SOC201 - Theory 1 Notes

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Sociology
• A study of the human condition- all aspects of the human condition. There is nothing that humans do or say that is foreign to sociology
• Began in the earliest stages of history- even in the Paleolithic period where we were hunters and gatherers because even in this time, there were human relationships. • Safe to say that sociology is as old as history

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Pre-Socratic Theorists
Heraclitus:
• Arguably the most important pre-Socratic writer
• Said that “one can never step into the same river twice”. In other words, everything changes. The entire universe is in a state of constant flux and change.
Nothing is static and everything is constantly changing. This means that the word process becomes important.
• When discussing human beings, we have to realize the importance of human history because this is the only way that we can understand how things have changed over time
Cratylus:
• Disciple of Heraclitus
• Said that “one cannot step into the same river once”. This language makes
Cratylus’ version of Heraclitus’ quote even more deliberate. He’s saying that you can’t even experience something once because even during that first experience, things are changing so much that you can’t experience the present tense because the present cannot really exist

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Theory
• What is theory? Clear thinking about experience.
• Everything is learned. Even instinct is something that had to have been experienced and learned. Instinct refers to a biologically rooted mechanism that tells an individual how to behave in specific circumstances. According to Zeitlin’s school of thought, humans don’t have instinct because everything is learned. Even the survival instinct is proven wrong by suicide and mothers who kill their children prove the motherly instinct wrong.
• How are things learned? Through trial and error. All beings are subject to falibilism (failing). We only learn to succeed by failing, even if the failures are small. For example, you learn table manners by failing to use your fork properly.
• There is no way to learn anything at all except by experience- either our own or our predecessors. Most of what we have learned is from our predecessorsespecially things that are fatalistic.

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If we define human culture as the totality of designs for living (all the things that humans have to do to make a living and experience in any given day), the only test of any given theory is practical experience.
You therefore cannot have theory without practice and cannot have practice without theory because theory untested by practice is useless, and practice without some sound theory is blind, dangerous and destructive to yourself and/or others.
Theory should be seen as an ongoing process. Practices include science, scholarship, what happens in farming and industry etc.
Dialectical: the lion’s share of our learning comes from dialogues with others and literature. We have to recognize that the primary way that we learn what is said in conversation with others is by testing it.
Another term for this is philosophical pragmatism. Another term for this is common sensism. The key word there is common because it is common wisdom that humans have collected through history. If one or few believe something that the majority does not, we may not take them seriously. However, experience has taught us that one or few may be able to prove the masses wrong.
What accounts for the fact that some people still believe that the world is flat or that the earth is the center or the earth? The term is ideology and it contributes to ignorance and error. Our Ideologies can sometimes be so ingrained within our learned experiences that it causes us to make more errors.
Another term for pragmatism is “critical common-sensism”
Einstein’s theory of relativity:
Theories are more than just opinions because theories are based on some evidence
Einstein’s theory of relativity led to the Big Bang Theory
According to the big bang theory, if you go back far enough, there was no universe, time space- nothing existed.
The point here is that all of these theories (Darwin’s Theory, Einstein’s Theory, the Big Bang Theory) are not just guess work or opinions. They are based on some evidence and hold severe implications for how we understand life and develop future theories
Verstehen Soziologic: interpreted sociology. There is a fundamental difference between studying inanimate objects and studying human beings. We cannot understand a human being without understanding the mind, the human’s motives, desires, emotions etc.
In regards to human beings,
Empiricism: belief that sensory experience (the five senses) are the main source of valid knowledge. The criticism of this is that people experience things differently through their senses and that the senses are not always reliable
Epistemology: meaning knowledge. Branch of philosophy that questions how we know anything and come about knowing things.
Symbolic Interactionists agree with Weber
Democritus:

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Zeitlin’s Definition of Mind: the presence of significant symbols in human action. !

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Wednesday May 13, 2013
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The Enlightenment
• The dark ages
• In Western Europe, the Catholic Church was dominated. Thus, the human mind and method of thought was dominated by Catholic theology. Everyone was taught that truth was revealed through monotheism.
• The human mind used revelation (the ultimate source of God’s message to us), tradition (knowledge passed down) and authority (hierarchical authority from the
Pope, to the Cardinals, Bishops and Parish Priests)
• Faith was the base of knowledge in the Catholic Church and it was not questioned
• It was said, “faith begins where thinking leaves off” by a man who himself subscribed to faith.
• Ideology is the opposite of theory because theory is the attempt to understand the human condition and everything about it in some objective sense based on logical evidence. Theory is the pursuit of truth and knowledge. Ideology is an attempt to indoctrinate, which means that people who are privileged and powerful are rationally entitled to more.
• Oligarchy: the rule of few
• Democracy: the rule of the people
• Some people have been indoctrinated to the point that they are involved in “selfdeceit” where they have not been taught any better. Extremists in a way have been indoctrinated because they haven’t been taught any better and this is why they hold particular views
• Before the enlightenment, all scholars were in some way attached to the church.
There was no such thing as a free-thinking scholar and when there was one, they often experienced trouble
• There were no real nation states yet in Europe. Countries like Germany and Italy did not exist
• Counter-factual thought/experiment is an important way to think about history.
Asks the question of what if this had happened or what if that had happened.
What if a brick fell on Hitler’s head as a child and he died? Using this method of thought, you can evaluate the importance that certain events/individuals had in the development of humanity
• 3 Processes that led to the Enlightenment
1. Capitalism/Commerce: Montesquieu and the Persian travelers. People who were travelling around the world for commerce and capitalist purposes, were being exposed to other cultures and this caused them to question their own home culture’s beliefs.

2. The Protestant Reformation: Under Martin Luther and John Kelp. When Luther visited Rome he noticed Simony where the religious leaders were actually buying and selling positions of power because these positions were so valuable. There was also a sale of indulgences with Tetzel, which was a document that you could buy that allowed you to be among the saved! if not entirely, at least you would go to purgatory. Luther was particularly upset that in the Catholic Church, the liturgy was in Latin (allowing only the educated people to understand the liturgy) and that meant that the majority of the people had no idea what was being preached to them. This meant that the people could not have a personal relationship with God because they could not understand God’s word. So, Luther translated the Bible into German and for the first time people could hear God’s word in their own language. Guttenberg invented the printing press and now
God’s word could be printed and distributed this way.
3. Science: In the renaissance period,
• These three factors led to a movement where epistemology became dominant.
• On the continent of Europe you had a movement called rationalism, which was led by Descartes (Cartesian philosophy) Leibniz and Spinoza. Three mathematical geniuses. The highest form of knowledge was mathematics for them.
• In Britain you had the movement of empiricism where the five senses are relied upon. Here you had Locke, Bishop Burkeley and David Hume.