Significance and Limitations of Quantitative Sociology

This introduction is concluded with a discussion of some epistemological and operative aspects of the relation between quantitative dynamic sociology and the traditional forms of sociology and political science. 

On the one hand, the transition from a qualitative to a quantitative formulation of a science has always opened new dimensions of thought and argumentation this should also apply to the social sciences. On the other hand, the strong structural differences between the natural and social sciences may lead to the (mutually exclusive) objections either that quantification definitely is not a successful method for the complex problems of sociology and history or that mathematical methods may be successfully applied to these sciences but, in turn, imply the possibility of misuse. 

The standpoint of the authors with respect to these views is a cautious one trying neither to overestimate nor to underestimate the role of application of 

The same increase in precision and simultaneous restriction of meaning takes place in the transition from the word force of colloquial language to the quantitative concept of force in Newtonian mechanics. 

Therefore, in comparing physico-chemical and sociological systems in terms of synergetics the structural and global aspects of dynamic systems are stressed rather than the more detailed aspects of particular models. In this sense it may be better to call the theory of this book semi-quantitative sociology. 

---