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A Criticism of Scientific Method as Applied by Sociologists Author(s): Alban D. Sorensen Reviewed work(s): Source: The Journal of Philosophy, Psychology and Scientific Methods, Vol. 1, No. 6 (Mar. 17, 1904), pp. 141-148 Published by: Journal of Philosophy, Inc. Stable URL: http://www.jstor.org/stable/2012105 . Accessed: 22/03/2012 20:16
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VOL. 1.

NO. 6.

MARCH 17, 1904

THE

JOURNAL OF PHILOSOPHY METHODS

AS APPLIED BY

PSYCHOLOGY AND SCIENTIFIC

A CRITICISM OF SCIENTIFIC METHOD SOCIOLOGISTS.

the October-December number of The Forum, in an article entitled 'Sociological Questions,' Professor Giddings feels the need of first explaining"the sense in whichthe word 'sociological' " is used. The explanation crystallizesin two definitions, viz.: "Soin which a of facts those social fundamental ciologyis, short, study all otherbranchesof social science take for granted." "Sociology is an attemptto get away froma priori theorizing, and to arrive at even of the a modest be though knowledge sort, falling knowledge, short of philosophy." There are two phrases in these statements that are worthnoting before passing to a discussion of the larger principle that is involved. In the firstplace, fromthe view-pointof eitherscience or philosophy,using thosetermsin a liberal sense,thereis no 'knowledge' whichis 'of a modestsort.' Knowledgethat is knowledgeis neither modest nor boastful-it is simply the means, it is simply the intellectual instrument, the furthering of our ends. It is the servant for. whichis at once masterand servant; and we fail to see the purport of this apologetictone in defining the scope and methodof sociology which stands, in the Comtean scheme,for the correlationand climax of all the sciences. of being captious in our critiAgain, and withoutany intention no' can be there at cism, 'arriving knowledgewithouta priori theand orizing,'for therecan be no arrivingexcept therebe a starting, 'a priori theorizing,'however distastefulthe phrase may be, if it means anything,simply locates the initiative,it means in psychological terms the intellectualimpulse to thinking, which, in order to realize itself,does go out and then returnto itselfby way of the fact. If the impulseis a priori,is blind,so likewiseis the fact; they are bothblind until each has been defined by the otherin a dynamic
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situation. The one simply definesthe other,and any completeintellectual act is simplythe biological,the organic,methodof defining them. Facts are not found ready-madein objective concreteness, nor are theoriesand principles spun out of a priori minds. Facts and theories are not objective, in the sense of existing in and do not exist as such. It is always some externalunrelatedness, fact or group of facts which definesand shapes a theory,and it is always a theorywhich gives meaningto facts. The failure to comprehendthis essentially dynamic character has diverted some of the of method at the outset,by sociologists, leading minds that are interestedin establishingthe new science, of fundamentalprinciples to a as a science, fromthe formulation voluminousdiscussionof logic under the guise of the scientific term, methodology. Nor does the problem seem to have received any satisfactory solution. Assertions regarding the scientificmethod of the new science seem to have receiveda stereotyped place in all pretentious articles. And these assertionsall have that same attitude of hostility toward the a priori in their reverencefor the inductive and comparativeand statisticalmethods. attitudeof the article Turningnow to the generalmethodological we findthat the a priorimethod whichis the occasionof thiswriting, has become an ism, and amountssimplyto 'an off-hand guess.' It is identifiedwith 'dogmatism.' The method pleaded for is that methodwhichhas yielded positiveresultsin all the induc'scientific tive sciences.' 'The comparativemethodsof the trained historian' and 'the quantitativemethodsof the statisticians'are to characterize the study of contemporaneous society. In order to maintain his equilibriumin this position the author findsit necessary,at fivedifferent points in the course of his argument, to assail a priorism in the manner mentioned above. It strikesthe tyro in sociologyas exceedinglystrange that the father of all science,to whomall sciencegoes back for its initial movement, and it does not decrease the should also be the fatherof a priorism, tangle of the situation to learn that the charge of a priorismhas been laid also at the door of one who thus asserts and reassertshis in that method. lack of confidence Nor does it clear up the situationmuch when, regardingquestions that are raised, the assertionis made that they 'admit of an but the answerhas not been found.' exact statisticalanswer,2 The feelinghas been expressedin scholasticcircles that socioloand the writerfeels that gists have not risen to their opportunity, at least one of the causes of this failure can be traced on the one
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side to this overt adoption of the so-called scientific method,and on the otherto the overt abandonment of the a priori method,without a careful analysis of the essentiallydynamic nature and identity of all effective method. A purely mechanical conception,in spite of the profusionof organicterms, scienunderliesthis much-praised as contribution tificmethodin a good deal of what has been offered to chaptersof the science. Sociologistshave taken up the problems of the new science fromthe view-pointof the objective results of modern science. Method has been regarded as being just as fixed and establishedas facts. The latter have been conceivedto be prointo the fieldof vision of every man who would jecting themselves but open his eyelids. Facts and methodhave been regarded as if the one were existingready-madein nature waiting simply for appropriation,while the other has been a product of science which could be simply handed over to and applied by the social investigator. of social that all investigators The writerdoes not mean to affirm facts and phenomenahave gone at the problemsso crudely as this arraignmentmight imply, nor that any one would admit that he of facts and methods;yet he does does hold a mechanicalconception mean to assertthat a large part of what has been said about methodology in sociology has confineditself to a reactionary assertion favoringthe inductivemethodsof modernscience and of opposition to the deductivemethod, withoutany adequate analysis of the essentially organic relation betweeninduction and deduction in mental have placed that sociologists therefore, procedure. The writerfinds, in the anomalous position of affirming the dynamicand themselves organic nature of the relations of individuals in society,while, on the side of method,they have asserted with equal vehemencethe essentiallyinorganic, dualistic nature of mental procedure. This to have been a fundamentalstriccontradiction seems,to the writer, of generalprinciplesand ture upon progressin boththe formulation the detectionof salient facts. ? What What, then,is thetruelogic of the sociologicalprocedure is the essentialnature of sociologicalmethod? What is the basis of the affirmation that societyis an organism? Why is it coming to be regarded among sociologicalthinkersthat the statement that inof each other,is a truism ? Is it nof dividuals are simplyfunctions that sociological method,as all effective method,is dynamic and organic,that to grasp the essential principles of any and all relationshipis to see that the elementsare all functionally interdependent? And is this not just as true of the relationbetweenfact and theoryas it is betweenindustrialprincipals and subordinates? of this divorce beWhat, then,we may ask, is the significance

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tween fact and theory? Why are we asked to reduce the mind to in a tabula rasa, free from all theoretical bias and presupposition, order that it may be in perfectconditionfor this photographicexposure to facts? It is not the purpose of the writerto deny the possibilityof a bias which would absolutelyexclude the possibilityof a theoretical and even demonstrated true perceptionof patent and demonstrable facts. But, on the otherhand, it is equally true that an abstract, in its exclusion mechanicalconceptionof facts is quite as effective not of a perfectly working universally demonstrable, though valid, terms. In are and fact related other words, theory hypothesis. is if and fact it is at is of all, theory Theory always theory fact, to if reason of its relation at theory. all, by always fact, The universe is but a storehouseof raw material,which when abstractedfor some particular anthropicpurpose or end is thereby for mind into a fact, a means to an end. The raw transformed and it remains materialis fact by virtueof its psychicalconnection, fact so long as, and only so long as, it is connectedwith some psymarks its return to the great storechical end. Its disconnection house fromwhich it was taken. Its characteras fact is definedby the end for which it was abstractedand which it served. It comes of the end, to consciousness as fact only when, fromthe view-point which is always and necessarilya priori,it proves adequate to that end; when it can serve as the means whichthe end has been groping for in the processof its self-realization. It serves to definethe end. are relatedin the processof experienceas means Fact and theory of a functionalpsychology of experito end. From the view-point the exact nature of the methodologence it is possible to determine ical problemof sociologists. Both fact and theoryhave a negative and a positivephase in the process of knowledge. It has been said above that fact is a mental derivative; that the affirmation of fact is possible only from the point of view of its relation to an anthropicend as means. This is its positive phase. Its negative aspect appears when it is no longer serviceablein this capacity, when it is rejected as irrelevant. This takes place either conwhen the fact itselfhas been found to have been fragmentarily has altered. of the or when the theory ceived, scope Similarly, theory exhibits a positive and negative phase. On the positiveside, theoryis valid to the extentthat it sharply differentiates excluded fromincluded facts. On the negative side, it is either by reason questioned when it is undergoingreconstruction, of its failure to rationalizethe facts or by reason of a reconstruction of theory. After of facts which necessitatesa like reconstruction of the relativityof all that has been said by science in affirmation

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it seemsstrangethat thereshould persistsuch strenuousknowledge, ness in the insistence upon the positivenessof scientificmethod. The whole confusionseems to the writerto arise fromthe failure to grasp the essentialmeaning of the organic concept. It is a failure to see that the limitingscientific just as trulyas the philocategories, sophical, are functionallyrelated. The most improvedself-binder, with all the latest patents,will cut and garnerweeds just as readily as wheat,but the lord of the harvestmakes a distinction. The botanist may trample down the wheat to get the weed, but not so the lord of the harvest. Why does the one ignorewhat the othersees? Is not the weed as practically serviceable to the botanist as the wheat to the lord? Is the value in eithercase any moretheoretical or any morepractical than in the other ? The economist has a ready answer. Who has not felt,in reading some of the recentclassifications of so-calledsociologicaldata, that the line has not been very carefully drawn betweenwhat has been subsumedunder fact on the one hand, and under theoryon the other? The affirmation and classification of data under a certain caption are not necessarilya determinative of credencein the asseveration. And have we not frequently found ourselvesgreatlypleased to have put into our hands data both carefullycollectedand arranged,while,on the otherhand, therehas been a revolt of feelingwhen the author has attemptedto commitus to a certain interpretation of those facts in anotherrelation? it seem that we have two equally necessary would Accordingly, functionsmutually supplementary;and that human nature is so as to make a divisionof labor bothpossible and feasible. constituted An old statementof the functionalpoint of view is to the point: "The eye can not say unto the hand, I have no need of thee," etc. "Those members of the body whichseemto be morefeebleare necesFact and sary." theory,principle and practice, a posterioriand a priori, are psychologicallybut the two poles of a single act. Neither pole has any significance apart fromthe sphere which involves its antipode. Facts are serviceableonly in relation to theory, and theory finds its meaning, its realization, only in facts. Historically,it is true that the oscillationis betweenthe two, with the emphasisnow upon the one and then upon the other. But the of this oscillationis not that either is to be neglected, significance but ratherthat the progressin the development of the one has proceeded at a morerapid pace than in the case of the other. The fact that attentiondoes thus focalize now upon one and then upon the othersimplyindicatesthe methodof all humanprogress. Man puts but one foot forwardat a time. In our search for theorythe differentia of facts is reduced to a

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in order that theirunifyingprinciplemay be determined. minimum While, on the otherhand, in our search for facts their differentiae are carefully distinguishedin order that elemental characteristics is may appear. Their unifyingprincipleis put in the background, reduced to a minimum. But without some background,it is obvious that they would be simply unrelated and arbitrary. The methodof reason,therefore, the true logic,is simultaneously inductiveand deductive. It is stereoscopic. Fact and theory, when theyappear as such, appear in organicrelatedness. They are vital. Until theydo so appear thereis neitherfact nor theory. The situation is problematic. Of the presentstatus of the logic of the social scienceswe may and not functional. In attempting say, then,that it is reactionary, to avoid the errorsinto which a past historicalperiod had fallen in the pendulum has swung to the extremeof its state of degeneracy, denyingany validity to a notable methodonce held as valid. Inits positive elements,its validity has been destead of determining nied without any adequate analysis of its psychological nature. There seems to be a need for a psychologyof logic. In this connection, mightfindmaterial for reflection sociologists in the statements of the experienceof psychologists with the scientificmethod. Professor James, calling attentionto the dearth of definitive results,says: "In the light of some of the expectationsthat are abroad conit is instructive to read the unusually cerningthe 'new psychology,' of its founder,Wundt, after his thirtyyears of candid confession self-observaexperience: . . . Well, has our experimental laboratory ? No tion,so understood, already accomplished aught of importance generalanswerto thisquestioncan be given,because in the unfinished state of our sciencethereis, even inside of the experimental lines of doctrine." inquiry,no universally acceptedbody of psychologic Again he says: "In my humble opinion there is no. 'new psychology' worthy of the name. There is nothingbut the old psychology whichbegan with Locke's time,plus a little physiologyof the brain and senses and theoryof evolution,and a few refinements of introspective detail." ' And again: "It is indeed strange to hear people talk triumphantly of the 'New Psychology'; and write 'Histories of Psychology,'when into the real elementsand forces which the word covers not the first glimpse of clear insightexists." "A string of raw facts; a little
s' Talks on Psychology,' p. 20-21. 4 Wm. James: 'Talks to Teachers,'

p. 7.

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and gengossip and wrangle about opinions; a little classification eralizationon the mere descriptive level; a strongprejudice that we have states of mind, and that our brain conditionsthem: but not a single law in the sense in whichphysicsshows us laws, not a single propositionfrom which any consequencecan causally be deduced. . . . The Galileo and the Lavoisier of psychology will be famousmen indeed when they come,as come theysome day surely will, or past successesare no index to the future. When theydo come,however, the necessitiesof the case will make them 'metaphysical.' Meanwhile the best way in whichwe can facilitatetheiradvent is to understandhow great is the darknessin whichwe grope,and never to forgetthat the natural-scienceassumptionswith which we started are provisionaland revisable things."' From these statements it appears that the outcomeof the application of scientific laboratorymethodshas not yielded to psycholodata which might serve even suggestivelyto gists those definitive indicate the broader fundamentalprincipleswhich they had hoped would prove to be ultimate. and syntheses are recognized generalizations Principles,theories, to be the derivativesof a different mode of approach, or, at least, of a mode of approach whichinvolvesthe insightof the metaphysician. The productof scientific in the formof an everinvestigation increasingbulk of data has only broughtmore clearly to consciousness our utter dependence upon constructive talent for the deduction of fundamentalprinciples. In no departmentof knowledge can this fact be overlooked;and this recordedexperienceof psychologists ought at least to be regarded as a datum in the consideration of methodological procedure. What the sociologistsare waiting for is preciselythe correlating fromthraldom a priorimind whichcan see, by reason of its freedom to the multitudinousdetails of the science,those fundamentaland determinative principles which, when they shall have been formuwill obtain general credence. The positivismof gnosticssuglated, gested the relativismof agnostics. And it may be that, similarly, the positivismof sociologistsmay bring about the reactionaryattitude of relativismregardingsociological facts and principles,than which no more baneful position is conceivable,involvingas it does the whole realm of morals. Revertingto the second definition given by ProfessorGiddings, of a definite while, on the one hand, there is the explicit statement 'a to from there "get away purpose is, on the priori' theorizing," other hand, the admissionthat what is sought is 'knowledge,even thoughof a modestsort,falling shortof philosophy.'
5James: 'Briefer Course,'pp. 468, ff. Italics are ours.

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It would seem that the 'a priori theorizing'is the chief cornerstone whose rejectionhas necessitatedthis 'falling short of philosophy.' Until a priori and a posterioriare seen to be but names for in the positionof the stressin the relationof fact and the difference in the processof the discovery of the truth,littleprogresscan theory be hoped for in any science,and least of all in the correlationand of the confused and confusingdata of sociology. interpretation That thereis a place for the a prioriin sociologyis comingmore acutely to consciousnesswith the rapidly accumulating data gathered by a host of investigatorsinto social facts and phenomena. And we may say, in the words of ProfessorJames, concerningthe minds that shall establish the new science, 'the necessitiesof the of the new case will make themmetaphysical.' The metaphysicians in have profited the sciencewill,however, by progress logical method both inductiveand deductive; their attitudebeing characterizedby and not by the deliberate exclusion of any its comprehensiveness methodwhich has proved serviceablein reaching results.
COLBYCOLLEGE. ALBAN D. SORENSEN.

DISCUSSION
PRAGMATISM1 ER.F. C. S. SCHILLER, of Oxford University,continues to be at once the most pugnacious and the most facetiousprotagonist of pragmatism. In his preface to his latest work he events in the hischronicleswhat would seem to be epoch-making tory of this theory,viz., ProfessorJames's clear enunciationof it in 1879 and his own later discovery (date not given) that he had been talking pragmatismas far back as 1892 without knowingit. Now he knowsit and he tells us that pragmatismis the application to the theoryof knowledgeof a 'greater and more sovereignprinciple,' viz., Humanism, which Mr. Schiller knows 'to be habitual' but 'which seems to be sporadic and in William James and himself, inchoate in many others.' .Since I am concerned here only with it may suffice to say that Humanthe pragmaticview of knowledge, ism is 'the philosophic attitude which, without wasting thought upon attemptsto constructexperiencea priori, is contentto take human experienceas the clue to the world of human experience.'2 M
1 Humanism. Philosophical Essays,' F. C. S. Schiller, pp. xxv + 297. New York, The Macmillan Co., 1903; 'Pragmatism as a Philosophic Method, Irving King, Philosophical Review, Vol. XII., No. 5 (Sept. 1903), pp. 510-524. See also 'Studies in Logical Theory,' John Dewey and others, Chicago, The University of Chicago Press, 1903. 2 'Humanism,' pp. xix-xx.