Archeology is not science

[brianeyci]

1. Is its objective to study?

2. Does it use the scientific method and all its principles (objectivity, Occam's razor, etc)?

Why aren't people reading Mike's post?

Objectivity and using the scientific method are not sufficient to define an academic science. Or else English can be a science. Yes, you can teach humanities objectively, believe it or not. Or engineering is a science.

Your method to decide is not the best. It results in watering down the word. I see no need to call something hard or soft science, or differentiate between things which are more science or less science. It seems to be weasel words, used by fields which want to attach more credibility than they deserve. For example, Park Science like Durandal mentioned: what the fuck is that?

It's high time people like Einstein, Hawking and theoretical scientists get separated from fodder and get the respect they deserve. It's high time people realize why Einstein was Man of the Century.

[Darth Wong]

Even the formulation of theories is routinely done in engineering; the line between the development of a new fabrication method and a scientific discovery is often quite blurred. And yet engineering remains firmly categorized as "not science", which always suggested to me that the definition of a "true science" requires a lack of involvement in direct applications.

Could you elaborate on the sort of thing you're referring to?

Well, a simple example would be the modeling of micro-structural behaviour of materials: something that began as an engineering exercise and was later given the name "materials science" even though it remains an area of investigation which is almost entirely conducted by engineering researchers (who are themselves not considered scientists).

The same is true of many manufacturing methods. Suppose one is developing a new method for assembling metallic objects through high-speed vapour deposition: predictive models are necessary regarding the microscopic activities during this process, the rates at which they will occur, and the resulting micro-structure. It looks an awful lot like a science, but because it has a direct commercial application, it is not regarded as one.

If the subject of those theories fall under other sciences rather than engineering proper, then the following dilemma may serve as a counter-argument. Consider a physicist developing a new mathematical technique. If in doing so he is motivated by solving some physical problem or increasing understanding of a physical theory, this may be taken to mean that he's still behaving like a scientist, and only secondarily a mathematician. If he has no such motivation, then he is acting like a mathematician and not a scientist. For an engineer, it would be analogous: an engineer that investigates toward a new theory ordinarily falling under a scientific field is either only secondarily a scientist or is not doing engineering, depending on circumstance. In either situation, there is no indication that engineering itself is a science. [*]

On the other hand, if those theories are genuinely about engineering (methodologies, general theories of design, etc.?) rather than being parasitic on other sciences, it seems that forbidding the study of its own methods only precludes characterizing archaeology as a science of excavation and preservation of artifacts.

Not being an engineer, I may be suffering from a failure of both knowledge and imagination here, in which case please correct me, but the above cases appear to cover everything.

A lot of engineering research seems to occupy a middle ground. Studies of methodologies also tend to involve studies of the nature of things, such as the behaviour of materials under certain conditions. When a researcher attempts to create a form of glassy metal, he is researching a manufacturing method, but he is also expanding our knowledge of the nature of inter-atomic bonding. However, as you say, it could be considered a 'secondary" priority; he is primarily attempting to develop a product with potential commercial applications.

[B5B7]

Engineering is older than science. There used to be natural philosophy that became science. I have created this little fable of what "could" have happened:
500 years ago - a noble is speaking to his engineer friend: "I am starting a new university, and I want you to be head of the School of Engineering. The schools of Philosophy, Mathematics, Natural Philosophy and Engineering will all be under the Department of Philosophy."
Engineer: "We aren't stinking philosophers!"
Noble: "OK, we will make Engineering a separate department."
200 years later:
Uni Chancellor to head of engineering: "We are doing a reorganization. We're creating a new super-department called Science, and putting Natural Philosophy and Engineering in there."
Engineer: "Screw that, let the natural philosophers call themselves scientists. we're engineers."
Chancellor: "OK, engineering will remain a separate calling."

[Fingolfin_Noldor]

Engineering is older than science. There used to be natural philosophy that became science. I have created this little fable of what "could" have happened:
500 years ago - a noble is speaking to his engineer friend: "I am starting a new university, and I want you to be head of the School of Engineering. The schools of Philosophy, Mathematics, Natural Philosophy and Engineering will all be under the Department of Philosophy."
Engineer: "We aren't stinking philosophers!"
Noble: "OK, we will make Engineering a separate department."
200 years later:
Uni Chancellor to head of engineering: "We are doing a reorganization. We're creating a new super-department called Science, and putting Natural Philosophy and Engineering in there."
Engineer: "Screw that, let the natural philosophers call themselves scientists. we're engineers."
Chancellor: "OK, engineering will remain a separate calling."

Actually, Engineering didn't enter universities till rather late. It was largely in the hands of guilds like the Freemasons and so forth. The Sciences like Mathematics and Physics (which are actually quite old mind you, all the way to the Greek Philosophers), were in the universities from the start. It used to be the curriculum included theology, the Classics, and two others (I forgot what they are) and to an extent Mathematics and Physics.

[Straha]

I believe, and correct me if I'm wrong, the Original Post is taking issue with the "Processual Method" school of archaeology which is bullshit. To quote directly from an Archaeology textbook under a heading bluntly titled "Archaeology as a Science":

The objects that archaeologists discover, on the other hand, tell us nothing directly in themselves. It is we today who have to make sense of these things. In this respect the practice of archaeology is rather like that of the scientist. The scientist collects data (evidence), conducts experiments, formulates a hypotheses (a proposition to account for the data), tests the hypothesis against more data, and then in conclusion devises a model (a description that seems best to summarize the pattern observed in the data). The archaeologist has to develop a picture of the past, just as the scientist has to develop a coherent view of the natural world. It is not found ready made.

Archaeology, in short, is a science as well as a humanity. That is one of its fascinations as a discipline: it reflects the ingenuity of the modern scientist as well as the modern historian.

Taken from Page 12 of "Arhcaeology: Theories Methods and Practice by Colin Renfrew". Emphasis as is.

A large portion of the archaeological schools form around the idea that with the proper process you can come to a "correct" interpretation of a site every time, meaning that the real question is finding the process. I've let my disdain for that idea slip through but it's pretty much exactly what they hold. It's bullshit. Not only is the idea of a universal archaeological process bullshit on its face but the idea that there is somehow a "correct" interpretation of a site is simply absurd (I'm staring straight at you Marxist Archaeology.) What Archaeology can do, should do, is discover facts and offer a historical interpretation of those facts.

[Durandal]

Sorry to computer science students, but computer science is not really a science unless you're on the cutting edge, the same that software engineering is not really engineering.

Why does being on the "cutting edge" matter? Computer science models algorithms, though since those algorithms only exist in an abstract sense (like numbers), it's generally understood to be a field of mathematics. And academically, apparently, maths are now sciences. Carnegie Melon's math department says as much. Is it really correct? No. But the computer science department would inherit the properties of the overall math department. Having the word "science" is one of those properties.

And if you take it that computer science is not really science, then software engineering cannot be engineering, since it does not apply science. It's basically applied math. Some co-workers and I were talking about this and settled on the title "applied discrete mathematician" for our proper job titles.

The defining aspect of science seems to be the possibility of perfection or complete understanding, while for application there's no such lofty pinnacle.

That's the exact opposite of science's defining aspect. Science's defining aspect is that it is always open to change because there can always be a better model. Science is an endeavor in approximation, not perfect understanding.

[Dooey Jo]

What about medical science? It was said that detectives apparently are not scientists because they are only working on solving single cases. Well, doctors do both. They solve single cases and perform research which can be applied elsewhere.