3 key ways in which Anth studying culture differ sharly from the ways natures scientists do?

Question

3 key ways in which Anth studying culture differ sharly from the ways natures scientists do?

Answer 1

I don't know if there are specific answers, but I can give a couple.

1)  Anthropology observation is much more detailed than nature observation.  This is because humans tend to have more complicated social structures than plants or animals. This means that there is more to studying culture than just reproductive strategies or simple trait genetics, though those do still play a role.  

2)  Anthro observation in general is a lot slower because new generations of humans take 15 to 30 years depending on the culture, where insects and plants can produce new generations in a year, a matter of months, days, or sometimes even hours.

Those are what I come up with off the top of my head, hope it helps.

Answer 2

Anthropology is a social science and still riddled with ideology and has no overarching theory.

Natural science is much more rigorous and has safe guards against bias. We of science do not settle empirical matters politically, as The American Anthropological Society does; voting on whether to accept data, or not to accept conclusions that do not fit the ideology.

With the overarching theory of evolution by natural selection I can make predictive hypothesis and test them. Anthropology needs to rely on preconceived notions and anecdote.

For example; if I were to predict from evolution theory that women have certain maternal instincts, I could hypothesis that there would be proximate rewards for that ultimate behavior. This was actually done and the hormone oxytocin was implicated in bonding behavior.

Now, anthropologists had posited some nonsense about this being a " culturally mediated behavior, " stripped from biology. They still will not accept " the out of Africa " theory, though all the good evidence points that way.

If you want a valid description of human behavior ask a scientist dealing with this area and do not waste time with the confusions of social science.