Soc 10

History of Social Sciences

I. Ancient Greece

A. Rationality: reason to explain the world

B. Plato, Aristotle, Socrates

1. Role of the state

2. Market

3. Nature of Man

II. Middle Ages

A. Monarchy, religion, and feudal system

B. Centrality of religion

III. Renaissance (rebirth of knowledge)

A. Intense struggle between religious thinking/rationalist thinking (faith or reason)

B. Specialization

1. Knowledge

a. Humanities (arts, literature, music)

b. Physics

-empirical studies —> natural science

-metaphysics —> philosophy —> socio and other soc sci

C. Reasons why social science developed later than natural science

1. The monarchy and the church were fearful of early ideas of social thinkers

2. Material needs favoured natural science thinkers

a. Agricultural productivity

b. Preparation for war

c. Trade

3. Medieval theology and ideas of early social science thinkers are similar

4. Reverence to the Greek classics & Descartes' geometric deduction

IV. Enlightenment

A. Development from Philosophy —> Social Science

1. The renaissance mind: heavily influenced by Greek Philosophers

a. Philosophical mind: use of abstract principles, reliance on reason in explaining man and society

2. Enlightenment mind: influenced by Newton's scientific method to study man and society

a. Social Science: use of empirical observation and reason

B. Contributions of Enlightenment in the development of social science

1. Applications of science in understanding society

2. Rising awareness of the multiplicity and variety of human experience

3. Spreading sense of the social and cultural character of human behaviour in society

4. Ideas of structures (Hobbes, Locke, Rosseau) and developmental change (Rosseau, Condorcet, Adam Smith)

V. French Revolution —> Industrial Revolution —> Other Revolutions

A. Fundamental ideas, themes, and problems of social sciences were responses to the problem of...