> if you stop doing social science (which isn't a science) then what do you do when people turn out to need social scientists? Aren't we interested in having a balanced, happy society?

The implicit claim that you're making is that state funded academic studies of social science are important for a balanced, happy society. But where's the evidence that this is the case? Someone could argue (and at times have) that the state should fund religious institutions because they're necessary for a happy society. But some would counter that religion isn't necessary for a happy society, while others might counter that religion is important for a happy society but that it's unnecessary for the state to support it.

If we're making the claim that these things should be funded by the state, and that they're important for a happy society, then those claims should be backed up by some fairly strong evidence.

So, the problem with these types of arguments is the evidence is often obscured by shell games with labels, or ignoring the elephant in the room.

My research sort of straddles statistics, epidemiology, neurogenetics, and social sciences, and my impression is there's a great deal of stuff that doesn't become interesting to people until it involves social sciences. I say this from the perspective of someone who often wants the math and whatnot to be more appealing to people when it's not.

You can take some model, or method, or advance, and if it sits somewhere in a wetlab or physics building, no one cares. But if you make it about relationships, or money, or happiness, or children's social development, it becomes interesting.

The value is so built into the fabric of these things we don't even recognize it half the time. It becomes another physics grant, or engineering grant, or medicine grant. They're social science in nature, but god forbid you call it that because it's seen as soft or irrelevant even though that's the thing people are actually most interested in. People don't give a damn about memory models in bare-metal programming, or electrical engineering, but they do care about being able to talk to their relatives on the other side of the globe.

The other thing that always strikes me as odd about these discussions and decisions is we as people are, well social beings. So do you want to leave the study of our social behavior and experiences to ... what exactly? Religious theory? Astrology? What else is there than scientific study of psychosocial phenomena? Are you saying that social phenomena shouldn't be studied at all? That it should be studied nonscientifically?

Within the social sciences there's a well-known phenomenon of people coming in from elsewhere and thinking they can solve all the problems because they're physicists, or chemists, or whatever, and that you can just slap whatever paradigm works in that to study psychological or socioeconomic phenomena. It's seen as naive, and it inevitably fails because it doesn't scale up to the population level, or doesn't address the difficulties of the real-world phenomenon as it is, or whatever.

There's also the problem that some of the biggest contributions of social science aren't what people think they are. Modern meta-analysis and preregistered replication research both came from psychological research for example (meta-analysis from clinical and educational psychology), and I doubt people realize that. But it's widespread in biomedical research, and should probably be applied more widely in many other fields. In certain ways it's more scientifically rigorous than what happens in a lot of biophysical science. But it goes against the stereotype of what "psychosocial research" is.

Stop arguing sense. They will find out in due time. All technological advance eventually come down to modifying human behavior, individually or collectively. When we de-priortize ways to study and better understand human behavior collectively, we are stealing from our long-run selves.

All developed countries are struggling with fertility declines. If all you have are economists, they will suggest economic solutions (i.e. offer incentives, lower costs of parenthood). A sociologist will tell you that alone won't work, you need to create a culture where child-raising is the social norm and is cool. Ally that with economic incentives and maybe we stand a chance.

But don't worry. Let's get rid of social sciences. My people have a saying "a person who is not knowledgeable about why a fence exists, should be wary of removing the fence"

L

So how do you get that evidence?

Shouldn't this be asked of someone making the claim, and not of someone who says that the claims should be backed up by evidence? If someone claims that Apple cider vinegar cures cancer, they should be the ones providing the evidence. You shouldn't be asking people who didn't make the claim how to find evidence for it.

Though after decades of funding the social sciences I would have hoped that someone would have looked into whether or not they're actually accomplishing anything. If not, it would speak volumes.

I think you didn’t get the question. If we were to seek that evidence, who would turn to?

Economist! /s

I think you’re missing their very good point. ”Social science” is how you get the evidence.

As I mentioned previously, if after decades of funding social science we don't have an answer to that, then it's simply incorrect to claim that continuing to fund social science is going to give us an answer.

If you want to argue that we should put into funding a specific project to look into the benefits of social science, you can do that.

But saying that we should do widespread funding of a discipline in order to find out if a discipline is actually worth it, and then after decades of doing widespread funding of that discipline you say "well, I don't have any evidence that it's worth it, because you have to keep finding it to find the evidence," is, to be frank, bizarre.

Imagine if we did this for other fields. We putting funding into homeopathy for decades. Someone comes along and makes the claim that we need to continue doing this, in order for society to be healthy. Someone asks what the evidence for this is, and the reply is "we have to keep funding homeopathy to get the evidence!"

The difference being for homeopathy we actually do have the research priving it's a scam whereas for social studies we only have the research showing that some proiminet studies are a scam (or are unpreplicatable for other reasons). That's a far cry from "social studies are proved not to benefit society at all" and cutting all funding for them.

Well, we don't have studies proving it's a scam. We have papers that show that specific homeopathic remedies don't work. That doesn't disprove homeopathy in general. So - we should fund it until funding it is fully disproven from all angles?

There are many questions we may want to ask about society. For example, "Does funding social sciences make a society happier?" is one of them. Social sciences give us the general capability to ask those questions and understand the answers. Whether you see value in that is of course up to you.

(I never said, claimed or argued any of the things you mention in your reply, so I'm not addressing those points)

I think you're both still talking past one another.

> Social sciences give us the general capability to ask those questions and understand the answers.

This is almost tautological depending on where those fields lie between physics and philosophy.

Chemistry is just applied Physics. Biology is just applied Chemistry. Neurology is just applied biology.

But psychology (and by extension, sociology) is firmly on the Philosophy side of the fence in my uneducated opinion.

Where is the evidence that social sciences give us the capability to ask those questions and understand those answers? I would argue that only I have that ability and instead you should direct that money towards me.

The evidence is in the typical academic outputs: textbooks, published articles, monographies, etc.

Well, you could ignore the naysayers and divert hundreds of billions of dollars into funding a vast social science apparatus for decades, and then see if the results have clearly made people happier in ways that couldn't have been done without the state.

Which is what has been done, and why NZ is defunding it.

Ah, but that wasn't true social-science research :)

I'm absolutely not for these cuts, and I believe that social sciences are important. Nonetheless, the politicization and radicalization of social sciences in the last 15 years is undeniably problematic, and plays a role in the balcanization of society. Academic detachment from reality is a problem even smart academics can joke about, as they know it is somewhat of a true trope. The ones that certainly laugh about that the least are a lot of social scientists, in my experience. They are also often very far from considering the complexity of economics in their fields of studies, and that's also an issue. Sprinkle some identity politics dust on it, and you have the perfect recipe for disaster, offering conservatives and anti-progressists your academic head on a silver platter. I believe that social sciences (yep, it's a generalization, I know...) have failed to play academic politics properly in the last two decades, mostly due to radicalization of ideas and topics.

The irony is that it's the same non-academic organisations that are deciding those topics to get funded and who now are deciding to cut the funding.

Academics have to apply for funding and one big criteria over the years has been it's "social impact".

So there's three things. The politics of those in charge of funding. The change of academia to only allow research deemed socially useful (utilitarianism). And the third is the co-adoption of researchers themselves.

As politics change the response should be to change the criteria and agenda of funding to make it less radical not to cut the funding.

Furthermore these organisations have, over the years enlarged and entrenched themselves. This is why millions are spent on thousands of people to monitor DEI of the academics.

Implicit in the request for research with social impact was that it should be positive social impact, as perceived by most people not just one partisan wing.

> As politics change the response should be to change the criteria and agenda of funding to make it less radical

If it were that easy it'd have been done already. You can't tell radical activists to just be reasonable.

Not particularly important, but it is 'balkanization' with a k.

> social science (which isn’t a science)

This is literally true in the sense that social science isn’t a science because it encompasses numerous sciences, but it is not true if the intent to say “social science (which isn’t science)”.

(Social sciences may often require hypothesis testing in statistically-controlled experiments or have other practical limitations on experimentations because they address phenomenon that cannot easily and/or ethically be experimented with as much freedom as one would want in a laboratory, but then those issues exist for some phyiscal and life sciences as well.

> (Social sciences may often require hypothesis testing in statistically-controlled experiments or have other practical limitations on experimentations because they address phenomenon that cannot easily and/or ethically be experimented with as much freedom as one would want in a laboratory

Social sciences have deeply problematic methodologies and the IRB is a cancer that's no longer about ethics but gatekeeping.

It's just memetic in many ways. The bar for statistical relevance is low across all fields hard and soft, it used to be you could parade Cyril Burt out but we're well beyond a point where he's different to any discipline, social or not.

I should have resisted the temptation to repeat the slur.

Demographics couldn't be more important in a world dominated by millions of refugees. Or, for example, we'll be arguing about vaccines forever and having people who study why that is, is important. I think social sciences should be funded properly.

I think NZ will regret this, just like the UK lived to regret Thatcher de-funding Russian studies, only to fail to seize advantages in the end of the cold war: insufficient people with skills facing Russia.

I'm a computer scientist (which isn't a science)

I'm a Kiwi, but living abroad now. I have mixed views on this announcement, I do agree with the basic sentiment that NZ is broke and has been for a long time. That means 'decisions' on public spending need to be in the national interest, for the current govt, that translates into 'fiscal interest'. That said, cutting "all" govt funding to social sciences is not the right call. I would have though that a smaller budget and stricter set of criteria for funding would have been a better approach. NZ has always had a 'fringe element' looking for funding for dubious research of limited value, but de-funding everything that is not of economic value feels like the wrong approach.

I just can't find any reference to Thatcher cutting Russia studies, it's quite a strange thing to imagine given that she presided over the peak of the cold war. Could you help? I know that Blair closed great chunks of the foreign office and that has seriously impacted the UK's ability to represent its interested abroad, but that's not just Russia.

I find it hard to imagine what the UK could have done in terms of taking advantage at the end of the cold war. I mean maybe if we had all moved to Germany then we would have been well placed to get the benefits that those folks got. On the other hand we did, eventually, get to shut down the British Army of the Rhine which saved a lot of money, and a bunch of skilled labour from eastern europe migrated to the UK as well. What potential benefits from a Russian engagment could the UK have realised?

Possibly this was a slur against her made at the time but I was told this as a young student at uni in 79-82 window.havw a read of https://www.epoch-magazine.com/post/the-rise-and-fall-of-sov... for context.

During the initial rapprochement years British banking was nothing like as present in the Russian denationalisation and the emergence of the oligarch kleptocracy. The decision of the Russian elites to invest in London came much much later.

> what do you do when people turn out to need social scientists?

I’m usually supportive of fundamental research where there are no specific benefits known ahead of time, because the track record of fundamental research is pretty good in terms of eventual payoff - but some of the social sciences are definitely on the soft end of this, and the examples given in the article don’t seem to make a strong case for being something NZ needs, when considered alongside all the other things NZ needs.

I strongly disagree.

One of the examples mentioned studies population changes during NZ's colonization. It's part of Maori-led research. Such research provides a better understanding of the history and culture of the indigenous population of NZ. In turn, this research contributes towards contextualizing and enriching relationships between communities within the larger modern NZ society with respect to the economic and political plight of these groups.

The overarching theme here is identity. Both on an individual level, as well as a community level. Our shared past, heritage, traditions, stories, relationships with others,... are all what make us "us". And social sciences are paramount within that never-ending debate.

In a way, defunding research which studies particular indigenous communities within society is tantamount to effacing those communities from a larger national historical identity. However, doing so will never end that drive communities have to remember and to assert their own history and identity.

That's why studying how the arrival of Europeans in New Zealand has had an demographic, political, economical, cultural effect on the indigenous population definitely is fundamental research. And an important one at that.

Do you want to get social sciences defunded? Because this is how you get social sciences defunded. The academic obsession with identity is completely toxic.

I don't get why NZ is 'fucked'. One of the richest people on the planet, with amazing nature, very, I mean absolutely terrific strategical location. Democracy. Big friends with US. I could go on for a long time.

Is it 'fucked' in same way some folks from say Staten island or New Jersey say its fucked since they are not central Manhattan so everything else is subpar or wrong? I don't think rich people want to have their SHTF backup location in shithole, you have prettier cheaper places all over the world, yet folks want to go there.

If you meant there are issues, sure they are everywhere, even in nordics or Switzerland. Not an interesting nor helpful position.

"Senior" software engineer salary in NZ is maybe $120k NZD (about $70k USD), median house in Auckland or Wellington (which is where you need to be to earn even that much) is about a million NZD. Cost of living is very high.

Maybe f*cked is hyperbole but if you don't already own property it is quite difficult to sustain a reasonable standard of living (let alone "get ahead") as a wage earner.

I love NZ but it didn't make economic sense to stay.

A million NZD plus however much you spend on fixing it up so it doesn't make you sick or kill you in an earthquake. And after that you're stuck working in a country which outside of a few very niche areas is a complete dead end where tech's concerned. I miss my family, but couldn't bear the thought of continuing my career there.

Sounds about the same as the UK ... but that is a median 1 bed flat in London.

What on earth do you mean by: "One of the richest people on the planet"?

National have started an "austerity" programme, tens of thousands of civil servants have been laid off, housing is disgustingly expensive (and the quality of it is awful as well), the price of goods and food is pretty expensive (even dairy products that are produced here are often more expensive than in Europe).

The location's only great strategically if you ignore the (huge) future earthquake potential.

Cities like Wellington have also had a chronic lack of infrastructure investment, so there are HUGE issues with water / sewage leaks - pretty much every week there's a new water main leaking somewhere in the city.

(Have lived here for 10 years, and am looking to return to Europe - things are going downhill pretty fast here IMO).

Your reply is rife with logical fallacies that has little to nothing to do with anything originally raised.

> People want paradise and absolute success on all fronts of existence, now, I mean right fucking now or they are losers.

Complete straw man argument.

> I have trouble having sympathies with rich folks complaining that they can’t buy central houses in main capital city right out of pocket from first 2 years salary

Ad hominem. Try engaging with the actual point rather than resorting to thinly veiled personal attacks.

> Same situation all over the world

False equivalence.

> Be prepared half of folks will be either very welcoming of Russian attack on Europe

> EU green deal is killing European (not only) automotive industry right now

This bizzare tangent has absolutely nothing to do with addressing or refuting any of the specific points made about NZ's economy, infrastructure or cost of living.

> You should travel a bit around the world, you would then understand how high NZ stands globally

First of all, they have. They are an immigrant. Not to mention its an appeal to relative privation. You can't just dismiss legitimate criticisms by claiming they are not valid because worse problems exist elsewhere.

> Be prepared half of folks will be either very welcoming of Russian attack on Europe… Tens of millions of immigrants and refugees, you see them everywhere

Appeal to emotion.

> People want paradise and absolute success… it’s an immature approach

You're projecting.

> You should travel a bit around the world, you would then understand how high NZ stands globally

They come from Europe to NZ - that is literally travelling the world.

There's a reason a large proportion of kiwis move to Australia and not the other way around.

We are at the age of engineering human behavior and societal engineering is in the realm of STEM. social science is like alchemy in an age where chemistry already exists

Every time you interview a user or set up a survey to determine customer preferences, you're using techniques developed from social sciences.

All the video games and online gambling trying to maximize micro transactions and revenue are too.

Advertising ...

Mostly you are doing statistics, which is math. Social science (when it is the good thing) also uses statistics to get answers to questions.

> We are at the age of engineering human behavior and societal engineering is in the realm of STEM.

We are definitely not. I'm saying that as someone researching how to use computational methods to model human behavior. We know very little about human behavior/mind/brain or society at that level.

This has to be most arrogantly ignorant statement I have read in a long long long while. I just have to imagine this was sarcasm.

I guess this is itself a social science experiment, namely to see if there is a link between doing social science and having "a balanced, happy society" :)

I wonder how much funding will be needed to observe the results?

> if you stop doing social science (which isn't a science) then what do you do when people turn out to need social scientists? Aren't we interested in having a balanced, happy society?

Do social scientists actually produce the knowledge required to create a balanced, happy society?

is that like saying: if we get rid of all the artists to fight a war is the country really worth saving?

That's the apocryphal Churchill quote.

Get right-wingers in, this is what happens to a country. Right wing politics is bad socially, and economically, unless you are already stinkin-rich

> what do you do when people turn out to need social scientists?

avail yourself of the thousands still at work in other allied societies

the world has more people at work pursuing pure academics than ever, and they are sharing their work