[Ads-l] Quip: Any field that had the word "science" in its name was guaranteed thereby not to be a science (Help request)

[ADSGarson O'Toole]

I was asked to explore the provenance of the remark in the subject
line which might be categorized as an insight or a joke (or both).
Here is a link to the examination:

http://quoteinvestigator.com/2015/06/26/not-science/

The top quotation references do not appear to have an entry on this
topic. Any pertinent citations before 1975 would be most welcome.

Below is the unverified data for the second earliest citation. The
information was constructed iteratively by examining multiple Google
Books snippets, using guesswork, and performing indirect searches. Now
I am reasonably confident of the accuracy, but the data must still be
verified. If your library has issues of "Bulletin of the American
Society for Information Science" in 1979 you could help.

[ref] 1979 December, Bulletin of the American Society for Information
Science, Volume 6, Number 2, Endpoint: Information Science,
Decision-Making, and Management Information Systems by Marshall C.
Yovits, Start page 52, Quote Page 52, Column 2, Published by American
Society for Information Science, Washington, D.C. (Google Books
Snippet View; This citation has not yet been verified on paper; data
may be inaccurate)[/ref]

[Begin excerpt]
We have not yet succeeded in defining even information in an
intellectually satisfying way--certainly not in general, measurable,
and quantifiable terms or even in useful terms.

Information science is, of course, not the only “science” or
pseudo-science in this situation: library science, military science,
and even computer science come to mind. A friend once said that if a
discipline needs the word “science” in its name, it isn’t one.
[End excerpt]

Thanks,
Garson

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