We study social science because social phenomena affect people’s lives in profound ways. If you want to start with Cantor’s focus—physical illness and death—then social phenomena are tremendously important.
Everyone has experience being human, and so findings in social science coincide with something that we have either experienced or can imagine experiencing. The result is that social science all too often seems like common sense.
Last week we heard the sad news that Professor Elinor Ostrom has died. Her profound contributions to scholarship have been told often since she became the first woman and the first political scientist ever to receive the Nobel Prize for Economics.
On May 9, the House of Representatives adopted a provision that would preclude the National Science Foundation (NSF) from supporting research in the field of political science.
Recently, the US House of Representatives passed off an amendment offered by Representative Jeff Flake (R-AZ) that would prohibit funding for the Political Science Program with the National Science Foundation. If enacted into law, this amendment would set an extraordinary and disturbing precedent in which Congress chooses which scientific disciplines should be funded and not funded within the NSF’s research portfolio.
Across the world in the media, in policy, government discussions, and in our daily lives, there is evidence of social science at work. Whether it’s analysis of a cultural phenomenon like crime, or a major international concern such how climate change leads to changing lifestyles or inequality, social scientists help us understand cultures and behaviours.
There has been a good deal of debate across the web this week following the publication of a report by United States […]
An article in the journal Psychological Science, “The New Statistics: Why and How” by La Trobe University’s Geoff Cumming, has proved remarkably popular in the years since and is the third-most cited paper published in a Sage journal in 2013. The idea of an autonomous vehicle – i.e., a self-driving car – isn’t particularly new. Leonardo da Vinci had some ideas he […] Social sciences can also inform the design and creation of ethical frameworks and guidelines for AI development and for deployment into systems. Social scientists can contribute expertise: on data quality, equity, and reliability; on how bias manifests in AI algorithms and decision-making processes; on how AI technologies impact marginalized communities and exacerbate existing inequities; and on topics such as fairness, transparency, privacy, and accountability. If schools provide the proper support and resources, they will help educators move from anxiety to empowerment when integrating AI into the classroom. An article in the journal Psychological Science, “The New Statistics: Why and How” by La Trobe University’s Geoff Cumming, has proved remarkably popular in the years since and is the third-most cited paper published in a Sage journal in 2013. By carefully interrogating the system of economic incentives underlying innovations and how technologies are monetized in practice, we can generate a better understanding of the risks, both economic and technological, nurtured by a market’s structure.
EXPLORE
Impact
Paper Opening Science to the New Statistics Proves Its Import a Decade Later
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A Milestone Dataset on the Road to Self-Driving Cars Proves Highly Popular
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Why Social Science? Because It Can Help Contribute to AI That Benefits Society
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Innovation
AI Upskilling Can and Should Empower Business School Faculty
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Paper Opening Science to the New Statistics Proves Its Import a Decade Later
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To Better Forecast AI, We Need to Learn Where Its Money Is Pointing
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