Physical and Behavioral Sciences

I view the sciences as existing in two categories, physical and behavioral. 

The physical sciences deal with the physical world and include physics, chemistry, medicine and the subsets of each.  These can be studied separately, but the discoveries in each often collide with the others. Advances in physics are often useful in chemistry.

The behavioral sciences deal with human behavior and include history, economics, politics, literature and the subsets of each. These must be studied together to be useful.  Knowing history without knowing the economics, politics and literature in play is useless. It is essential to be able to understand the circumstances that exist at different points in time.  Knowing when wars occurred isn’t sufficient unless you know what caused these wars.  Knowing what empires failed is insufficient unless you know why they failed. These behavioral sciences have value to predict the outcomes of current events. 

I like physical sciences because they require confirmation of their theories. If science is done honestly, accurately and thoughtfully, more can be learned. 

My curiosity about our human failures prompted me to search for solutions to these failures. I wanted to see if different things would work to avoid failures. Behavioral sciences have value to predict human decisions and the reasons behind these decisions.

Norb Leahy, Dunwoody GA Tea Party Leader