https://orcid.org/0000-0001-5948-4183
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Robert Jungmann, Review of “The Logic of Social Science”, Social Forces, Volume 100, Issue 4, June 2022, Page e12, https://doi.org/10.1093/sf/soab159
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My early student experience involved studying to be an energy engineer, and the first year was mainly about studying math. The abstract clarity of this discipline thrilled me. The same was true when I switched to sociology. At that time I mainly studied modern systems theory, heavily inspired by the works of mathematicians like Spencer-Brown and Gödel. The underlying idea of a unity of sciences based on mathematical modeling and a unitary logic has been constitutive for sociology since Auguste Comte. James Mahoney adds to the list of mathematical inspirations by highlighting a relatively rarely discussed branch, namely set theory. His book provides a new epistemological, methodological, and methodical basis grounded in logical principles of set theory. The book is definitely not an easy read. Nevertheless, it is very accessibly written (and well organized), given the fact that it treats almost all of the big questions in epistemology and methodology. His general orientation can be summarized as anti-essentialist, processual, and preserving both the explanatory and exploratory aims of the social sciences.
