as you know, I’m always in the mood for a fundamental discussion 😉 The reason that I explicitly mentioned empirical science, is not to get into the debate whether or not disciplines as philosophy are to be regarded as science.

I do think that it is possible to do observations that are interesting for social studies. Indeed, the level of accuracy is lower than in physical science (however, on what scale?) and it is not possible to do real experiments, controlling for all variables. However, it is possible to control all conceivable variables. Thereby, I do think that many of the social science articles I read are indeed testing hypotheses (and sometimes rejecting them) in a Popperian sense. Perhaps the level of uncertainty is indeed larger than with sciences that do experiment.

But, I do not think that the discussion regarding what an explanation is has anything to do with observations. As Jasper points out, I’m trying to make a logical argument, not one regarding the validity of observations. Science proposes explanations, which are hypothetical in nature and empirically tested. I do not think that we should be more or less tolerant regarding the issue what the nature of a proper explanation should be. The discussion regarding tolerance is only interesting when it comes to testing the explanations.

But that isn’t really what this is al about, empirical science. I don’t think the problem concerns something like an objective truth. It is just that saying things like ‘small differences lead to conflict’ is not a explanation for the fact that small differences lead to conflict. That is like saying that ever time we eat icecream, we get a cold tongue without saying that it is so, because ice has a temparature below zero, which is far below the normal temperature of a human tongue… Etc..

Of course, we can find situations where small differences lead to conflict between groups, but as I said, because there might not be and conflict between other groups with small differences between them, this doesn’t explain anything. The most we can say is that there seems to be a correlation, which isn’t the same as an explanation.

I raise the question because ultimately, if you become real popperian, it is not possible to do science regarding social events. You can never control for all variables. So you must allow some level of non-objective decision, for example regarding what is big and what is small at evaluating a real social event.

So, even if I in general agree that the goal of being as objective as possible is desirable, I would be more or less tolerant of alternative definitions of what an explanation is…

The problem is, I think, that in this case the correlation can’t even become an explanation because there aren’t enough factors determining how the correlation came to be seen in the first place. I hope I guess correctly when I say, that they probably took whatever they needed from the empirical world to show the correlation, without putting them in context. The context being, that conflict can probably arise when differences are very big too and, as you said, may not arise when the differences are very small. If you have enough examples of similar instances, like small differences leading to conflict, then this doesn’t prove that small differences between groups leads to conflict.

I know, this is like pouring salt into an open wound. But these kind of supposed explanations ask for such obvious complaints. Hopefully, in some distant future, anthropologists will understand the difference between a correlation and an explanation too. That’s all I can say about the subject.