contemporary social sciences directly or indirectly provides the tools for more social groups to engage in the process of social analysis and change, in the evaluation and estimation of elites and experts, and in making the difficult choices that we individually and collectively face.
Word count: 1,530 words
Reference:
Goldblatt, D. (eds.) Knowledge and the Social sciences: theory, method, practice, London, Routledge/ The Open University (2000).
Hinchliffe, S. and Woodard, K. (eds.) the Natural and the Social: Uncertainty, Risk, Change, London, Routledge/ The Open University (2000).
Hughes, G. and Fergusson, R. (eds.) Ordering lives: Family, Work and Welfare, London, Routledge/ The Open University (2000).
Thompson, K. and Woodard, K. (2000) ‘Knowing and Believing: religious knowledge’ in Goldblatt, D. (eds.) knowledge and the social sciences: theory, method, practice, London, Routledge/ The Open University (2000).
