Return-Path: sendmail 5.67/UCSD-2.2-sun Sun, 14 Feb 93 04:59:55 -0800 for /usr/lib/sendmail -oc -odq -oQ/var/spool/lqueue -oi -fsocgrad-relay socgrad-list Date: Sun, 14 Feb 93 07:48:58 EDT From: "JOnathon S. Epstein" Subject: Unimportance of philosophy To: socgrad@ucsd.edu WHile I'm not sure what the hell Pareto was talking about in the posted quote it really doesn't matter because a)he was an economist and therefore not a philospher or a sociologist and b) he was pals with Mussolini and therefore an asshole. But let me point out that sociology is a philosophy, a positivistic one to be exact. If we weren't philosophers the degree we are working on wouldn't be called a ":PhD" now would it. Sociology doesn't become a science because a majority of sociolgists agree to use statisitcs to totally abstract society from their work, count up up the results, and publish meaningless research that has no relevence to anyth ing but the tenure process. Fancy graphs and charts do not make us a science. See Bergers Invitation for more on this. But let me point out that the rejection of philosophy by sociolgists is impossible and shows a persons lack of understanding about sociology. The idea that we do not need metaphysics is a metaphysical statement, Postivivism is a philosophy and the engulfment of sociology by statistics is a damn shame.