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We don't know about social sciences because it is a heavily politically charged subject. The most interesting and potentially enlightening experiments are also

by Shorel 11y ago

We don't know about social sciences because it is a heavily politically charged subject. The most interesting and potentially enlightening experiments are also probably illegal. That's why it's hard. And you ALSO need a branch of mathematics, called statistics, and probably many more. You can't simply pour lots of money into it without any hard science and expect useful results. tl;dr: it's not about quantity, it's about quality and the political landmine of social sciences.

paulojreis 11y ago
> The most interesting and potentially enlightening experiments are also probably illegal. I fully agree with your points. However, regarding this one in particular, I would like to add that this shouldn't stop the harnessing of already existing knowledge in the social sciences to better shape the products we build. I mean, you're totally right; there's a lot of knowledge "locked" in the difficulties related to studying humans. However, we know some stuff about people and their behaviour. A relevant amount of stuff I would say. And that stuff isn't being applied when we create a technical solution to a human problem; the solution is almost solely defined by technical aspects. We don't know much, but we know enough to do better than what we do with technology today, human-wise. (At least, better than defining "UX work" as pixel-pushing in Photoshop or Illustrator)
innguest 11y ago
> We don't know about social sciences because it is a heavily politically charged subject. It did not used to be that way. It started to change after WW2 and even stronger after 1967. Social "sciences" were made political because a group of radical influential thinkers were interested in furthering studies that would disprove the role of genetics, biology and darwinism in social studies. Before this shift, social studies were not politicized.

by Shorel 11y ago

paulojreis 11y ago

> The most interesting and potentially enlightening experiments are also probably illegal. I fully agree with your points. However, regarding this one in particular, I would like to add that this shouldn't stop the harnessing of already existing knowledge in the social sciences to better shape the products we build. I mean, you're totally right; there's a lot of knowledge "locked" in the difficulties related to studying humans. However, we know some stuff about people and their behaviour. A relevant amount of stuff I would say. And that stuff isn't being applied when we create a technical solution to a human problem; the solution is almost solely defined by technical aspects. We don't know much, but we know enough to do better than what we do with technology today, human-wise. (At least, better than defining "UX work" as pixel-pushing in Photoshop or Illustrator)

innguest 11y ago

> We don't know about social sciences because it is a heavily politically charged subject. It did not used to be that way. It started to change after WW2 and even stronger after 1967. Social "sciences" were made political because a group of radical influential thinkers were interested in furthering studies that would disprove the role of genetics, biology and darwinism in social studies. Before this shift, social studies were not politicized.