Concrete Practicality in the Social Sciences

Social science seems to have a commitment to the “concrete” and “practical” in its study of humanity in a social context.  But is this commitment valid? …Does the rest of reality’s spectrum fall in line with this utilitarian, pragmatic “realism” (as-it-were) and its associated “materialism” of manifest objects or it is as a whole more atomistic in orientation? …

You see, I don’t really accept the notion that chairs, tables, and desks are more “real” than cells, microscopic organisms, and molecular forms (because people can more readily “perceive” these things in their “concrete”, “practical” day-to-day lives).  I don’t accept the notion that radios, televisions, and computers are more “real” than atoms, quarks, other sub-atomic forms [just because people can’t see the latter right in front of themselves with their own two eyes or because they cannot directly encounter, interact, or even perceive these things with the ordinary abilities of their unaided five senses of sight, hearing, touch, taste, and smell].

Furthermore, I do not really accept the notion that large-scale socioeconomic processes like long distance trade and communications, their corresponding networks and linkages, and their significance to wholistic world-systemic (humano-environmental-behavioral-energetic) frameworks (and world history itself) are somehow “less real” than the commodities that are exchanged in such systems or the localized activities that take place on a microeconomic level of business dealings, accounting, and personal-localized finances. And, I believe the same rule applies with regard to communications in world-systems. That is to say, I don’t believe the linkages and minute structures of a world-systemic framework are any “more real” than the system itself and the large-scale process that take place within it.  There’s no reason why the so-called more “practical,” “concrete” elements of our human lives and individual-localized experiences should be more “real” than any of the other phenomena I’ve made reference to here in this discussion. 

I accept even less the idea that experimentation and empirical-methods-in-general somehow “establish” the reality of: (macro-cosmic phenomena like supernovas, black holes, and so on), (biological phenomena, such as cells, cellular structures microscopic organisms like bacteria and amoebas, and biochemical substances like DNA), (molecular, atomic, and sub-atomic forms of matter), and (the very principles of “matter”, “energy”, “forces”, “solids”, liquids, gases, and so forth that Science understands as comprising some of the parameters that constitute the physical universe).  In short, experimentation may uncover and discover these “scientific” realities of the cosmos, but it cannot “establish” them to be realities or make them any more real than they already are.  That is to say, a dead frog’s innards - that a student removes in biology class (in the classic lab exercise we’ve probably all done back in high school or perhaps in college) – is no more real now than it was before, now that the young man or woman has pulled the organs out and “seen” them and “felt” them for themselves.  The organs are still the organs, they’re as real as they were before the student came in contact with them.  Experimentation cannot make them any more “real”, either in terms of a systematic “proof” or even in terms of an individual’s experience.  Just because I’ve tasted a chocolate cake doesn’t mean it’s is any more “real” for my having tasted it or eaten it.  Its reality in itself  (the fact that “it is”)(whatever this may truly mean) is a thing apart from my mind, perceptions, and senses getting an impression of it.  In other words, if I taste a chocolate cake, my tasting it cannot prove or even really contribute to the veracity of its being “real.”

The old saying says “SEEING IS BELIEVING”/”I’ll BELIEVE IT WHEN I SEE IT.”  Or, if we rephrase the saying, this cliché becomes “IT WILL BE REAL WHEN I SEE IT”/”WHEN I SEE IT, then IT WILL BE REAL.”  What an unfortunate statement; unfortunate because it confuses sense & perception with both (proof/verification of something being real) and (our individual experience of certain things versus our non-experience of other things, attempting to ‘weigh them against reality’ or better said ‘weigh reality against them’ - and more to the point – equate whether something’s real-or-not with individual experience + sense + perception.  So, to cite another example, if “I”can’t see or hear what’s conspiring currently on the floor of the floor of the New York Stock Exchange then it’s somehow it’s less real because I’m not able to see/hear/feel it?  Because “I” (as-an-individual) (& in-my-experience) can’t?  This makes no sense …

Hence, if the senses are no more a measure of what’s truly real (i.e., they can’t establish the proof of something’s “reality” or even the contributing verification of such) and what we term as being “concrete” and “practical” in our daily experience is itself no more “real” than those parts of our universe that we can’t perceive without special instrumentation and empirical methods, then what’s to say these perceptions and senses themselves are any more accurate when we get our initial readings/data in our experiments?  What’s to say, besides prediction and comparing results of similar studies and the information such inquiries provide, that our readings and observations (wh/ are functions of our senses/perceptions/& mental activity) are accurate?  In other words, when we engage in empirical study, what’s to say in our work that what we call the “concrete” and “practical” is somehow the more solidly “real” than those elements of the cosmos – quarks, protons, electrons, photons, singularities, atoms, and even molecules – that seem to be less so?

Based on either a general scientific perspective or more specifically a social science interpretation via World Systems Theory, how do we answer this question?  What do you all think? … Isn’t what we call the “concrete” and “practical”  (which seems to be more a function of modern thought) just as much culturally and historically-conditioned as any other concept by a people’s collective system of meaning, and therefore just as meaningless in establishing a scientific criterion or measure of something being “real” – be our study in the natural/physical sciences or in the social sciences?  What are your opinions on this matter? 

I look forward to reading your responses.

All the best!

Luke R.

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