Social science (economics, politics, anthropology, psychology, etc.) is the search for and study of human behavior, both individually and in groups. The social sciences are not exact, meaning they cannot predict with 100% certainty what the behavior of one person or a group of people will be in the future. By way of contrast, physics and chemistry are exact sciences, meaning they can accurately predict the future behavior of matter acting under the mathematical rules of physics and chemistry.

 

The social sciences can never be exact sciences in the same sense that chemistry and physics are for the simple reason that human beings are not purely physical or material entities. In addition to their material body (which can be fully described and understood in terms of physics and chemistry), a human being also has a mind. Mind is not created by matter and is therefore fundamentally incapable of being understood in terms of the mathematical rules of physics and chemistry that govern matter. This distinction between mind and matter is called dualism, and it is the root of all clear thinking regarding human behavior and the social sciences.

 

Human beings behave economically because we have a dualistic experience of God’s creation, of which we are a part. We do not experience ourselves as mere spirits floating about, untouched by the rest of creation, but as true participants and interactors with creation. Likewise, we do not experience ourselves as mere automatons, machines fully controlled by the laws of physics and chemistry, but as true decision makers with minds capable of free will…the ability to direct our participation and interaction with creation. Our interaction with the word external to our minds creates a range of feelings, emotions, pains, and pleasures…these are the true cause of human action studied by the social sciences.

 

The feeling of hunger from lack of food and the alleviation of this hunger when we eat drives us to seek out food. Similar feelings and experiences drive us to search for shelter, clothing, etc. Further, we have an experience of the passing of time which is the origin of our experience of cost. Nothing in life is free. At the very least, the actions you take and experiences you have will cost you time. The time you spend doing one thing cannot be spent doing something else. This is called an opportunity cost, it comes from our experience of the passing of time, and this cost underlies our sense of value in all things. No one is immune to it, not even a person incapable of feeling pleasure or pain.

 

These dualistic experiences of creation, combined with their associated opportunity costs, are the foundation of cost, value, and economic behavior.

 

Our inner knowing that our fellow human beings share similar experiences (our sense of empathy with our fellow human beings, and our sense of empathy for animals), coupled with our inner knowing or sense of the way we “ought” to behave, lays the foundation of morality, ethics, law, and government. This sense of the way we ought to behave is called the natural, moral law. It is God’s law of right and wrong that every human being experiences. Morality and ethics are literally woven into the fabric of who we are. Because human beings have free will, and can willingly choose to ignore and disobey this sense of the way they ought to behave, governments and laws are created by men. Governments and laws do not create right and wrong, they themselves are created in response to our sense of right and wrong. These ideas were captured in the declaration of independence, “…That to secure these rights (not create them but protect them…secure them), Governments are instituted (created) among Men, deriving their just powers from the consent of the governed.” By rights, Thomas Jefferson is referring to experiences human beings ought to have, unencumbered by the ill will or mal-intent of other human beings, such as life, liberty, and the freedom to pursue happiness. These rights need to be protected because they can in fact be taken away. While your true, spiritual life and mind are eternal, your life on this earth can be ended “before your time”. Your liberty and freedom can be taken from you through imprisonment, among other things. To protect these rights, people have created governments, laws, and courts of law.

 

The non material human mind and spirit are the source of free will, the tablet upon which God writes his moral laws of right and wrong, and the foundation of the social sciences.