- I am interested in philosophy of the social sciences, sociolog of knowledge and science.edit
Research Interests:
Sociology in America scores low on all those organizational dimensions that produce cumulative knowledge. The ratio of skepticism to trust is high; the selection of facts is heavily influenced by the rituals of diverse tribes and... more
Sociology in America scores low on all those organizational dimensions that produce cumulative knowledge. The ratio of skepticism to trust is high; the selection of facts is heavily influenced by the rituals of diverse tribes and ideological cults; the use of instrumentation to observe and report facts is limited; the consensus over valid facts is horizontal rather than hierarchical; the mutual monitoring of knowledge often degenerates into games of rhetoric or, if not rhetoric, to mutual ignorance about the knowledge claims of rival tribes; the barriers separating sociologists from the lay public are porous; and the necessary material, symbolic, cultural, and organizational resources needed to sustain the discipline are unstable and typically in short supply. This situation is tragic because most of the problems confronting humans are organizational in nature; and yet, the science of social organization is not a major player in policy decisions. Indeed, policy is influenced more by ideological and political rhetoric, or even worse, by disciplines such as economics which have an inadequate theory and psychology which has no theory of the structure and collectivity. This exclusion of sociology from important policy decisions is the result of the perceived failures of the discipline to cumulate knowledge and to possess knowledge that would be useful to clients.