Human Sciences

• Reason 

Can we assume that human beings are rational animals?

No, because being rational is dependant  on the person and the situation they are in, as some people are experiencing certain situations that play a role and provoke their actions, making them do something irrational. Humans are irrational beings, because reason may play a part and the human may overlook logic. 

• Emotion

How can a social scientist avoid becoming emotionally involved?

- A social scientist's job is linked with the interaction with other individuals, as it is said in its name "Social". Experiments that take place would normally have no harm whatsoever on the patient, however some experiments leave the scientist engaging with the patient on a emotional level. And to avoid that from happening, the scientist must not be engaged as a part of the experiment, and another aspect would be making sure that there is no associations between participant and the scientist, to make sure that there is no chance of any emotional feelings interfering with the experiment. 

Ethics

How do ethical factors limit experiments?

- Ethical factors are implemented to ensure that the experiments that take place do not go beyond any human right ( psychological effects). With that however does come the con of it which is the limitation it brings to the study. While each experiment has their own aim, scientist would want to be able and go deeper in terms of knowledge, however the ethical factor does limit them to take such precautions. 

• Language: 

Can questionnaire be written in a neutral language? 

Yes, I believe so, while it does depend on the type of questionnaires that are being presented. But nevertheless, it can be written in neutral language. An example of it would be the way it is written in terms of the balance it has. If the questionnaire is on a product and the options are "Good- Brilliant -Perfect" there isn't a lot of other options of emotions, in contrast to the questionnaire being a score rating etc..

Standford Prison Experiment Questions (Zimbardo)

Central question of the experiment (answer this before viewing the documentary):

1. “Does the situation outside of you—the institution—come to control your behavior, or do the things inside of you—your attitude, your values, your morality—allow you to rise above a negative environment?” –Philip G. Zimbardo

- I believe that the two situations (outside and inside us) both play effective roles, however i personally view “the things inside of you—your attitude, your values, your morality—allow you to rise above a negative environment”

Learn about the Stanford Prison Experiment:
Watch the BBC Documentary:  BBC Documentary on Stanford Prison Experiment

Or research  http://www.prisonexp.org/rebellion

2)Background: What had Milgrim’s study shown?

Aim:

Milgram (1963) was interested in researching how far people would go in obeying an instruction if it involved harming another person. 

Stanley Milgram was interested in how easily ordinary people could be influenced into committing atrocities for example, Germans in WWII.

Procedure: 

Participants were 40 males, aged between 20 and 50, whose jobs ranged from unskilled to professional, from the New Haven area. They were paid $4.50 for just turning up. At the beginning of the experiment they were introduced to another participant, who was actually a confederate of the experimenter (Milgram). The teacher is told to administer an electric shock every time the learner makes a mistake, increasing the level of shock each time. 

Results :

There were 30 switches on the shock generator marked from 15 volts (slight shock) to 450 (danger – severe shock). 65% (two-thirds) of participants (i.e. teachers) continued to the highest level of 450 volts. All the participants continued to 300 volts. Milgram did more than one experiment – he carried out 18 variations of his study.  All he did was alter the situation (IV) to see how this affected obedience (DV).

3)Consider the psychological consequences of stripping, delousing, and shaving the heads of prisoners or members of the military. What transformations take place when people go through an experience like this?

PTSD (Post Traumatic Stress Disorder), Humilation 

4)During the experiment, how did the prisoners and guards conform to their roles?

Several of the guards became progressively more sadistic - particularly at night when they thought the cameras were off, despite being picked by chance out of the same pool as the prisoners.

Prisoners did not stand up for themselves. 

5)How did even Zimbardo, the psychologist conducting the experiment, conform to his role as a prison superintendent?

He payed little to no attention to the effects on the prisons, he just cared about the outcome which would help his study.

6)How did the guards break the solidarity of the prisoners?

They used a form of manipulation to convince them that they were nothing but troublemakers. In addition they tried to make deals with them, for instance if they gave up their blankets they would be free.

7)How did the good guards react to what the bad guards were doing?

They left the situation and removed themselves from that atmosphere 

8)What are Zimbardo’s conclusions about human behavior, based on this experiment?

The situation that were deemed as “bad situation” won over the good people 

Natural Sciences and human sciences

- Natural Sciences and human sciences are two different areas of study, however with some common aspects. While  Natural Sciences can be defined as an area of knowing that makes claim about the natural world and attempts to find laws by which the world works.These laws are defined often, as results of experiments or tests, and usually claim to be true at all times, under the same conditions. In contrast, human sciences are known to be the science.The human sciences correspond to humanities and social sciences, but also includes aspects of psychology and even mathematics, as one of the key things we are concerned with is how we gather information in our study of human behaviour. 

Are the findings of the natural sciences as reliable as those of the human sciences? 
The findings of the natural sciences are seen as a more reliable source due to it being "Scientifically proven' and are identified as facts. In contrast to the human sciences where the information are regarded as "theories" the difference between the two was discussed in the previous blog post." A fact is known to be a proven observation justified by being a repetitive outcome or having scientific evidence to support" while in correspondence a theory is an assumption based on either logical explanation or simply examining the explanation in a very focused manner. Theories differ from facts or scientific observations(laws) as they do not contrast with the Mathematics or Natural Science AOK and are adopted( deemed as acceptable) and used by the general public. Which is why the findings from an experiment conducted in a natural science scope are deemed as a more "reliable" source that of the human science one. In add-on aspects such as psychology base it's information of the action of one, however, does not have a scientific backbone to it as it does not relate to every single human, therefore it being a theory. 

 To what extent can information in the human sciences be quantified? 

- Information extracted from human sciences are quantified to a certain extent, while it is true that human science is linked with behavioural science and the way one acts, it is important to remember that unlike the natural sciences, one should take great precaution before concluding a statement. As psychology is a theory based aspect and not all observations made from reproaches relate to everyone. So this limits the reliably and unfortunately does not allow the information be quantified.  Examples of how we try to quantify aspects of human behaviour: I.Q. = how we think and what we "know" Personality Tests = how we act, On the other hand, can quantifying behaviour actually help gain knowledge? Scientists are quantifying human behaviours which can help autistic children and even make technology more realistic.  Quantify and categorising people using tests in the human sciences can limit them 
Enrichment programs in education isolate students while quantifying them as special or more knowledgeable

Theory of Knowledge Homework (2/3/2017)

 Theory of Knowledge Homework (2/3/2017)

Theory Of Knowledge Prompt:

“Facts are needed to establish theories but theories are needed to make sense of facts.” Discuss this statement with reference to two areas of knowledge. May 2017

1) 1-Identify (give definition) for key terms.

• The key terms of the prompts are “Facts”, “Theories” and “Sense”. A fact is known to be a proven observation justified by being a repetitive outcome or having scientific evidence to support. In addition, facts can also be seen through religious beliefs which is known as “Religious Knowledge systems” in the AOK and as mentioned in the definition given, scientific evidence which would fall under the Natural Sciences and Mathematics AOK. An example of a fact would be “The sun is a star”  and this is regarded as a worldwide known FACT: having scientific evidence and observations from AOK that back up the claim. In contrast, a theory is an assumption based on either logical explanation or simply examining the explanation  in a very focused manner. Theories differ from facts or scientific observations(laws) as they do not contrast with the Mathematics or Natural Science AOK and are adopted( deemed as acceptable) and used by the general public. An example of a theory would be”Information theory: Claude Shannon, 1948”. Information theory studies the quantification, storage, and communication of information. It was originally proposed by Claude E. Shannon in 1948 to find fundamental limits on signal processing and communication operations such as data compression, in a landmark paper entitled "A Mathematical Theory of Communication”. And lastly, sense is a feeling that something is the case.However can easily be regarded as a not accurate enough way of knowing. 

2. Brainstorm specific examples in two AOKs you would use to answer the prompt.

Mathematics: Knowledge in mathematics is identified as unique in comparison to the other ways of knowing,  it is identified as unquestionable since the information is certain and factual it is regarded as a high degree of certainty assisted with knowledge in this area.In addition, it is free of specific cultural context.

         &

Natural Sciences:  Science makes claim about the natural world, and attempts to find law by which the world works. The laws are defined, often, as the results of experiments or tests(Observations). However, raises a question such as the certainty of the knowledge gained by these methods or the usefulness of the scent laws in predicting the future. An example of a biology theory would be the falsification of urea or spontaneous generation. 

3.  What are the assumptions of the claim?

- The assumption of the claim identifies that theory is reliable once being an established/delivered source. This could potential negatively affect our progressiveness in the scientific or mathematic filed, as it is known worldwide; science is a progressive field and there are new theories to be discovered and some theories. When considering bias, we associate it as the subjective way of thinking that is not impartial, leading to uncertainty in information given out. 

““Science is built of facts the way a house is built of bricks: but an accumulation of facts is no more science than a pile of bricks is a house” Henri Poincaré" 

The Natural Sciences Blog Post

When does an observation become scientific law? How many times should an experiment be conducted to make turn a hypothesis into a theory? 

-An observation becomes a scientific law when there is action taken upon the observation;  Science as we know it is a progressive field. Observations lead scientist to find out facts about life. An example of this would be Newton's law: Newton observed the apple falling on his head, and from the observations, he came up with the law of gravity.  He repeated this and concluded that if the object with more mass (the Earth) attracts the object with less mass (the apple).
- An experiment should be tested multiple times before we can conclude it is a fact, in addition, we have to also add in other factors such as the environment it is in. "A scientific law always applies under the same conditions, and implies that there is a causal relationship involving its elements."

Newton's Law of Gravity

Is Science created or discovered? 

- There are many ways to look at the question upon answering it, while some areas of science where always there since the beginning of time and have been known due to humans discovering them, an example of this would be mathematics " Since much of math that we used (almost all) is based on first principles found in the universe, it can be argued that basic math is discovered rather than invented, but since those principles are not the only math systems explored math as a whole is not created. In addition, everything that was found as a "scientific law" was discovered rather than created from the human. 

 Examples: laws of physics, finding new elements, molecules (Chemistry) 

How reliable is your science textbook? 

- Our science textbooks are reliable sources, due to the fact that topics that are taught are usually fact based rather than theory based. So, physics students would learn reliable stuff by Newton as it is supported by facts, in addition, science is a very progressive field so with new major discoveries there will be new topics to teach and learn about. Furthermore, our science textbooks show real life examples of how the law applies in our everyday lives. We also do labs and experiments to prove these laws and theories, and this shows why we should trust our science textbooks

Natural Science Blog post

TASK: 

In your blogs, write a definition and give and example for each one of these: a fact
a theory
a hypothesis
a belief
Watch again the TED video and summarise the main points.
http://ed.ted.com/on/uNp5NZ59

→→→→→→→→→→→→→→→→→→→→→→→→→→→→→→→→→→→→→→→→→

Natural Sciences can be defined as an area of knowing that makes claim about the natural world, and attempts to find laws by which the world works.These laws are defined often,as results of experiments or tests, and usually claim to be true at all times, under the same conditions. 

However, many questions are raised when it comes to Natural Sciences. 

• How certain is knowledge gained by these methods?
• How useful is scientific law for predicting the future?

Key Terms (Definitions and Examples) 

FACT

Definition: a scientific fact is an objective and verifiable observation. A proven statement backed up by science and mathematics,in addition it  cannot be questioned 

Example: Avogadro's Law, Thermodynamics

THEORY 

Definition: A scientific theory is a assumption or an idea based on evidence and fact however has not been confirmed through science or math, thus making it an assumption, and can be questioned and challenged

Example: Evolution 

HYPOTHESIS 

Definition: Similar to theory, a hypothesis is a "educated guess or prediction" made before having any lab reports run, however the prediction is made with limited information which is why it can be supported or not supported. 

Example: Peanuts do not cause acne because there is no correlation between consumption of nuts  and acne. 

BELEIF 

Definition: Something believed by people and can sometimes have a relation within religious perspective and cultural ones too. Furthermore, scientific beliefs is based on previous factual informations. 

Example: The earth is flat 

Notes

• Humans have no control on what we learn 
• Question everything (How do we know?) 
• Looking at previous facts can help us progress in the field of science 
• Science interacts with the world 
• How did the discovers come to understand 
• The field of science is open 
• There is a difference between Facts and Theories and it is important to be able to decipher what it is 

To what extent  does language shape our thinking?

-Language plays a part in many parts of our life, some says that it is what differentiate  between human beings while others disagree and say that our process of thinking isn't linked to our language. Personally i must say that the language we use to speak,whether we are bilingual or monolingual, i do believe that language is linked to our way of thinking and heres why. Since we can associate language with a certain culture, we know that within different cultures there comes different beliefs and those beliefs come with a certain manner of thinking. So i think language plays a massive part in the shape of our thinking process. 

Do people think differently in different languages? 

- Yes, and just basing this off from the answer above, since language is associated  with different cultures we can say that peoples thought process is based on what they know based on cultural acceptance which gives them  the freedom to think in a certain way. 

If you do not have words for certain situation, does it mean you do not have thoughts for them? 

-No it doesn't, remember that thought shouldn't only be associated with speaking, thought can also be liked with reaction and feelings. A person may feel something but not be able to express it, that doesn't mean that they don't have thoughts about the situation it's just they don't have the words to express them (Pain is a good example, people use hand movement and face gestures to issue pain)