For example, a social scientist might submit a range of articles to HN in order to record, quantify, and study the personalities drawn to different topics. A board owner might use this information to attract the conversational tone they'd like to see.
Social science includes: "academic disciplines, including anthropology, archaeology, economics, human geography, linguistics, management science, communication science, political science and psychology.[1]"
Now if you're saying that you have issues with some of the common methodologies or lack of repeatable experimentation in anthropology or political science - that's one thing, but if you're saying that linguistics, economics, and archaeology are not science? I do not agree.
Something is science if it uses the scientific method to generate knowledge. The fact that the knowledge generated is highly dependent (e.g. "in mid-century european society, we've found that A and B are likely result if C and D are present") doesn't make it not science. That's a limitation on the conclusions, not a built-in invalidity of the knowledge. There is plenty of knowledge generated by physics, biology, etc. that is highly dependent too.
