Sociology As Pseudoscience

Rafi Farber wrote another worthwhile article on sociology, scientism, statism and more. Here is an excerpt from The Jewish Libertarian, here:

If NASA or SpaceX were to build their hardware based on the methods in sociological studies, everyone who ever blasted off in a rocket would be dead. No hard scientist would ever risk anyone’s life on the basis of a study conducted via the methods of sociology.

But when “social scientists” with certain political opinion conduct studies on minimum wage, gun control, or whatever other political issue and then these studies are presented to politicians who make laws based on them, then logic is thrown out the window and laws are passed. People literally become lab rats, testing the policies of the political elite with their lives. This is incredibly immoral.

Based on pseudoscientific minimum wage studies, low skilled workers will lose their jobs. Based on gun control studies, it will become more difficult for nonviolent people to buy and carry guns. Nevermind the a priori logic that higher minimum wage means a labor surplus AKA unemployment, and never mind the a priori logic that criminals do not follow gun control laws.

Let’s say a bunch of academics study which gun control laws correlated with the lowest gun violence. This could be done, but proves nothing of a causal link. Let’s then say they piece together the “perfect gun control legislation” they have pieced together from their correlative hunt based on what they think are the best aspects of each “successful” gun control law. Then they give it to the politicians and they pass it into law.

That would be like putting astronauts on a rocket engineered by sociologists who conducted studies of rockets that have worked in the past but have no idea why because they are not physicists, and combined what they think are the best features into a new rocket, and then test  it for the very first time when it’s fully loaded with people on the thing.

…

Read the rest.

Would Jews Defend Themselves Without the Military Draft?

The participation of Yeshiva Bachurim in the Six Day War – Yeshivat Hanegev

I recently found an insightful letter, photographed below. The letter was written by Rabbi Yisachar Meir, Rosh Yeshiva of Yeshivat Hanegev. R. Meir was born in Hamburg, though as a young man, he was a Rosh Yeshiva in Morocco with over 300 talmidim. Ultimately he settled in Netivot where he literally transformed a desert wasteland into a town that embodied the essence of Torah.

The letter was written on June 3rd, 1967, a few hours before the state of Israel declared war, on what was to become the six day war. Rav Meir describes in the letter the struggles of having a Yeshiva on the Gaza Border, in the then immigrant settlement of Netivot. He describes the time, as “this time of imminent danger”.

From the letter: “At this crisis in addition to studying day and night and bringing moral comfort to citizens of the town to prevent panic our Talmidim who intend to become the spiritual leaders for the entire Negev, now guard the town at night, render first aid to the citizens, dig trenches and assist the mayor in administration and the importance of this fortress of Torah on the Gaza Border is now recognized by all”.

From Musings of a Jewish Bookseller, here.