> How to know if this connection and grounding is present? In
> the same way
> that scientific hypotheses (also tautological if left to
> themselves, without
> external referent) are tested: by seeing if the hypothesis correctly
> predicts something in the physical world.
Dear Mike,
In the philosophy of the physical sciences, this positive position was
abandoned by Popper. There is no independent "reality" out there; it remains
the external referent of the discourse.
In the social sciences--the subject of this list--the problem is even more
serious. Social order is different from the physical one in terms of adding
an order of expectations. Prices, for example, are expectations of values.
They are not given, but constructed. Yet, they may be predictable in some
models. When intentions, meaning, etc., are involved, measurement becomes
much harder. Yet, these notions belong to the core of the social sciences.
(Weber's Marx critique; Husserl's "Crisis").
I don't mean this against striving for explanatory power; the latter is an
(unintended, since at the supra-individual level) result of improving on the
discourse.
Best wishes,
Loet
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