Integrating the Sciences and Society

This volume starts from the premise that interfacing between the social sciences and the "hard" and "natural" sciences, technology, engineering, and math (STEM fields) will result in benefits for the social sciences, the STEM fields themselves, and society on both macro- and micro-levels. That is, we believe that individuals are the better for their exposure to contextual understandings of technical and theoretical knowledge, that social interaction in scientific (and other) environments will be enriched by such understanding, that citizenship on every level (local, national, global) will benefit by critical awareness of social and technological forces impinging on us, and that global developments will be enhanced by understanding societal and technological contexts for a variety of common endeavors. The absence of such exchanges may result in myopic indiscretions and missed potential for development and growth. Each of the contributions in this volume speak to the challenges of such interfacing, the current practices in some arena of social action, and the potential for increased and fortified bridge building in multiple arenas.