Dead white males did not invent the rules of science; they discovered them. These rules enable science, and science alone, to make successful prediction.
And prediction is only evidence acknowledged by science to demonstrate that one is on the trail
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Imagine the devastating effect, even on the mass of young black men who successfully resist the temptation to violence, of Gwen Guthrie’s song Ain’t Nothin’ Coin’ On But The Rent:
Boy, nothing in life is free / That’s why
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The “Common-Sense Sociology Test” made its first appearance in the mid-1960’s. The test is now a familiar fixture in introductory sociology courses and textbooks, but in the beginning its exciting novelty instantly captured the hearts and minds of graduate students
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People with more than a passing interest in words fall into two groups: prescriptivist and descriptivist. The prescriptivist believes that there is an ideal of correctness in the use of words, shifting and temporally-based as it ultimately may be. The
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The morality of abortion is entirely a matter of definition: is the fetus a person or not? The definition—whether derived from millennia of religious tradition or from individual analysis and subjective choice—both generates and justifies the intense emotions that are
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Over in my philosophy department they used to shake their heads and smile. They didn’t actually pat me on the head or anything; professors don’t do that. But they did get a kick out of what they saw as my
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In the recent firing of “Jimmy the Greek,” CBS explained its action in a “terse statement,” decrying racism. (What they meant by this is anyone’s guess. I ban the word racism in my introductory sociology class, not because there are
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Like most sociologists, I am conservative in the sense that I believe in the existence of barely perceived social mechanisms—mechanisms that satisfy the deep physiological, psychological, and cultural needs. This sociological world view contains a conservative element: the belief that
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In the 1980’s the doctrine of sexual equality is increasingly being misapplied. The current discussion of women’s sports provides a graphic illustration. The central premise of the sexual egalitarian is simple: It is unjust to reward or support a woman
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The stereotype is in disrepute. The word is often defined in purely negative terms. Some definitions construe the stereotype as necessarily possessing the negative charge that does, indeed, energize many stereotypes. Other definitions see as inseparable from the stereotype
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