Global Social Challenges: insights from the physical sciences and their relevance to the evolution of social science

<!--HTML-->The complex challenges confronting humanity today point to the need for new thinking and new theory in the social sciences which overcomes the limitations of compartmentalized, sectoral concepts, strategies and policies and mechanistic approaches to living social systems. The World Academy of Art & Science is convening a consortium of leading institutions and thinkers from different sectors to contribute ideas for formulation of a cohesive framework capable of addressing global social challenges in their totality and complex interrelationships. The objective of my presentation will be to explore the potential for collaboration between the physical and social sciences to arrive at a more cohesive and effective framework by exploring a series of questions, including - - Is an integrated science of society possible that transcends disciplinary boundaries based on common underlying principles as we find in the natural sciences? - To what extent can principles of natural science serve as valid models and analogies for the social sciences? - How are the laws governing society similar or different from the immutable laws of nature identified by the natural sciences? - How does conscious anticipation impact on the action of causality in human society? - To what extent does systems theory provide adequate models for understanding conscious human social systems? - What are the implications of entanglement, complexity and uncertainty in physics for understanding social systems? The Academy hopes that this meeting will lead to on-going collaboration with CERN on this project.