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I have a "real" science degree, in physics, from UC Berkeley. There I assisted in research on condensed matter physics. And I'm here to tell you that political science *is* real science. THREAD/
In physics, you don't have to think too much about methods, because you can usually conduct controlled experiments. The laboratory gives you the ability to change just one single causal variable. And to do it again and again and again. 1/
In other words, if you’ve got a controlled experiment, the lab does a lot of the work for you. 2/
When I moved over to political science research, that luxury was gone! You usually cannot conduct controlled experiments in politics (though some people do, and its fascinating!). 3/
But often, neither can astrophysicists, geologists, or macrobiologists conduct controlled experiments. But they are still considered "real" scientists. 4/
And BTW, in medicine, controlled laboratory experiments are considered insufficient...not science enough! You need all sorts of animal and human trials, after the lab work is done. 5/
So controlled experiments are great! But they do not define what "science" is. 6/
Now back to political scientists! Absent labs and experiments, they cannot create their own data and controls. So they have to think a LOT about methodology: which data to gather and compare, and how to go about doing that. 7/
Hence my first shock at entering political science was how much more sophisticated and self-aware they are about getting the science right! Very humbling for a cocky physicist like myself 8/
Sometimes, political scientists are too rigorous! In physics, a theory is often considered "valid" if it gets within a power of 10 of what we observe in nature. Physicists then reduce those error bars to ever smaller amounts. Hence the illusion of perfect certainty. 9/
In political science, the error bars are often huge...but it's still science. But most political scientists reject theories if they are not with 5% of what we observe! Crazy right? 10/
Others argue that political science ain't science because we cannot quantify a lot of political behavior. No numbers = no science! 11/
But lots of physics wasn't quantifiable either (heat, luminosity, force, mass, acceleration, etc.)....until eventually it was. But that didn't stop physics from being science. 12/
So "science" isn't about what you study or how accurate the predictions are or how constant the explanations are over time. 13/
Rather (here comes the dramatic finish), SCIENCE = the public and reproducible application of methodology to explain, predict, and/or control cause-and-effect relationships. AND science evolves via debate and is therefore a consensus amongst its practitioners. 14/
So not only is the study of politics scientific, but science itself is a form of political consensus building. (See what I did there?) 15/
So everyone should go spend some time myth-busting: observe how physics research is really done…and then how politics research is really done. Each side would learn a lot! 16/
FINALLY, if you want to learn about what countries can do to become more competitive in science and technology, then read my book: amazon.com/Politics-Innov… (oh, you knew this would come in somewhere!) FIN/
