Technology as a social phenomenon is the bridge and it will merge engineering and social science into a design oriented, artificial science. Informatics is an artificial science. Sociology is either history or natural science. The IT Revolution is what drives the postmodern movement. Postmodernism is an example of how philosophy begins to change well before the technical revolution driving the change is clearly visible.
Modern philosophy is industrial age philosophy - the mechanistic world view.
This philosophy was developed together with notions of machines and mechanics already in the 17th century. It will have to change when we leave industrial society behind. We have to realise that the social sciences were established, in the midst of the industrial revolution, to explain that revolution, as theories of modernisation and industrialisation. As we leave industrial society behind, there will be need for a more fundamental rethinking of the conceptual and theoretical frameworks of the social sciences. In informatics, we have to get rid of systems thinking, and we have to develop new ways of thinking about technology.