The biggest problems I see are that making sausages remains a messy business, and that, as a rule, the more familiar people are with books the less familiar they are with people. In many professions that is a trivial matter, but it is huge in government. Not only in serving the publics needs and desires (which often conflict,) but in getting the opportunity in the first place. I still think Stevenson and Gore would have been light years better presidents than Ike or Bush, but their relative ability is irrelevant since neither could get the job. Patton was a better general than Ike, too, but a grossly inferior politician, which is why he went from his superior to his subordinate (in the middle of the war that proved him our greatest general, no less.)


As noted elsewhere, they also know best how to frame questions in a way that mitigates such biases. While I dislike how he expressed it, I agree with Cannoli that sounds like another allegation of "cultural bias." I never put much stock in that, and still do not. I recall that article I linked about eye witness accounts noting even neutral questions can induce people to believe they SAW things that never happened, a belief that grows with each retelling, but I have no reason to doubt the questions themselves in this study.


I was thinking more in terms of the gas than the container itself, but it was hard to think of a concise way to express it as such, since gases expand to fill their container. It was an imperfect analogy, as all such are, but I am sure you got the gist of it: Social scientists must measure dyanamic systems, often when even identifying, let alone calculating, all equally dynamic variables is impossible, and frequently with improvised tools and an observer effect that would give Heisenberg himself pause. Oh, and the vote/election/budget allocation is next week, so make it fast. At least when they are done they have the satisfaction of knowing they cannot claim even general certainty about ANY of it, but dozens of people with stated agendas prejudiced by the research will still be there with a list of errors.

Physicists have their own set of challenges, some unique, but need never deal with people insisting the "kinetic elites" "gravitational media bias" is denying hydrogen has 1.5 protons because they hate God and America. And if they did, they could point to cold hard indisputable and independently measurable data refuting that claim. The social scientist has no such luxury; his choice is who will attack him, and why.