Download or read book Natural Experiments in the Social Sciences written by Thad Dunning and published by Cambridge University Press. This book was released on 2012-09-06 with total page 379 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: The first comprehensive guide to natural experiments, providing an ideal introduction for scholars and students.
Download or read book Natural Experiments of History written by Jared Diamond and published by Harvard University Press. This book was released on 2012-10-01 with total page 290 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Some central questions in the natural and social sciences can't be answered by controlled laboratory experiments, often considered to be the hallmark of the scientific method. This impossibility holds for any science concerned with the past. In addition, many manipulative experiments, while possible, would be considered immoral or illegal. One has to devise other methods of observing, describing, and explaining the world. In the historical disciplines, a fruitful approach has been to use natural experiments or the comparative method. This book consists of eight comparative studies drawn from history, archeology, economics, economic history, geography, and political science. The studies cover a spectrum of approaches, ranging from a non-quantitative narrative style in the early chapters to quantitative statistical analyses in the later chapters. The studies range from a simple two-way comparison of Haiti and the Dominican Republic, which share the island of Hispaniola, to comparisons of 81 Pacific islands and 233 areas of India. The societies discussed are contemporary ones, literate societies of recent centuries, and non-literate past societies. Geographically, they include the United States, Mexico, Brazil, western Europe, tropical Africa, India, Siberia, Australia, New Zealand, and other Pacific islands. In an Afterword, the editors discuss how to cope with methodological problems common to these and other natural experiments of history.
Download or read book Natural Experiments written by Judith A. Layzer and published by MIT Press. This book was released on 2008 with total page 385 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: EBM entails collaborative, landscape-scale planning and flexible, adaptive implementation.
Download or read book Advances in Experimental Political Science written by James N. Druckman and published by Cambridge University Press. This book was released on 2021-04 with total page 671 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Novel collection of essays addressing contemporary trends in political science, covering a broad array of methodological and substantive topics.
Download or read book Microeconometrics written by Steven Durlauf and published by Springer. This book was released on 2016-06-07 with total page 365 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Specially selected from The New Palgrave Dictionary of Economics 2nd edition, each article within this compendium covers the fundamental themes within the discipline and is written by a leading practitioner in the field. A handy reference tool.
Download or read book 175 Amazing Nature Experiments written by Rosie Harlow and published by Random House Books for Young Readers. This book was released on 1992 with total page 0 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: A collection of hands-on nature experiments, activities, and crafts.
Download or read book Biological Emergences written by Robert G. B. Reid and published by MIT Press. This book was released on 2009-08-21 with total page 536 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: A critique of selectionism and the proposal of an alternate theory of emergent evolution that is causally sufficient for evolutionary biology. Natural selection is commonly interpreted as the fundamental mechanism of evolution. Questions about how selection theory can claim to be the all-sufficient explanation of evolution often go unanswered by today's neo-Darwinists, perhaps for fear that any criticism of the evolutionary paradigm will encourage creationists and proponents of intelligent design. In Biological Emergences, Robert Reid argues that natural selection is not the cause of evolution. He writes that the causes of variations, which he refers to as natural experiments, are independent of natural selection; indeed, he suggests, natural selection may get in the way of evolution. Reid proposes an alternative theory to explain how emergent novelties are generated and under what conditions they can overcome the resistance of natural selection. He suggests that what causes innovative variation causes evolution, and that these phenomena are environmental as well as organismal. After an extended critique of selectionism, Reid constructs an emergence theory of evolution, first examining the evidence in three causal arenas of emergent evolution: symbiosis/association, evolutionary physiology/behavior, and developmental evolution. Based on this evidence of causation, he proposes some working hypotheses, examining mechanisms and processes common to all three arenas, and arrives at a theoretical framework that accounts for generative mechanisms and emergent qualities. Without selectionism, Reid argues, evolutionary innovation can more easily be integrated into a general thesis. Finally, Reid proposes a biological synthesis of rapid emergent evolutionary phases and the prolonged, dynamically stable, non-evolutionary phases imposed by natural selection.
Download or read book Multi Method Social Science written by Jason Seawright and published by Cambridge University Press. This book was released on 2016-09-08 with total page 247 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: This book provides the first systematic guide to designing multi-method research, considering a wide range of statistical and qualitative tools.
Download or read book Design of Experiments for Agriculture and the Natural Sciences written by Reza Hoshmand and published by CRC Press. This book was released on 2018-10-03 with total page 456 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Written to meet the needs of both students and applied researchers, Design of Experiments for Agriculture and the Natural Sciences, Second Edition serves as an introductory guide to experimental design and analysis. Like the popular original, this thorough text provides an understanding of the logical underpinnings of design and analysis by selecting and discussing only those carefully chosen designs that offer the greatest utility. However, it improves on the first edition by adhering to a step-by-step process that greatly improves accessibility and understanding. Real problems from different areas of agriculture and science are presented throughout to show how practical issues of design and analysis are best handled. Completely revised to greatly enhance readability, this new edition includes: A new chapter on covariance analysis to help readers reduce errors, while enhancing their ability to examine covariances among selected variables Expanded material on multiple regression and variance analysis Additional examples, problems, and case studies A step-by-step Minitab® guide to help with data analysis Intended for those in the agriculture, environmental, and natural science fields as well as statisticians, this text requires no previous exposure to analysis of variance, although some familiarity with basic statistical fundamentals is assumed. In keeping with the book's practical orientation, numerous workable problems are presented throughout to reinforce the reader's ability to creatively apply the principles and concepts in any given situation.
Download or read book The Laboratory of the Mind written by James Robert Brown and published by Routledge. This book was released on 2005-09-26 with total page 196 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Thought experiments are performed in the laboratory of the mind. Beyond this metaphor it is difficult to say just what these remarkable devices for investigating nature are or how they work. Though most scientists and philosophers would admit their great importance, there has been very little serious study of them. This volume is the first book-length investigation of thought experiments. Starting with Galileo's argument on falling bodies, Brown describes numerous examples of the most influential thought experiments from the history of science. Following this introduction to the subject, some substantial and provocative claims are made, the principle being that some thought experiments should be understood in the same way that platonists understand mathematical activity: as an intellectual grasp of an independently existing abstract realm. With its clarity of style and structure, The Laboratory of the Mind will find readers among all philosophers of science as well as scientists who have puzzled over how thought experiments work.
Download or read book The Ecology of Human Development written by Urie BRONFENBRENNER and published by Harvard University Press. This book was released on 2009-06-30 with total page 349 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Here is a book that challenges the very basis of the way psychologists have studied child development. According to Urie Bronfenbrenner, one of the world's foremost developmental psychologists, laboratory studies of the child's behavior sacrifice too much in order to gain experimental control and analytic rigor. Laboratory observations, he argues, too often lead to "the science of the strange behavior of children in strange situations with strange adults for the briefest possible periods of time." To understand the way children actually develop, Bronfenbrenner believes that it will be necessary to observe their behavior in natural settings, while they are interacting with familiar adults over prolonged periods of time. This book offers an important blueprint for constructing such a new and ecologically valid psychology of development. The blueprint includes a complete conceptual framework for analysing the layers of the environment that have a formative influence on the child. This framework is applied to a variety of settings in which children commonly develop, ranging from the pediatric ward to daycare, school, and various family configurations. The result is a rich set of hypotheses about the developmental consequences of various types of environments. Where current research bears on these hypotheses, Bronfenbrenner marshals the data to show how an ecological theory can be tested. Where no relevant data exist, he suggests new and interesting ecological experiments that might be undertaken to resolve current unknowns. Bronfenbrenner's groundbreaking program for reform in developmental psychology is certain to be controversial. His argument flies in the face of standard psychological procedures and challenges psychology to become more relevant to the ways in which children actually develop. It is a challenge psychology can ill-afford to ignore.
Download or read book Nature Science Experiments written by Sudipta Bardhan-Quallen and published by . This book was released on 2010 with total page 0 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Provides instructions for science experiments that use common materials and teach about a variety of nature-related topics, such as DNA collecting and carnivorous plants.
Download or read book Methods Matter written by Richard J. Murnane and published by Oxford University Press. This book was released on 2010-09-17 with total page 416 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Educational policy-makers around the world constantly make decisions about how to use scarce resources to improve the education of children. Unfortunately, their decisions are rarely informed by evidence on the consequences of these initiatives in other settings. Nor are decisions typically accompanied by well-formulated plans to evaluate their causal impacts. As a result, knowledge about what works in different situations has been very slow to accumulate. Over the last several decades, advances in research methodology, administrative record keeping, and statistical software have dramatically increased the potential for researchers to conduct compelling evaluations of the causal impacts of educational interventions, and the number of well-designed studies is growing. Written in clear, concise prose, Methods Matter: Improving Causal Inference in Educational and Social Science Research offers essential guidance for those who evaluate educational policies. Using numerous examples of high-quality studies that have evaluated the causal impacts of important educational interventions, the authors go beyond the simple presentation of new analytical methods to discuss the controversies surrounding each study, and provide heuristic explanations that are also broadly accessible. Murnane and Willett offer strong methodological insights on causal inference, while also examining the consequences of a wide variety of educational policies implemented in the U.S. and abroad. Representing a unique contribution to the literature surrounding educational research, this landmark text will be invaluable for students and researchers in education and public policy, as well as those interested in social science.
Download or read book The Handbook of Historical Economics written by Alberto Bisin and published by Academic Press. This book was released on 2021-04-21 with total page 1002 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: The Handbook of Historical Economics guides students and researchers through a quantitative economic history that uses fully up-to-date econometric methods. The book's coverage of statistics applied to the social sciences makes it invaluable to a broad readership. As new sources and applications of data in every economic field are enabling economists to ask and answer new fundamental questions, this book presents an up-to-date reference on the topics at hand. Provides an historical outline of the two cliometric revolutions, highlighting the similarities and the differences between the two Surveys the issues and principal results of the "second cliometric revolution" Explores innovations in formulating hypotheses and statistical testing, relating them to wider trends in data-driven, empirical economics
Download or read book Experiments About the Natural World written by Zella Williams and published by The Rosen Publishing Group, Inc. This book was released on 2007-01-01 with total page 25 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: A collection of simple science experiments designed to teach young students about the natural world.
Download or read book Reproducibility and Replicability in Science written by National Academies of Sciences, Engineering, and Medicine and published by National Academies Press. This book was released on 2019-10-20 with total page 257 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: One of the pathways by which the scientific community confirms the validity of a new scientific discovery is by repeating the research that produced it. When a scientific effort fails to independently confirm the computations or results of a previous study, some fear that it may be a symptom of a lack of rigor in science, while others argue that such an observed inconsistency can be an important precursor to new discovery. Concerns about reproducibility and replicability have been expressed in both scientific and popular media. As these concerns came to light, Congress requested that the National Academies of Sciences, Engineering, and Medicine conduct a study to assess the extent of issues related to reproducibility and replicability and to offer recommendations for improving rigor and transparency in scientific research. Reproducibility and Replicability in Science defines reproducibility and replicability and examines the factors that may lead to non-reproducibility and non-replicability in research. Unlike the typical expectation of reproducibility between two computations, expectations about replicability are more nuanced, and in some cases a lack of replicability can aid the process of scientific discovery. This report provides recommendations to researchers, academic institutions, journals, and funders on steps they can take to improve reproducibility and replicability in science.
Download or read book Nature s Experiments and the Search for Symbolist Form written by Allison Morehead and published by Penn State Press. This book was released on 2017-02-27 with total page 467 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: This provocative study argues that some of the most inventive artwork of the 1890s was strongly influenced by the methods of experimental science and ultimately foreshadowed twentieth-century modernist practices. Looking at avant-garde figures such as Maurice Denis, Édouard Vuillard, August Strindberg, and Edvard Munch, Allison Morehead considers the conjunction of art making and experimentalism to illuminate how artists echoed the spirit of an increasingly explorative scientific culture in their work and processes. She shows how the concept of “nature’s experiments”—the belief that the study of pathologies led to an understanding of scientific truths, above all about the human mind and body—extended from the scientific realm into the world of art, underpinned artists’ solutions to the problem of symbolist form, and provided a ready-made methodology for fin-de-siècle truth seekers. By using experimental methods to transform symbolist theories into visual form, these artists broke from naturalist modes and interrogated concepts such as deformation, automatism, the arabesque, and madness to create modern works that were radically and usefully strange. Focusing on the scientific, psychological, and experimental tactics of symbolism, Nature’s Experiments and the Search for Symbolist Form demystifies the avant-garde value of experimentation and reveals new and important insights into a foundational period for the development of European modernism.
