Critical realism and scientific inquiry: natural vs social science (Part I: Open and Closed Systems)

Critical realism is a philosophy of social science originally pioneered by Roy Bhaskar. Originally quite useful in laying out a theoretical model of experienced reality that sought to explain why it is even possible to perform scientific research at all, his later work took things in a rather esoteric and, frankly, mystical direction. But the work on critical realism that did not take this "spiritual turn" is quite interesting, especially in how it seeks to explain why the methods of natural science and the methods of social science must be significantly different.

The premise of critical realism is realist: it presumes that there is a reality "out there" that exists independently of our knowledge of it. The means by which we learn about this reality is fallible, affected (but not determined) by our pre-existing theories about it, and different aspects of reality have different methods through which those aspects can be studied. Critical realism, as a theory about scientific inquiry, puts forward some ideas about the different nature of physical and social objects of study, and these ideas demonstrate differences in the way that scientific inquiry ought to work for the natural and social sciences.

Open vs Closed Systems

In natural sciences, the preferred method of study is the laboratory. In the terminology of critical realism, this is referred to as a closed system: a single aspect of reality is to be studied, so parts of reality that are irrelevant to that study are artificially removed so as not to affect the outcome. Even in situations where study isn't specifically in a laboratory, the goal is still much the same: close the system so as to be able to focus specifically on one aspect of external reality. In critical realist terminology, the goal off the closed system is to isolate and prove the existence of a "causal mechanism". In natural science terminology, a causal mechanism is a scientific law.

Closed systems are artificial environments. This becomes problematic when the object of study is social reality. According to critical realist philosophy, most attributes of social reality are not the result of simple, easy to isolate causal mechanisms, but stem directly from the interaction of multiple causes; each cause by itself would not produce even remotely the same effect by itself. Additionally, some effects may be actually negated by other causes, effectively removing evidence of the effect, even though the cause of the expected effect is present and salient. While isolating and testing a single cause-and-effect relationship can be done in some situations, there are a whole host of causal mechanisms that cannot be isolated for study, as the emergent effects of the interactions between those mechanisms forms a vital part of the picture of what is going on. This may not be so bad if there are only a few such interacting mechanisms, but in even the simplest social system, there are a whole host of them. And different social systems and situations can have entirely different causal mechanisms in operation.

To complicate matters even further, social reality is in part defined by its relationship to other parts of that reality, social or otherwise. Even before critical realism, an ongoing criticism of laboratory social science was that social scientific laboratory experiments don't explain what people do, but only what people do when they're in the social environment a laboratory. Trying to close off a social system for study potentially changes how that social system works, which means that any results from such a study cannot readily be generalised to social systems which have not been artificially closed off in the same way.

The goal of social scientific study, similar to attempts in natural science to uncover scientific "laws", is to discover causal mechanisms that explain the observed behaviour of an external reality. But while the natural scientist can observe closed systems and interpret them through deduction, along with some amount of induction (i.e. to consider how generalisable the experimental findings might be), the social scientist has to observe open systems. And while the social scientist may be able to make some deductive conclusions from such observations, they must make make much greater use of inductive reasoning to try and figure out what causal mechanisms are present and salient in a particular social system.  In order to consider what causal mechanisms might even potentially be present, they must also make use of what critical realists call "retroduction": the attempt to explain an aspect of reality by positing what pre-conditions are necessary for such an aspect of reality to exist.

Both induction and retroduction are less reliable tools of inquiry than deduction, As social science must rely on these tools to a greater extent than natural science, the claims of social science tend to be less reliably true than claims made in the natural sciences. Such "laws" as can be posited from these methods of inquiry are also much harder to test across different social systems and situations. This means that the explanations provided by social science are much more tentative than in natural science, and the extent to which findings from the study of one area of social reality can be applied to a different area of social reality is much less clear than in it is in the study of reality undertaken by the natural sciences.

I actually wrote this in an attempt to clarify my own understanding of critical realism's understanding of the differences between natural and social science. It's worked (I think), but it's taken longer for me to explain the first difference between them  than I expected it to. The other main difference - the element that interpretation plays as both something that is applied to findings in all types of scientific study, and as something that is also studied by social science - will have to wait for Part II.

ISG report: the press conference version

My opinion: the content of the Baker-Hamilton report isn't as important in forming policy so much as the political interpretation of that report, particularly how the US-UK governments spin it to make it line up with their future Iraq policy.

I haven't read the report. My impressions - like that of the average Western citizen - currently come from media reporting of it. Here's a transcript of a press conference with Bush and Blair for analysis.

First item of note, Bush has committed to the existence of a Palestinian state, I believe the first US president ever to do so:"In the Palestinian territories, they are working to stop moderate leaders like President Abbas from making progress toward the vision of two democratic states, Israel and Palestine, living side by side in peace and security." Blair echos later on, showing it wasn't a mis-statement: "You are the first president who committed yourself to the two- state solution." I wonder how the Israeli political establishment feels about that?

I've read elsewhere that one of the reasons Blair was so willing to chum it up with Bush was as a way of trying to exert pressure to get a better deal for the Palestinians in Israel/Palestine negotiations. I guess he's succeeded in that, even though it looks like his own political career is basically over now after going against too many of his own constituents on the Iraq war issue.

The vision of the Middle East that Bush/Blair are pushing is pretty blatant: it's evil terrorists and exremists vs good democracy-lovers and moderates. I wonder if those four concepts always line up on two polarised sides like that? Hamas was democratically elected in Palestine after all. And Hezbollah faired pretty well at the polls in the elections in Lebanon.

I get tired of sloganeering in place of actual policy. From reading the conference I get the impression that Bush/Blair's top priority in dealing with the US mid-term electoral smackdown was changing the slogan: "stay the course" and "win hearts and minds" are out, "find a way forward" is in. It is repeated ENDLESSLY! Bush even pushes the "way forward" slogan as a way of avoiding a question:

QUESTION: Why did it take others to say it[that the situation in Iraq is grave and deteriorating] before you've been willing to acknowledge it to the world?

BUSH: You know, in all due respect, I've been saying it a lot[um...has he? I sure haven't heard it]. I understand how tough it is, and I've been telling the American people how tough it is. And they know how tough it is.

And the fundamental question is: Do we have a plan to achieve our objective? Are we willing to change as the enemy has changed?

And what the Baker-Hamilton study has done is it shows good ideas as to how to go forward. What our Pentagon is doing is figuring out ways to go forward -- all aiming to achieve our objective.

The "finding a way to go forward" slogan just doesn't seem to be getting into media headlines the way the "stay the course" slogan did, though.

Reading the tea leaves, and from previous efforts with slogans, I predict that in six month's time, maybe a year's time, we'll still be repeatedly being told that Bush is boldly and confidently "finding a way to go forward", and will continue to be "finding a way to go forward", until it becomes blatantly obvious that the war effort is not "going forward" and is never going to "go forward", because there is no way to "go forward". We'll see how long Bush/Blair's "we're all about finding a way to go forward" posturing can obscure that from the American public.

On negotiation with Syria and Iran, Bush and Blair seem to split. My impression is that Bush really doesn't want it, and is trying to find a way to lay the blame for not negotiating with Iran and Syria at the feet of Iran and Syria:

When people -- if people come to the table to discuss Iraq, they need to come understanding their responsibilities -- to not fund terrorists, to help this young democracy survive, to help with the economics of the country.

BUSH: And if people are not committed -- if Syria and Iran is not committed to that concept, then they shouldn't bother to show up.

I heard this particular excerpt spoken aloud on the radio while riding a taxi. Bush sounded really angry when he was saying this. I really don't know what's going on in his head here, but I'm pretty sure that the idea of negotiating with Evil on Earth isn't something he would ever be willing to do. Please God, let us never have another Evangelical Christian as President of the United States.

Blair's more open to the idea, and has a comment which to my mind sounds like someone who is good at diplomacy, unlike, President Cowboy:

And let me come directly to the Iran and Syria point. The issue, for me, is not a question of being unwilling to sit down with people or not, but the basis upon which we discuss Iraq has got to be clear and it's got to be a basis where we are all standing up for the right principles, which are now endorsed in the United Nations resolutions, in respect of Iraq.

At which point, he points the finger at Iran:

BLAIR: In other words, you support the democratic-elected government, you do not support sectarians, and you do not support, arm or finance terrorists.

Now, the very reason we have problems in parts of Iraq -- and we know this very well down in the south of Iraq -- is that Iran, for example, has been doing that. It's been basically arming, financing, supporting terrorism.

Hmmm. Maybe not that good at diplomacy...

Blair also mentions how "the old Middle East had, within it, the origins of all the problems we see." Are we still talking about magically solving all of that region's deepseated problems through the neoconservative pipedream of creating a "new Middle East" through military might, Mr Blair? Well, to be fair, the UK I think understands that military strength alone is not enough. But to have an echo of the neoconservative utopia-pretensions for the Middle East in Blair's commentary is deeply unsettling.

Last point before I finish off, this comment from Blair:

Its[Iraq's] people can either be presented with a choice between a secular or a religious dictatorship, which is not a choice that any free people would ever choose.

seems way off the mark, and indicates even further his embrace of the wrong-headed idealism of neoconservatism. "Free people" I believe are entirely willing - eager, even - to embrace dictatorship and oppression of people, so long as there's a pretty good chance that they are the ones who get to do the oppressing.

People will not choose to be an oppressee, but we are often all too willing to choose to be an oppressor. Perhaps we might justify it to ourselves with the usual moral equivocations - "they did it to us for so long", "it's not oppression if they deserve what they get", there are others I'm sure - but we would be freely choosing oppression nonetheless. That is a part of human nature that Bush and Blair's grand vision of a "new Middle East" doesn't take into account. That's why this vision simply cannot work.

Conspiracy theories as an attempt to make sense of a senseless world

Why conspiracy theories?

Humanity is driven by narrative. We tell stories about the world around us. We like those stories to make sense. We like those stories to have understandable reasons for playing out the way they do.

First, a lot of the "stories" that occur in reality make no sense, and have no reasons for why they happen the way they do. People are killed for no reason, good people are punished and bad people rewarded, things happen that don't fit any kind of narrative structure

A conspiracy theory provides a narrative. It replaces the terrifying arationality of blind chance with a more reassuring story in which events are under somebody's control. Even if those "somebodies" are mysterious and hidden figures, that's a better option for many than the idea that things "just happen" sometimes, without any ability to understand or influence them.

Second, sometimes we're presented with events which do line up in an understandable narrative - but it's a narrative that contradicts some other narrative about the world we've accepted as true. How to resolve the contradiction? Discard one of the narratives as false. Either the new narrative shows that we've misunderstood how the world works (discard the old), or the new narrative is viewed as not true (discard the new).

But if you "discard the new", a person still wants a narrative to make sense of the events which the discarded narrative described. One way to do this is to construct yet another narrative - but one in which the events are portrayed as lining up with the old worldview rather than contradicting it. So a bomb in Bali becomes a narrative in which the US is an evil mastermind rather than a narrative in which there are people in the world who slaughter the innocent in Allah's name. On some sites on the web, an ignomiously captured and defeated Saddam Hussein was fit into a narrative in which he was a tool of the US all along as a way of avoiding acceptance of a narrative in which his opposition to the US was a whole lot of empty posturing, with zero ability to back it up in action.

Third, sometimes a narrative has an appeal of elegance to it that makes it seem like it MUST be true. The allegation that the US government knew of the 1942 Pearl Harbour bombing in advance fits this mould: it seems so pat that the event which brought the US into World War 2 may have been allowed to go ahead in order to bring about that exact end-goal. But accepting that as true requires ignoring the role that blind chance plays in life. As said above, sometimes things "just happen" - even things like a punishing military strike which actually had the ultimate effect of aiding the Allies by bringing the US into the war.

Ethics, sort of

A review by David Byrne. The documentary "Jesus Camp" portrays what is essentialy a Christian version of a madras - one which teaches "that evolution is being forced upon us by evil Godless secular humanists, that abortion must be stopped at all costs, that we must form an “army” to defeat the Godless influences, that we must band together to insure that the right judges and politicians get into the courts and office and that global warming is a lie". That last one puzzles Mr Byrne. It doesn't puzzle me: they oppose the existence of global warming because their ideological enemies - the "godless Left" - support it. That's all the reason they need.

Anti-Iran protest misdirects LGBT struggle. This article has bounced around the hard left side of the web a bit since the anti-Iran protests on the one year anniversary of the execution of Mahmoud Asgari and Ayaz Marhoni. It weaves a, to my mind, frankly ludicrous conspiracy of neoconservative imperialists trying to misrepresent Asgari and Marhoni's deaths in order to scapegoat an Iran that, while not gay friendly, isn't as hostile as we poor, media-besotted fools have been misled into believing, with the goal being to prime the public for another forcible "regime change" in Iran. Skipping over most of my questions about the accuracy of this alleged scenario - and there are many - I find it especially disconcerting that the article goes so far as to not only condemn "neoconservative imperialism", but praise Iran's handling of gay rights, implying that it is actually better than the US in some ways.

The relationship between the two links is this: they each describe an ideological position - "global warming is a lie" in the Jesus Camp adherents and "Iran is better than the US on gay rights" from the hard left - that is arrived at solely from taking the opposite position to that taken by their ideological opponents. There appears to be no independent thought involved: "godless leftists" say global warming is a serious environmental concern, therefore it must be a lie they cooked up to oppose Christianity somehow; "neoconservative imperialists" say Iran persecutes gay people, therefore they must actually be okay on the issue.

The formulation of "x=bad, therefore NOT x=good" is seductively simple, broadly accepted and completely illogical. It justifies torture in Abu Ghraib by the Right: the prisoners are Evil Terrorists[tm], therefore any action taken against such evil must be good, or at least justifiable. It justifies siding with illiberal regimes in the Middle East by the Left: the Evil US opposes them, so they must actually be good, or at least not really all that bad.

I believe that everyone tries to do right, but are led to do wrong by accepting faulty reasoning that makes wrong appear right to them. I believe one such avenue that leads people to do wrong is the acceptance of the faulty reasoning that anything or anyone that opposes a perceived wrong must automatically be right.