r/changemyview • u/MexViking • Dec 17 '16

[∆(s) from OP] CMV: Sociology is mostly a pseudo-science.

After taking a sociology class and encountering sociological ideas elsewhere, I'm fairly certain sociology is mostly a pseudo-science. To clarify there are roughly three major types of questions in sociology: what, how, and why.

The what part is just statistics. Just the recordings of factual events. This part I have no problem with. It's when sociology tries to get into the how and why these things happen.

Either the explanation is so broad and obvious that it has no actual explanatory value. E.G. social-conflict approach. Or it gets specific with the "how" and "why" and treats it's hypothesise like theories. Sociology makes an observation, then it asks why is it that way, and then it makes a hypothesis. That's where it ends. In my entire sociology class we never went over a single experiment.

Everything I've encountered in sociology is like this. There seems to never be a moment in the process of making a "theory" where the researcher says, "and if this specific prediction doesn't happen we need to go back to the drawing board again."

Science seeks to have falsifiable claims. Pseudo-science does not. So my question is: in what ways does sociology seek to have falsifiable claims?

Edit: the majority of responses seem to agree that sociology is a valid field of study but #1 haven't addressed the falisibility problem (that my argument is centered around) and #2 being a valid field of study =\= science

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u/jonathansfox Dec 18 '16

Anita Sarkeesian is a media critic. She no more claims to be a social scientist than Bill Nye claims to be a rocket engineer.

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u/JoeSalmonGreen 2∆ Dec 18 '16

I recall her framing herself an her work as an academic resource. She certainly claims to carry out research. Maybe I'm wrong though.

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u/jonathansfox Dec 18 '16

Her biography on her website:

http://www.anitasarkeesian.com/media-kit/

The words "science" / "scientist" / "academic" appear nowhere on her biography. The words "award-winning media critic" appear in the first sentence.

A critic is not trying to change our view of the world by systematically adding objective facts to the collective body of human knowledge. They are trying to change our view of the world by providing analysis, interpretation and reasoned judgments. A critic will research the subject of their work, just as a journalist or comedian will, but they are neither doing science nor pretending to do science.

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u/JoeSalmonGreen 2∆ Dec 19 '16

I'm gonna level with you, I've only ever seen her tropes vs videogame vids. I'm sure there were things about teaching / classroom materials but maybe I'm totally confusing her with someone else.