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Originally Posted by xepherys
hard and soft are pretty static terms for sciences. Physics is a hard science. Biology is a soft science. Chemistry is a hard science. *shrug* It's just a term. It's not a matter of better or worse.
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I disagree. The terms are used differently by different people. In the history of those terms "hard" has been associated with "good", "more scientific", and "more rigorous while "soft" has been associated with "bad", "less rigorous" and "less "scientific". Personally, I think that the distinction is more about political jabs between fields than any real assessment of the field's scientific value. I find it particularly inapplicable when comparing MDs and PhDs. I've interacted with many MDs who seemed to have only a limited understanding of the scientific method. I've also interacted with PhDs in sociology, anthropology, poli sci, and psychology who employed the scientific method in their work everyday.