Matematica şi mecanica în ştiinţele sociale
Mathematics and Mechanics in the Social Sciences (Edited text, Abstract and Preliminary Remarks by Andrei Negru)

Summary/Abstract: The present study is based on a conference delivered by N. Ghiulea at the Sociology Seminar at the Jassy University on the occasion of the publication of Spiru Haret’s work, Mecanique sociale (Social Mechanics, 1910). The study makes a synthetic presentation of the most relevant theories on how to apply quantitative methods to the investigation of social phenomena that have been up to then debated upon in the national and world literature in the field. In opposition to those who believe that mechanics is part of mathematics due to the fact that both sciences operate with numerical values, the author deems that the two disciplines have distinct subjects of research, as mathematics is the science of pure quantity, while mechanics is the science of motion in general. In addition, the methods used by the two sciences are essentially different: whereas the mathematical method involves complex logical reasoning, the mechanistic method is a system of reasoning that enables to determine the movement accompanying a phenomenon by knowing the forces that generate the movement and the circumstances in which the respective phenomenon is manifested. The mathematical method can be used whenever the constitutive elements of the phenomenon enable the employment of its reasoning, while the mechanistic method can be used when certain forces determine a movement or equilibrium between the respective elements. Focusing on the field of social sciences, the author asserts that the mathematical method can be applied to the disciplines that relate only to quantities, characterized by a static view on the phenomena – finances, statistics, insurances; the mechanistic method is useful to the disciplines governed by forces and motion, characterized by a dynamic view on the social phenomena – economics and sociology. The former group of sciences, namely those characterized by a static view on the social phenomena, is more briefly approached because mathematics has anyway played a leading part in their creation as they are essentially quantitative, and nobody has ever doubted the role and significance of the mathematical method in these sciences. Having a dual way of envisaging and approaching phenomena – its quantitative elements “favor” a static, mathematical approach, while the components “in motion” point to a dynamic, mechanistic approach – the science of economics enjoys a special attention from the part of the author. He states that the quantitative nature of the economic elements has compelled the economists who wished to give an accurate scientific form to political economy to employ the mathematical method. Nevertheless, reservations have been and are still expressed at the attempts at applying mathematics to the study of economic phenomena in spite of the fact that the mathematical method has already proved its efficiency.

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