To what extent does the evidences on human sciences offer us concrete knowledge?

The reliability of human sciencesBy: Joo Guimares and Guiherme CohenReal Life Situation Financial Crisis 2007-08

Also called the crisis of credit

Main antecedents/causes:Banks create too much money through loansMost money was used to push up house prices and speculate on the financial market (around 31% went to residential property)This pushes up house prices and the levels of personal debt. Since debts rise quicker than incomes, people become unable to make repayments. Crisis starts.After the crisis, banks begin to limit their loans to businesses and households, only lending when they are confident of repayment.This causes house prices to drop, meaning those who had borrowed too much to speculate on rising prices have to sell their asseststo repay their loansConsequence: the economy risks slipping into a debt-deflation spiral, where wages and prices fall but peoples debts do not change in value

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Knowledge questionTo what extent does the evidences on human sciences offer us concrete knowledge?

Human SciencesAnthropologyHuman biologyBusiness studiesCriminologyDemographyDevelopment studiesEconomicsEducationHuman geographyLawMedia studiesPhilosophyPolitical sciencePsychologySociologyHistory(?)A branch of study which deals with people or their actions, including the social sciences and the humanities, as contrasted with the natural sciences or physical sciences~ Oxford Dictionaries6Concrete KnowledgeComparing Human Sciences to MathematicsQualitativeQuantitativeAims to develop a complete and detailed descriptionAims to classify features, count them, and construct statistical models attempting to explain what is observedData is in the form of words, pictures or objectsData is in the form of numbers and statistics

Subjective individuals interpretation of events is importanteg. Uses participant observation (in depth interviews)Objective seeks precise elements and analyses of target conceptsEverything is either 1 or 0 ~ Fred Kerlinger Information is Richer, time consuming, and less able to be generalizedMore efficient, able to test hypotheses, but may miss contextual detail

Ways of knowingLanguage shapes thoughtReason relies on logical assumptionsEmotion induces biasLanguage shapes thought

Reason in human sciences

Why can history be considered a Human Science?A branch of study which deals with people or their actions, including the social sciences and the humanities, as contrasted with the natural sciences or physical sciences ~ Oxford dictionariesHistory is a narration of the events which have happened among mankind, including changes which have affected the political and social condition of the human race ~ John J. Anderson

Biased emotions

Final conclusionThe evidences on human sciences arent able to offer us concrete knowledge because of the influences of language and emotion and the fact that it relies heavily on reason to develop its theories.

Possible flaw: Psychology, one of the branches of human sciences, tend to develop its theories based on thorough empirical research.Linking back to the Real Life SituationThe economists predicting the financial crisis based their expectations assuming that individuals have a rational behavior, one of the key aspects of reason.Emotion influenced those economists whose businesses rely on economic booms for progression to give positive economic predictions.

Bibliographyhttp://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Rational_choice_theory_(criminology)

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