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Published online by Cambridge University Press: 04 August 2010
Difference Theory
Are explanations in the social sciences fundamentally (logically or structurally) different from explanations in the natural sciences? Many philosophers think that they are, and I call such philosophers ‘difference theorists’. Many difference theorists locate that difference in the alleged fact that only in the natural sciences does explanation essentially include laws.
For these theorists, the difference theory is held as a consequence of two more fundamental beliefs: (1) At least some (full) explanations in the social sciences do not include laws; (2) All (full) explanations in the natural sciences do include laws. For example, Peter Winch criticizes and rejects Mill's view that ‘understanding a social institution consists in observing regularities in the behaviour of its participants and expressing these regularities in the form of a generalization … [the] position of the sociological investigator (in a broad sense) can be regarded as comparable … with that of the natural scientist’. Daniel Taylor argues that ‘Scientific explanations involve universal propositions … if you think of an historical event and try to imagine explaining it in a way which fulfils these criteria you will see the difficulties at once.' Michael Lesnoff claims that, quite unlike the explanations of physical science, ‘at whatever level of detail a social phenomenon is investigated, the correct explanation may or may not conform to general laws’.
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