But the question you are asking is, do those theories have an underlying truth to them, separate from the circumstances of their creation?
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It reminds us that if we want to understand why some communities find truths that seem to endure, and others don't, there is a reason.
It reminds us that to create, convince, maintain truths requires an entire social apparatus. What we call "the scientific community."
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What it does not do is say, "scientific facts are arbitrary." That is not what social construction means.
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It is unfortunate that many people think it means that. I suspect most have not read the works they claim to criticize.
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Which is ironically not very scientific! /thread
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One last little thing: here's another way to think about it. Are nuclear weapons themselves social constructs?
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In the sense meant by social construction, yes. They are created by society, by social practices. They certainly don't just grow on trees.
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They are made to satisfy certain social goals, of certain societies. Over time, those goals have shifted a bit—hence the weapons have, too.
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Their creation, deployment, and use are all dictated by social practices. And indeed, the weapons themselves may dictate some practices—
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for example, they tend to require secrecy in the organizations that create them.
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Does that make the weapons not real? Of course not. They're real. Society making something doesn't make it non-real.
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Money is a social construct — but you still have to pay the bills.
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Race is a social construct — a fact that won't help you if you're an African-American in a dodgy traffic stop.
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Just because things are social constructs doesn't mean they can't have power or be real in the world. Social construction ≠ solipsism.
End of conversation
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