Fuzzy thinking in sociology

Abstract

The well-known distinction between soft and hard science cuts a sharp line of demarcation between hard and soft facts of scientific studies. Physics deal with precise hard facts characteristically whereas social sciences are confronted with imprecise soft social facts because social facts are notoriously vague, interpretative facts of meaning. Therefore Fuzzy logic seems to fit perfectly the needs of social scientist that look for mathematical precise models to deal with vague, imprecise data [52]. In this contribution we discuss the usefulness of Fuzzy logic for social sciences in general, and especially sociology. In a first step we summarize some fundamentals of "fuzzy thinking" [10] for social scientist. This will lead to the discussion of the need of fuzzy thinking in action theory, systems theory, modernization theory and empirical research. We discuss the advantage of fuzzy thinking for action theory and social systems theory at length whereas the discussion of fuzzy thinking in modernization theory and empirical research falls short. Modernization theory and empirical research just function as further examples for the need and usefulness of fuzzy thinking. © 2009 Springer-Verlag Berlin Heidelberg.