The following is a series of excerpts from a discussion of what science is by Richard Alexander (2001).  I have edited it to pertain to Anthropology.  Text in [] was modified or added by me. My apologies for the lengthy note, but it strikes me as an important concern.

Defining Science:  We all want to know how to distinguish truth from fiction (or do we?)

        "Formal science is a process of discovery in which every step is so well explained that it can be retraced to make sure that it was carried out and interpreted correctly.  When every experiment is subject to this test of repeatability, the process of science becomes self-correcting.  This means simply that if we use the verifying methods called scientific, we are more likely to detect and remove errors from our efforts to understand the world.  [Anthropologists] ... need to know which apparent facts really are facts, and not just someone's opinion; they also need to know how to turn the facts ...into an increasingly accurate picture of [humanity] as a whole.

        Self-correction in science happens not merely because people seek the truth and are rewarded for approaching it, but also because people are competitive.  They check out other people's claims.  Repeatability gives every new person on the scene a way of checking the results of everyone who went before.  As a result scientists can sort facts from errors in the publications of their peers and construct new theories or modify old ones, then test them.  In this way they correct and expand the whole analytical picture, regardless of the identity of the authors or the origins of the various parts and pieces of the picture.  They build from existing evidence, by discovering what is wrong or missing, then adjusting and rebuilding the structure of knowledge to new heights.  When all of the techniques and gadgetry are filtered out, science is the best method anyone knows of getting everyday things straight.  Like no other procedure, it relieves us of reliance on the untested, sometimes biased, and occasionally even deliberately misleading assertions of others.

        The results of science... are the continually expanding organized bodies of knowledge that guide our lives on nearly every front.  Sometimes people use the term to mean these organized bodies of knowledge rather than the method by which they are derived.

        It seems obvious that every individual builds a personal "body of knowledge" during her or his lifetime, and uses it to pursue goals of various sorts...  Every individual, no matter how honest, has a personal interest in being right, or in convincing others he or she is right, and a certain probability of being unaware of biases in how her or his "personal science" of procedures and beliefs actually came about.  Only when procedures and their outcomes are shared can they be subjected to the tests of critics or competitors, meaning those who are most likely to discover their shortcomings.  Seemingly correct results that are made available to others for criticism and tests will always tend to be more reliable.  It is no accident that for all aspects of science that affect us in serious ways -- such as drugs that may either save our lives or threaten them, or safety devices in automobiles that might fail -- we demand openness and repeated testing in every evaluating procedure.  This is why the traditional science of academia has become a community proposition, in which new information is not regarded as such until it has been shared openly through publication, so that when necessary the tests can be checked in every detail, and the adequacy of controls determined. "

Why anthropology has not become scientific (enough for some of us; too much, apparently, for others)

        "It is worthwhile to consider briefly the reasons why [anthropology is not always considered] a science, built up gradually from repeatable, controlled experiments.

        First, there is the difficulty that [humans], like all animals, are so complex that we can never understand all the stimuli, and cumulative individual, [cultural,] and species history, that account for how we respond and change during our individual lives.  Because no two [humans] are alike, no [anthropologist] can be sure that anything that has worked for her or him on one sample is going to work the same way on a different sample.

        Second, it will always be difficult to prove that any student or peer employed a method precisely as the instructor applied it.

        These first two reasons come down to the fact that.. human behavior is never going to be predictable enough to... make scientific experiments on it easy... These problems, of "quickly" and "easily," are the plague of the human social sciences (and education)... because of the enormous diversity of human behavior and motivations.

        Third, [some anthropologists do not explain their methods in such a way as to make them transparent, and easily duplicated by students and peers interested in repeating tests.]  It is therefore difficult to build a cumulative body of written knowledge by analyzing and criticizing each [anthropologist's] contribution in detail, separating the correct from the incorrect, giving the reasons, and then substituting better solutions for the ones that seem inadequate.

        Fourth, the expense of time and money of [anthropological investigations makes it difficult to carry out] repeatable controlled tests.  Until [anthropology, especially ethnography] is broken down into units that are tested repeatedly, in the same way each time, there will be no truly scientific analysis.  In lieu of this, we may attempt to compensate for this shortcoming by giving lists of reasons for every procedure and conclusion that we advocate.

        Finally, while many academic scientists are paid by their universities for generating new ideas and spreading (by publication) important and verifiable results, [anthropologists are sometimes rewarded for humanistic performance and academic politics]; they rarely get rich -- or garner sufficient credit -- from publishing the details of their efforts.  Until this situation changes... it is unlikely that [anthropology] can become a science in the traditional sense of a community of openly publishing investigators, all working both cooperatively and competitively to solve a common set of problems. "

--
Mark Flinn
Department of Anthropology
University of Missouri
Columbia, MO 65211
(573) 882-9404

-- 
M. Hubey
-o-o-o-o-o-o-o-o-o-o-o-o-o-o-o-o-o-o-o-o-o-o-o-o-o-o-o-o-o-o-o-o-o-o
The only difference between humans and machines is that humans
can be created by unskilled labor. Arthur C. Clarke

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