ABSTRACT
Newton discovered that the force that causes the apple to fall to the ground is the same as that, which keeps the moon in its orbit of the earth, governs the tides and causes the swing of the pendulum. Natural science and human science appear to be concerned with two different cultures, with the role of the natural scientist being to provide nomothetic explanations and that of the scholar to supply idiographic descriptions. God ordained the laws to which everything in nature is subject, even as the king decrees the laws the members of society must obey. In reaction against the obvious deficiencies of the minimalist theory, philosophers have developed another which could be called 'the maximalist position'. From Newton's laws a great number of other laws may be derived. An individualist theory sees human subjects as rational social agents whose social behaviour can be described by reference to individual mental states.
