A standard form of citation of this article is:
Moss, Scott and Edmonds, Bruce (2005). 'Towards Good Social Science'. Journal of Artificial Societies and Social Simulation 8(4)13 <https://www.jasss.org/8/4/13.html>.
The following can be copied and pasted into a Bibtex bibliography file, for use with the LaTeX text processor:
@article{moss2005,
title = \{Towards Good Social Science},
author = \{Moss, Scott and Edmonds, Bruce},
journal = \{Journal of Artificial Societies and Social Simulation},
ISSN = \{1460-7425},
volume = \{8},
number = \{4},
pages = \{13},
year = \{2005},
URL = \{https://www.jasss.org/8/4/13.html},
keywords = \{Methodology, Agent Based Social Simulation, Qualitative Analysis; Evidence; Conditions of Application; History of Science},
abstract = \{The paper investigates what is meant by "good science" and "bad science"
and how these differ as between the natural (physical and biological)
sciences on the one hand and social sciences on the other. We conclude
on the basis of historical evidence that the natural science are much
more heavily constrained by evidence and observation than by theory
while the social sciences are constrained by prior theory and hardly at
all by direct evidence. Current examples of the latter proposition are
taken from recent issues of leading social science journals. We argue
that agent based social simulations can be used as a tool to constrain
the development of a new social science by direct (what economists
dismiss as anecdotal) evidence and that to do so would make social
science relevant to the understanding and influencing of social
processes. We argue that such a development is both possible and
desirable. We do not argue that it is likely.},
}The following can be copied and pasted into a text file, which can then be imported into a reference database that supports imports using the RIS format, such as Reference Manager and EndNote.
TY - JOUR
TI - Towards Good Social Science
AU - Moss, Scott
AU - Edmonds, Bruce
Y1 - 2005/10/31
JO - Journal of Artificial Societies and Social Simulation
SN - 1460-7425
VL - 8
IS - 4
SP - 13
UR - https://www.jasss.org/8/4/13.html
KW - Methodology
KW - Agent Based Social Simulation
KW - Qualitative Analysis; Evidence; Conditions of Application; History of Science
N2 - The paper investigates what is meant by "good science" and "bad science" and how these differ as between the natural (physical and biological) sciences on the one hand and social sciences on the other. We conclude on the basis of historical evidence that the natural science are much more heavily constrained by evidence and observation than by theory while the social sciences are constrained by prior theory and hardly at all by direct evidence. Current examples of the latter proposition are taken from recent issues of leading social science journals. We argue that agent based social simulations can be used as a tool to constrain the development of a new social science by direct (what economists dismiss as anecdotal) evidence and that to do so would make social science relevant to the understanding and influencing of social processes. We argue that such a development is both possible and desirable. We do not argue that it is likely.
ER -