Abel Theodore 1977 the Operation Called Verstehen

8/2/2019 Abel Theodore 1977 the Operation Called Verstehen

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~CIDE

DONADO POR. FABRICE LEHOUCQ

BIBLIOTECA

B IB IJ O T E C A C I D E

Understandingand Social InquiryEDITEDBY

Fred R. DallmayrandThomas A. McCarthy

UNIVERSITY OF NOTRE DAME PRESSNOTRE DAME LONDON


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Copyright 1977 byUnivers ity of Notre Dame Press

Notre Dame, Indiana 46556/,

Library of Congress Cataloging in Publication DataMain entry under tit le:Understanding and social inquiry.

Includes bibliographies and index.CONTENTS: Introduction: The crisis of understand ing.-Max Weber onVerstehen: Weber , M. Objectivity insocial science and social policy. W~~r,M. Basic sociological terms. Parsons, T. Value-freedom and obJectIv~ty.Habermas J. Discussion.- The positivist reception: Abel, T. The operationcalled Ver;,ehen. Rudner, R. On the objectivity of social science. Taylor, C.Interpretation and the sciences of man. [etc.]I.Soc iology-Methodology-Addresses, essays, lecture s. 2. Know-

ledge, Sociology of-Addresses, essays, lec tur es . I. Dal lmayr , Fred R. ,1928- II . McCarthy, Thomas A.HM24.U53 301'.01'8 76--22404ISBN 0--268-01912-6ISBN 0--268-01913-4 pbk.

Manufactured in the United States of America

B I B L I O T E C A C I D E

Preface

THE PRESENT VOLUME IS A PRODUCT OF THE COLLABORATION BETWEEN Aphilosopher and a social scientist , more specifically, a political scientist . Theini tial impulse for the endeavor stemmed from pract ical and pedagogicalconsiderations. In teaching courses on the philosophy and methodology of thesocial sciences, we were handicapped by the lack of a suitable compendium ofmateria ls deal ing with the problematic of Verstehen, or interpretive under-standing. The relatively few available texts and collections did not reflect thefull range and diversity of the intellectual currents pertinent to the theme.

The selection of materials was guided by this pedagogical concern. Ratherthan propounding a particular doctrine , we have tried to acquaint the readerwi th the complexi ty of the issues involved in the interpretive dimension ofsocial inquiry. The materials were arranged with a view to stimulating discus-sion through the presentation of contrasting positions. This dialectical intentionisevident inthe volume asa whole-in that the Weberian tradition iscontrastedwith logical empiric ism, which is in turn cont rasted with the theory of "lan-guage games," phenomenology and hermeneutics-as well as inthe individualsections, where the respective position is not only presented and defended butexposed to critical queries and counterarguments.

Fred Dallmayr wishes to express his grati tude to Donald R. Wagner for h isdiligent and thoughtful assistance in collecting relevant bibliography and alsointracing the broad perimeters of the theme. Thomas McCarthy wishes tothankthe Alexander von Humboldt Foundation for a fellowship, which enabled himto complete his share of the work on th is volume. Both editors appreciate thepermissions granted by the publishers to reprint materials for which they holdthe copyrights. The original source is indicated at the beginning of eachselection.

F.R.D.T.A.McC.

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To our students

Contents

Preface iiiIntroduction: The Crisis of UnderstandingSuggested Readings 14

PART ONEMax Weber on Verstehen

Introduction 19"Objectivity" in Social Science and Social Policy. Max Weber 24Basic Sociological Terms Max Weber 38Value-Freedom and Objectivity Talcott Parsons 56Discussion Jiirgen Habermas 66Suggested Readings 73

PART TWO

The Positivist ReceptionIntroduction 77The Operation Called Verstehen Theodore Abel 81On the Objectivity of Social Science Richard Rudner 93Interpreta tion and the Sciences of Man Charles Taylor IOISuggested Readings 132

v


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IntroductionThe A Priori of Communication and the Foundation of the

Humanities Karl-Otto ApelThe Model of the Text: Meaningful Action Considered as a

Text Paul RicoeurA Review of Gadamer's Truth and Method Iurgen Habermas 335

36 4

vi CONTENTSPART THREE

The Wittgensteinian ReformulationIntroductionThe Idea of a Social Science Peter WinchUnderstanding a Primitive Society Peter WinchUnderstanding and Explanation. in Sociology and Social

Anthropology I.C. JarvieComment Peter WinchSuggested Readings

PART FOUR

Phenomenology and Ethnomethodology

IntroductionConcept and Theory Formation in the Social Sciences AlfredSchutz

What Is Ethnomethodology? Harold GarfinkelEthnomethodology: Sociology without Society? William W.

MayrlSuggested Readings

PART FIVE

Hermeneutics and Critical Theory

Suggested Readings

13 71 4 21 5 9

1 8 92072 1 5

2 1 9

2 2 52402 6 2280

2 8 5

2 9 2

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Introduction:T he C risis of U nd erstand in g

CUSTOMARILY THE TERM "UNDERSTANDING"IS USED TO DENOTE A TYPE OFinquiry germane to the humanities and some of the social sciences, incontradis-t inct ion to the method of empirica l "explanat ion" indigenous to the natura lsciences. Yet, despite the importance of methodological considerations, thesignificance of "understanding" does not properly come into view in a simpleconf rontation of the "two cultures" conceived as academic disciplines orresearch strategies . The contours of the issue emerge only against the back-ground of far-reaching, secular developments in our age: the so-called knowl-edge explosion or the tr iumph of scienti fic and technological rational ity.Contemporary science and technology afford the human mind access to theremotest and most recondite reaches of the natural universe-to the innerworkings of molecules and the physical and chemical condit ions of "outerspace." While man 's empirical knowledge in our century has expanded at anexponent ia l rate , however, h is sense of purpose or di rect ion seems to haveatrophied; although more knowledgeable about the wor ld than any of hisforebears, man today is more ignorant or at a loss as to what he and hisaccumulated knowledge areal! about. Confronted with a rationally functioningbut ultimately silent universe, he asks the question: what is the point? Viewed inthis context contemporary methodological issues reveal their sal ience andunderlying agony: the concern with "understanding" as a type of inquiry resultsfrom a crisis of human understanding.

That methodological reorientation should derive from broad intellectualpredicaments is not an entirely novel occurrence. Throughout history, when-ever existing conceptions of the world became dubious or lost their plausibility,new avenues of inqui ry were typically cleared to faci litate man's continuedquest for knowledge and sel f-knowledge. At it s incept ion , modern natura lscience itself was the result ofa crisis ofunderstanding-more specifically, ofagrowing rupture between man and nature (or a certain metaphysical-theologicalconception of nature). When man was no longer able to view himself as anintegral part of creation and when the divine "book of nature," the "biblianaturae ," was no longer intelligible tohim as a direct key tothe workings of the


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2 INTRODUCTION'verse, he began to investigate nature as a set of empirical processes inuOi -. . . ) dccordance with strict logical-mathematical canons (more geometrlco an

~aterin accordance with the method of experimental replication. 1The collapseof the medieval cosmos, however, laid the foundation not only for a ~ewtreatment of nature, but a lso for new efforts of human sel f-understandmg.When God was no longer immediately perceived in his creation, it becameimperative both for theologians and believers in general .to p~ace inc~easingemphasis on God's special revelation, his "word" as contained in the ~Ible-arevelation that was accessible to man alone among all creatures due tohis capac-ity for language. This trend led to comprehensive en~eavors at biblical exegesisor scriptural "hermeneutics," during the Reformation and post-ReformatIOnperiod. Simultaneously with this at tent iveness to ~c~ip .t~re. ' man began todiscover (or rediscover) himself inhis own works. This irutianve took the formof a revival of antiquity and of a renewed reading of classical texts , which hadpreviously either been ignored or been known only in th~ologi~al disguise .Thus, the Renaissance inaugurated the development of philological and cul-tural interpretation."At the beginning , the two seedlings of early modernity-science and in~er-pretive understanding-were able to coexist more or less peaceab~y and wI.th-out mutual recriminations; but harmony soon gave way to antagonism. Dunngthe Enl ightenment, logical calcula tion and empirica l analysis beg~~ to gainascendancy over and challenge the in tr insic value of cul tural t radi tions; theattack was continued on a more pragmatic level by utilitarianism with itsemphasis onmeasurable personal gain. An initial response tothis challenge canbe found in the wri tings of Giambatti sta Vico, whose thesis verum etfactumconvertuntur suggested that history and culture were more readily intelligiblethan nature since man was (at least in a loose sense) their author and thus couldrecapture himself in records of the past. Vico's lead was .conti~ued, in aspeculative vein, by the idealist and romanticist movements Withtheir stress?ninternal or spiritual experience; romanticism in particular presented. t.h~entirewor ld of culture (if not of nature) as an emanation of human sensitivity andingenuity, especial ly of the creat ive endeavors of leading individuals. Re-stricted from the outset to small philosophical or literary circles, however, thesemovements vanished with the rise of the industrial era committed to efficientproduction. By that time, utilitarianism had found a ma~o.rally in pos.itiv~sm-adoctrine centering on the proposit ion that only empirical and sClent lf ic~l lyuseful knowledge deserves the tit le "knowledge" at all and that all .c~~pe~mgtypes of cognition or inquiry belong to more primitive .stages of c.lvlhzatlOn.Couched atfirst asa vague formula, positivism began to Implement ItSprogramin the later part of the nineteenth century, with the result th~t.alldisciplines w~resoon faced with the alternative of either embracing scientific method or facingextinction.

The Crisis of Understanding 3This situation-the claim of empirical science to absolute supremacy-con-

sti tutes the immediate background for the intellec tual "cris is" of our age andfor the intense ferment in the republic of letters accompanying this crisis. Thefol lowing pages intend to give a condensed synopsis of the major batt les andskirmishes resulting from the positivist offensive in our century. One point thatshould emerge clearly from this account is that successive encounters haveaffected not only the arsenal of weapons but a lso the respective sel f- image ofthe contestants inthe sense that both science and interpretive understanding aretoday involved in a process of serious self-scrutiny and reevaluation.

The story of the contemporary crisis of understanding opens, in this volume,with one of the leading pioneers, or"founders," ofpresent-day sociology, MaxWeber. 3 Weber's l ifetime witnessed some of the first impressive advances ofpositivism on the road to hegemony and also some of the first comprehensiveand methodologically scrupulous efforts to block and checkmate this assault .Although highly inventive and innovative in his sociological investigations,Weber's philosophical outlook and also his attitude toward "understanding"were heavily indebted to prominent intellectual currents of his time, especiallyto Dilthey's historical inquiry and to neo-Kantianism; brief comments on thesesources of inspi ra tion may serve to place his approach into relief . WilhelmDilthey is known as the architect of the so-called Geisteswissenschaften-aphilosophical and methodological bulwark designed to stem the tide of posi-tivist science. His arguments were directed primarily against British spokes-men of positivist empiricism, such as John Stuart Mill, but one should notesome subterranean t ies that l ink him to his opponents . While an advocate ofempiricist methodology for purposes of sociological inquiry, Mill as a politicaltheorist was also a great defender of liberal individualism; whatever his otherpreferences, Dilthey shared at least Mill's latter premise, although individual-ism in his view referred not so much to the ownership of possessions as to thecapability of designing cultural artifacts. I n elaborating his cultural and histor-ical methodology, Dilthey drew heavily on the teachings of Schleiermacher (adistinguished philosopher and theologian of the romanticist period) and also onthe wri tings of the German" Historical School" (a scholarly offshoot of thesame era). Both Schle iermacher and nineteenth-century German historianswere strongly committed to the notion of "individuality" construed as amicrocosm or as the focal point of a given historica l and cultura l context. 4

Dilthey's out look was molded not only by the legacy of individualism butalso, a t least in his early wri tings, by what has been cal led "psychologism."The choice of the term Geisteswissenschaften ("mental sciences") was itself anindication that the distinctive feature ofthe proposed approach was its focus oninternal, psychic experience as contrasted to the occurrences of external nature.The basic task of the Geisteswissenschaften, which, in Dilthey's view, in-cluded history, the humanities, and even part of the social sciences, was to


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4 INTRODUCTIONex am in e m an ifestatio ns o f h um an cre ativ ity an d in ten tio nality w ith th e g oal o frecapturing in past docum ents and cultural records the original spirit thata nim ated th eir au th ors. A cco rd in g to D ilth ey , th is ty pe of in qu iry w as b oun d toproduce m ore reliable and m ore intelligible results than any other cognitiveendeavor, since, in his w ords, "only w hat m ind has produced, m ind can fullyunderstand." The occurrences of the natural or physical w orld, on the otherhand, w ere relatively opaque and could be rendered accessible only by m eansof the abstract explanatory constructs of natural science disclosing law likeuniform ities and causal connections: "Nature we explain; psychic life weunderstand [verstehen]."

O bv io usly, in its re lian ce o n in tern al ex pe rien ce , D ilth ey 's ap pro ach co uldserve as barrier to positivist hegem ony only as long as "m ind" and "psyche"w ere them selves im mune from scientific explanation; one of the chief de-velopm ents during his life, however, was precisely the traI1sformation ofp sy ch olo gy into an em pirical d isc ip lin e. O n th is sco re h is strateg y th us n eed edto be corrected-and w as corrected by, am ong others, a group of neo- K antianth in kers led b y H ein rich R ick ert, w ho o th erw ise w ere w ho lly in sy mp athy w ithh is an tip ositiv ist stan ce. In R ic ke rt's w ritin gs th e re med y re sid ed in a reco urseto th e K an tia n d istin ctio n b etw ee n fa cts a nd (tra nste mp ora l) n orm s; th is d is tin c-tion, he argued, w as crucial not only for com batting "psychologism " but alsofo r fin din g an o rd erin g p rin cip le in h isto ry . O nly th ro ug h th eir relatio nsh ip tonorm ative values could historical events acquire cultural significance;D ilthey's approach for this reason was recast by Rickert under the label of" cu lt ur al s ci en c es " (Kulturwissenschafteni."

The bifurcation of natural and cultural sciences becam e a cornerstone ofW eb eria n s oc io lo gy , a lth ou gh o ne s ho uld k ee p in m in d th at h is m eth od olo gic alviews underwent subtle modifications over the years. H is early essay on"'O bjectivity ' in Social Science and Social Policy" (published in 1904)fa ith fully refle cted R ick ert's te ac hin gs. S ocio lo gy w as presen ted by W eb er aso ne o f th e c ultu ra l scien ces, a nd th e latter w ere de fin ed as "th ose d iscip line sw hic h an aly ze th e p hen om en a o f life in term s o f th eir cu ltu ral sig nific an ce ."T he sig nifica nc e o f cu ltu ral e ven ts w as said to d eriv e fro m a "v alue -o rien ta-tion" tow ard these events, since "em pirical reality becomes 'culture ' to usbecause and insofar as w e relate it to value ideas." The exam ination of socialp hen om en a in term s o f c ultu ra l m ea nin g, W eb er ad ded , w as "e ntire ly d ifferen tfro m th e a na ly sis o f re ality in te rm s o f la ws a nd g en era l c on ce pts "-a lth ou ghth e fo cu s o n c au sa l a nd lo gic al re la tio ns hip s p erf orm ed a n im po rta nt " pre lim i-n ar y t as k."

Sim ilar notions can still be found in W eber's m onum ental study entitledEconomy and Society (p ub lish ed p osth um ou sly in 1 92 1), b ut the g ap b etw eencultural understanding and causal analysis w as narrow ed, and sociology w astreated m ore clearly as a general or system atic science. The study defined

The Crisis of Understanding 5so cio log y as "a scien ce w hich attem pts th e in te rp retiv e u nde rstan din g o f so cialaction" where the term "action" covered "all human behavior when andinsofar as the acting individual attaches a SU bjective m eaning to it," w hile"social" im plied that the action "takes account of the behavior of others and isth ereb y o rie nted in its co urse." M ean in gfu l actio n w as se greg ate d in th e stu dyfrom m erely externally induced or "reactive behavior" unrelated to an "in-tended purpose"; but W eber cautioned that the dividing line could not "besh arp ly d ra wn em pirica lly ." M oreo ver, d esp ite th e elab ora tio n o f a v arie ty o fs oc io lo g ic a ll y r el ev a nt a c ti vi ti es , Economy and Society p la ce d c en tra l e mp ha -sis on "instrum ental-rational" action-a type in which the end is basicallyg iv en a nd th e m ean s-e nd s re la tio nsh ip can b e trea te d a s a prec ise, q uasi-ca usa lrelationship. Regarding the notion of action, one should add that it referredonly to "the behavior of one or m ore individual h um an b ein gs"-a carry -o vero f D ilth ey '.s (an d R ic kert's) in div id ualism . So cia l a gg reg ate s o r g ro up in gs, inW eber's V iew , could never constitute genuine units of analysis: "For thes ub je ctiv e in te rp re ta tio n o f a ctio n in s oc io lo gic al w ork th es e c olle ctiv itie s m us tbe treated as solely the resu lta nts an d m od es o f o rg an iza tio n o f the p articu laracts o f in div id ua l p erso ns, sin ce th ese alo ne ca n b e treate d as ag en ts in a c ou rseo f s u bj ec ti ve ly u nde rs ta n da b le action.':"

W eber's im pact on social science and social theory has been profound andcom ~lex. B y and large, positivist social scientists have tended to be appre-hensive about his notion of interpretive understanding, w hile m any critics ofpositivism have been attracted to his w ork precisely because of this feature.Actually, however, reactions on both sides of the fence have been morev arie gated . D esp ite h is e ndo rsem en t in so me n on po sitiv ist circ les, reso lu tedefenders of "cultural" inquiry have found his legacy too deeply im bued w ithsys~em atic and em piricist leanings to provide an adequate rallying point fort he ir c au se .

A ttitudes in the other cam p also have tended to differ. Som e cham pions of as cie ntific s oc io lo gy c on clu de d th at W eb er 's w ork w as s uff ic ie ntly c lo se to th eiro ~n asp ira tio ns to se:v e as a p rec ed en t o r sp rin gb oard fo r "rig oro us" in qu iry ,given certain corrections or am endm ents. A ccording to Talcott Parsons thele ad in g p ro po ne nt o f th is vie w, th e m ajo r co rre ctio n ne ed ed w as th e in tro du c-ti?n of a general or system atic perspective. W hile strongly approving thep iv otal ro le assig ned to so cial a ctio n, P arso ns a rg ued th at to p erm it sc ien tificanalysis, hum an behavior needed to be seen as part of an overarching netw orkor a "social system ." Once it w as recognized that social system s pursued~ erta i~ n e~ e.ss ary g oa .ls -e s~ cia lly th e g oa l o f s ys te m m ain te na nc e a nd a da pta -tIO n-individual SO Cial a ctions could be scientifically explained in term s oftheir instrum ental relationship to such goals as their "final cause," that is, interm s of their "functional" or "dysfunctional" contribution to systemsta bility ." A s stud en ts o f W eb er w ere q uick to p oin t o ut, P arso nian soc io lo gy


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6 INTRODUCTIONinvolved an excessive pruning or streamlining of Weberian teachings; aboveall, the central category of interpretive understanding was rendered virtuallyobsolete by the stipulation of a preordained teleology.

On the whole, Parson's reformulation remained an isolated venture inWeberian scholarship; the bulk of his sympathizers were too apprehensive of"cultural" exegesis to follow his lead. The dominant posture adopted bypositivists and especially by logical empiricists was to treat Weber indeed as aherald of social research but as one who never caught sight of the promisedland. For methodological purposes, Weber's legacy inthis view constituted notan alternative but at best a preamble to scientific inquiry. Interpretive under-standing in particular-to the extent that it was not completely exorcised-wasviewed not as an integral ingredient but as a prefix or embroidery in theanteroom of research, useful for generating "heuristic" insights and for aidingin the formulation of hypotheses. As Otto Neurath, one of the early logicalempiricists, once formulated the issue: while helpful for increasing the seren-dipity or alacrity of the scientist, understanding was as little a part ofhis actualempirical work as a cup ofcoffee consumed in the course of his investigations.This "cup-of-coffee" theory of understanding was quickly picked up by othermembers ofthe logical-empiricist movement and became a standard weapon ini ts intel lectual arsenal . Typically, the term "understanding" in this contexttended to be identified with psychological empathy or with the reenactment or"reproduction" of mental and emotive processes. As one may note, thelogical-empiricist reception virtually reversed the order of priorities sketched inWeber's early writings, where causal or scientific explanation was presented asa "preliminary task" or heuristic prelude to sociological inquiry. More impor-tantly, the identification of understanding with psychological empathy ignoredthe neo-Kantian restatement and entirely bypassed the controversy over"psychologism." As one observer has noted: "The mistake ofboth the ortho-dox critics and certain advocates of Verstehen is their common acceptance ofthe idea that the meaningfulness of social action is elucidated by getting insidepeople's heads by setting into operation a mental process called'understanding.' "8

Batt les sometimes continue to be fought when the original motives havevanished or been seriously modified. While the empiricist offensive againstWeber's legacy was s ti ll in full swing, developments were already afoot thatwere des tined to recast the underlying issues in completely new terms. Thesedevelopments occurred in two very different settings and involved very diver-gent l ines of argument: the one arose in the ambiance of posi tivism within thelargely Anglo-American confines of the "analytical philosophy of language";the other emerged on the continent under such labels as "phenomenology" and"existential analysis. " Despite their heterogenei ty, the two developmentsmoved toward (at least partial) convergence inregard to the role of interpretive

The Crisis of Understanding 7understanding; using a shorthand formula one might say that both initiativesthrew a new light not only on the much belabored issue of"psycho logism" butalso on the much more weighty and age-old heritage of methodological "indi-vidualis~" (sti.ll prominent in ~eber's case). For the sake of continuity ofp~es~ntatlOn, ~I,Sc.usslOnhere Will focus first on the rise of linguistic analysiswithin the posmvist camp, broadly defined, and subsequently turn to intellec-tual trends on the continent.

In the positivist and empiricist context , the turn toward language and lan-guage analysis signified first of all a realization that empirical reality could notbe directly grasped without an adequate conceptual and linguistic framework'in the long run, however, the same turn carried with it another implicationimportant for social inquiry: the insight that human act ion is social f rom the?e~i~ning, s ince ~hemeaning of an act ion cannot be articulated even by thel?dlVldua! ~ctor w,lth?ut recourse to language, that is, a shared pool ofsignifica-tIO~S. Initially, It IS true, language analysts-like their positivist com-panions-shunned all reference to purposive meaning, whether individual orsocial , and to the enterprise of interpretive unders tanding. In his TractatusLogico-Philosophicus, Ludwig Wittgenstein-the pioneering leader of thegroup-tried todesign a transparent (or "ideal") linguistic framework modeledon formal logic,. a framework that would grant unobstructed access to reality,c~mpletely eluding the obscure domain of opinions, purposes, and intentions.Rigorously construed, the perspective of the Tractatus relegated the notions of"subject" and purposive "meaning" from the realm of concrete exper ience tothe status ofexte~n~l "limits" or linguistic parameters of the world; inso doing,the stud~ also eliminated the need for intersubjective clarification of meaning(and ultimately also the possibility of philosophical reflection).

Th~ aversi?n to exegesis was continued by semanticists and linguisticpluralists dedicated to the construction of specialized language frameworks'~espite the importance attached to meta-languages or meta-linguistic conven~nons for scienti fic inquiry, such conventions were treated either as s implefactual premises or as arbitrary f iats of exper ts. The contours of a rapproche-ment emerged only in the wri tings of the later Wit tgenstein, especially in hisemphasis on ordinary language and the notion of "language games" embeddedm commonsense conventions; once linguistic practices were seen as intimately"interwoven" with concrete "life-forms" and worldviews, the feasibility of a"c~ltura,l" interpretation became apparent. Nevertheless, Wittgenstein's ownattitude m this matter remained ambivalent to the end, as he left open (or failedto block) the road to an empiricist t reatment of language and the reduct ion ofmeaning to behavior."

Whatever Wittgenstein's pre ferences may have been, a number of fol-lowers-foremost among them Peter Winch-have developed the notion of"language games" into a springboard for cultural and social analysis. Winch's


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8 INTRODUCTIONThe Idea of a Social Science placed decisive stress on the task of interpretiveexegesis or-in his words-on "the central role which the concept of under-standing plays inthe activities which are characteristic of human societies." Asthe study tried toshow, however, the interpretation of social behavior could notrely solely on the intentions of an individual actor, since these intentions wereinteiligible only within a language community and in terms of the rules ofconduct and language usage operative in that community. Social analysis thuswas predicated on the understanding of intersubjective standards: "It is only asituation in which it makes sense to suppose that somebody else could inprinciple discover the rule which I am fol lowing that I can be said to follow arule at all ." Comparing these premises with tradi tional sociology and espe-cially with Weber's legacy, Winch found similarities as well as divergences. Inaccord with Weber (at leas t with Weber's early formulations), Winch arguedthat social understanding involves "grasping the point or meaning of what isbeing done or said" and thus an effort "far removed from the world of statisticsand causal laws" and "closer to the realm of discourse." The charge of"psychologism" was quickly dismissed by the insistence that the distinctive-ness of social inquiry "does not rest on the hypothesis of an 'inner sense.' "Despite these aff init ies, Winch summed up the chief divergence in the s tate-ment that Weber's "character ization of Sinn as something 'subjectively in-tended' must be approached wearily"; for the understanding of meaning waspossible only on the basis ofrules or"where the act inquest ion has a relat ion toa social context: this must be t rue even of the most private acts, i f, that is, theyare meaningful.Y'"

The aspect of Winch's s tudy that occasioned the most l ively controversyamong reviewers was the thesis of the uniqueness and virtual incommensura-bility of individual language games and life-forms. Viewing life-forms asclosely kni t webs of opinions and ideas, Winch considered i t "nonsensical totake several systems ofideas, find anelement ineach which can be expressed inthe same verbal form, and then claim to have discovered an idea which iscommon to a il the systems"; rather, the "very nature" of human society was"to consist in dif ferent and competing ways of li fe, each offering a differentaccount of the intelligibility of things." The thesis ofuniqueness was ofcrucialimportance to the social scient is t who had to take his bearings and his cri teriafrom "within the way of l ife he is studying," instead of arbitrar ily imposing"his own standards from without" ; in fact, science and logical analysis werethemselves a particular way of life and could not be applied as cri teria on"modes of social l ife as such." In formulating this argument , Winch seemedindebted, at least in part , to Wittgenstein's empiricist and antispeculativeleanings; despite his efforts to differentiate life-forms from mere habits on thebasis of the potentially "reflective" character of language rules, he was averse

The Crisis of Understanding 9to the enterprise of a general , comparat ive reflection: "Connected with therealization that intelligibility takes many and varied forms is the realization thatreali ty has no key." His argument on this score has been cri ticized from manyquar ters -most vocally by adepts of a "cri tical pos itivism" committed to theproposition that scientific research, although fallible and in need of constantrevision, is dest ined ult imately to grasp object ive real ity independently ofhistorical conditions and cultural variations. In subsequent' writings Winchprogressively modif ied his "relativist" assumptions; i t is not enti rely clear ,however, how these modifications affect the basic Wittgensteinian program ofsocial analysis.

On the continent, phenomenology was to some extent a continuation ofDilthey's and Rickert 's efforts to elucidate the dimension of "meaning" as acounterpart to scientific explanation. Paralleling Rickert's initiative, Husserl'sear ly wri tings launched a broad-scale attack on "psychologisrn" and on thereduction of thought to empirical processes; by comparison with neo-Kantianism, however, Husserl from the beginning extended the scope ofinquiry beyond normative values to the full range of (natural and cultural)phenomena amenable to human cognition. His Logical Investigations initiallysought to vindicate the integrity and constancy of logical propositions; but theforce of the argument carried over to all types of meaningful statementsreflecting man's understanding of the world. Although reformulating andsharpening the insights of his predecessors, Husserl at least in one respectremained heir to their perspective: in the attachment to individualism or to anindividual-egological "consciousness ." The phenomenological method of"bracketing," or epoche , in his treatment signified bas ically an attempt tounravel the meaningful core, or "essence," of phenomena as disclosed in (or"constituted" by) a purified consciousness. At least inthis respect his approachreplicated the solipsist ic dilemma of ear ly language analysis and of much oftraditional philosophy: to the extent that consciousness was presented as"transcendental limit" of the world, the domain of intersubjective understand-ing and clarification of meaning was obliterated. In his later writings Husserlsought to overcome this dilemma by introducing the notion of the "life-world,"or world of mundane experience, but the relationship between mundanity andconsciousness was never fully clarified.

By tha t time, the thrust of phenomenological analysis had already beenprofoundly reshaped by Heidegger's del ineation, in Being and Time, of a"hermeneutical phenomenology" or "existential ontology." Understanding ofmeaning, in Heidegger's conception, was no longer the prerogative of individ-ual cognition or consciousness but a basic attribute of man's existential condi-tion orDasein construed as "being-in-the world." Far from occupying the roleof an alien spectator, Dasein was seen as enmeshed in a fabr ic of "preunder-


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IO INTRODUCTIONstanding" and "pre-predicative" experience, a fabric that was basically inter-subjective and cul tural in character.P

Neither Husserl nor Heidegger were concerned with articulating the implica-t ions of their thoughts for social inquiry. The elaboration of a "phenomeno-logical sociology" was chief ly the accomplishment of one of Husserl 's stu-dents, Alfred Schutz. In one of his f irs t major works, The Phenomenology ofthe Social World, Schutz tried to effect a merger of Weberian sociology andHusserl ' s teachings by tracing the notion of meaningful social action to anunderlying stratum or stream of constitutive consciousness. Even in this earlys tudy, however , Schutz was not wedded ina doctr inaire manner tothe methodof bracketing; turning to the predicaments of intersubjective relations, hereplaced "transcendental reduct ion" with the "att itude of the natural s tand-point" concerned with mundane experience. In his later writings, he grewsteadily weary of egological methodology and increasingly preoccupied withthe domain of the "life-world," the domain of "common-sense" and everydayactivity. Drawing at least in part on Heideggerian insights, he treated "under-standing" not simply as an individual cognitive faculty but as a mult idimen-sional category denoting an existential or "experiential form of common-senseknowledge of human affairs" as well as an "epistemological problem" and a"method peculiar to the social sciences." Yet, like Husserl, Schutz ultimatelyleft unresolved the significance of the life-world and the respective weights ofconsciousness and intersubjectivity.P

In a sense the same ambivalence overshadows contemporary "ethnornethod-ology," one of the major offshoots of phenomenological sociology. Basicallycommitted to the investigation of commonsense experience, or "the practicaleveryday activities of men in society as they make accountable, to themselvesand others, their everyday affa irs," ethnomethodologists tend to diffe r onwhether ordinary life reflects invariant or transcendental cognitive structures orwhether cognition is itself shaped by cultural contexts. In the first case, socialreali ty is in danger of being dissolved into mental or" ideal" proper ties; in thesecond case, cognition faces the hazard of historical and culturalcontingency. 14

The tension between invariance and contingency, individualism and inter-subjectivi ty, are not the only predicaments beset ting social inquiry today.Conjoined with these issues, the sketched skirmishes and developments haveengendered a quandary which touches the core of cognition and the basics tructure of the republic of let ters : the quandary regarding the relat ionshipbetween science and understanding, knowledge and self-knowledge. The di-lemma is an outgrowth of the contemporary a ttack on "individualism" and"subjectivism," construed not as a methodological ploy but as a challenge tothe pervasive subject-object legacy of the modern age. Inthis sense, the present

The Crisis of Understanding 11day "cr is is of unders tanding" is also a crisis of moderni ty. Once the pil lar ofindividualism is eroded, the twin seedlings of the modern era-natural scienceand interpretive unders tanding--are also bound to be affected and to be com-pelled to redefine their respective provinces. Once man is no longer seen assovereign analyst and potential master of the world, his independence not onlyfrom society but also from nature is placed injeopardy.

Although universally noted, the dilemma has been debated in recent yearswith particular intensity by German and French thinkers; preponderantly, thesedebates have centered on the proper range or scope of interpretive exegesis .One argumentative strategy, favored by representatives of the "neo- FrankfurtSchool" of social research, has been to maintain the integr ity of tradi tionaltypes of inquiry while resisting the tendency toward segregation or one-sidedhegemony. Thus, dedicated to the long-range prospect of human self -under-s tanding and emancipat ion but dis turbed by the quasi-natural constraints ofmodern society, Jiirgen Habermas and Karl-Otto Apel have advocated thejuxtaposition of hermeneutics and scientific analysis (and also their combina-tion for purposes of critical social inquiryj.t> On the other hand, hermeneuti-cists influenced by Heidegger have tended to redefine interpretive exegesis bydeemphasizing the aspect of subjective purpose and intentionality; in his Truthand Method, Hans-Georg Gadamer presented history not so much as anemanation of individual pract ice but as a complex learning process in whichman is able to decipher himself only through encounters with past culturalins ti tutions. Seen in this l ight , the scope of hermeneutical understanding isbound to be broad and devoid of clear-cut boundary lines. In the Frenchcontext , Paul Ricoeur has argued infavor not only of the coexistence but of anintimate reciprocal dialogue and symbiosis of understanding and scient if icexplanation .16

The issues underlying these deba tes are likely to preoccupy and troublephilosophy and social inquiry for a long time tocome. This ishardly surprising.After all, the predicaments of human understanding are not like mathematicalproblems or crossword puzzles, which permit definitive solutions. Involvingboth man's relat ion to the world and his self -assessment, the contemporarycris is is itself par t of a dif ficult learning process whose direction s ignals arehazy and whose end is by no means in sight. Can interpretive exegesis stillperform a role in a si tuat ion when the individual is dislodged from his tradi-tional preeminence? Is itpossible to speak of "meaning" and the "point" oflifeeven without reference to subjectively intended purposes? Or will understand-ing become defunct and be effaced by anonymous events and structures? Socialinquiry cannot and should not be expec ted to offer ready-made answers;however, as long as they claim or desire to make a point , social scient is ts wil lhave to grapple with these questions.


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12 INTRODUCTION

NOTES

I . Compare on this point Karl-Otto Apel, "Das Yerstehen (eine Problemgeschichteals Begriffsgeschichte)," Archil' fur Begriffsgeschichte I (1955): 142-99, esp. pp.144-53. The essay sketches the "dual prehist ory" of the contemporary not ion of"understanding": the emergence of modern science and the development ofhermeneutical interpretation.

2. In the words of Richard E. Palmer, hermeneuti cal underst anding in i ts modernsense "emerges his torically from its parentage in biblical exegesis and classical phi lol-ogy." See Hermeneut ics: Interpretat ion Theory in Schleiermacher, Dil they, Heideg-ger , and Gadamer (Evanston , Il l.: Northwest ern Uni versi ty Press , 1969), p. 40.Palmer point s al so t o the Greek roots of the t erm "hermeneuti cs ," indicat ing (pp.12-32) tha t t hese roots refer broadly to al l kinds of effor ts to render man or the wor ldintelligible, including oral recitation, explanation, and translation.

3. Inl ieu of Weber i tmight al so have been possibl e tose lect as s tar ti ng point another"founder" of sociol ogy, Georg Simmel. However, many or most of Simmel's argu-ment s a re al so p resent in Weber' s wri ti ngs; besides , Weber 's i nfluence on soc iologyboth in Europe and America has been vastly more pervasive. One may note that MauriceMerl eau-Ponty ent it led a probing es say on Weber "The Cri si s of Unders tanding"; seeAdventures of the Dialectic, t rans . Joseph Bien (Evanston, III .: Northwestern Univer-s it y Pres s, 1973) , pp. 9-29.

4. As Apel wri tes: "The accent of Schle ie rmacher 's not ion of underst anding l ies onthe domain of individua l b iography-an aspect which makes him a teacher of Dil they,Simmel, and modern biography in general. His ult imate goal is to understand t heindividual as completely as possible." "Das Yerstehen ... ," p. 168.

5. Compare Wilhelm Dil they, Gesammelte Schriften, 5th ed. (Stuttgart: Kohlham-mer, 1962), I : 12,5: 144,7: 148. Compare a lso Herbert P . Rickman, "Reac tion agains tPositivism and Dilthey's Concept of Understanding," Bri tish lournal of Sociology , I I(1960): 307-18; Rudolf A. Makkree l, "Wi lhelm Dil they and the Neo-Kanti ans: TheDistinction of theGeisteswissenschaften and the Kulturwissenschaf ten ," lournal of theHistory of Philosophy, 7 (1969): 423-40.

6. See Max Weber, "'Objectivity' in Social Science and Social Policy," inMethodology of the Social Sciences, ed. Edward A. Sh ils and Henry A. Finch (Gl en -coe, I ll .: F ree Press , 1949), pp. 52-54; "The Fundamenta l Concept s ofSoc iology," inEconomy and Society, ed. Guenther Roth and Claus Wit ti ch (New York: Bedminst erPress , 1968), pp. 10-16.

7. Commenting on the relat ionship between natural and "cultural" sciences, Parsonsnoted: "What Weber did was to t ake an enormous s tep in the direct ion of br idging thegap between the two t ypes o f science, and to make pos sibl e t he treatment of socialmaterial ina systematic scienti fic manner rather than as an art . But he fai led tocompletethe process , and the nature of the halfway point atwhich he stopped helps to account formany of the difficult ies of h is posit ion." See The Theory of Social and EconomicOrganization, t rans . A. M. Henderson and Talcott Parsons (Glencoe, I ll .: Free Press ,1947), "Introduction," pp. 10-11.

8. Compare Arthur W. Diquatt ro, "Verstehen as an Empirical Concept," Sociologyand Sociological Research, 57(1972): 35; al so Thomas A. McCar thy, "On Misunder-s tanding' Understanding' ," Theory and Decision, 3 (1973): 351-70.

9. For thi s backg round compare Apel , "Wit tgenstein unddas Probl em des her-meneutischen Yerstehens," inTransformation der Philosophie (Frankfurt-Main: Suhr-

The Crisis of Understanding 13kamp, 1973), I: 335-77; also his" Die Entfaltung der 'sprachanalyt ischen' Phi losophieund das Problem der 'Geis teswis senschaft en ' , " i bid. , 2: 28-95.

10. Peter Winch, The Idea of a Social Science and Its Relation to Philosophy(London: Rout ledge and Kegan Paul, 1958), pp. 22, 30,47,50, 115 , 119. Comparealso his comment (p. 40) that "the phi losophical elucidation of human intel ligence, andthe not ions associated with this, requires that these not ions be placed inthecontext oftherelat ions between men in s oci et y. In so far as there has been a genui ne revolut ion inrecent years , perhaps i t l ies inthe emphasis on that fact and inthe profound working outof i ts consequences , which we find in Wit tgenst ein' s work."II. Ibid ., pp. 100, 102-3, 107-8.

12. On these developments see Apel , "Die be iden Phasen der Phanornenologie inihrer Auswirkung auf das phi losophische Vorverstandnis von Sprache und Dichtung inder Gegenwart " and hi s "Heideggers philos ophis che Radikali sierung der 'Her-meneutik' und das 'Sinnkriterium' der Sprache," inTransformation der Philosoph ie, I:79-105, 276-334. Compare also Palmer's comments: "For Heidegger, understandingis the power to grasp one's own possibilities for being, within the context of theli fe-world in which one exi sts. It is not a special capacit y or gi ft for feeli ng i nto thesituation of another person, nor is i t the power to grasp the meaning of some 'expressionof l ife' on a deeper level . Understanding isconceived not as something to be possessedbut rather as a mode or const ituent element of being-in-the-world." Hermeneutics, p.131.13. Compare Alfred Schutz, The Phenomenology of the Social World, trans. GeorgeWal sh and Frederi ck Lehnert (Evanston, I ll .: Northwes te rn Univers it y Pres s, 1967);a lso "Concept and Theory Formation in the Social Sc iences ," inCollected Papers I:The Problem of Social Reali ty, ed. Maurice Natanson (The Hague: Martinus Nijhoff,1962), pp. 48-66. The ambivalence i s evident i n the latt er essay (pp. 56, 62) whenSchutz first notes that, far removed from "introspect ion," Verstehen "is a result ofprocesses of learning or accul turation," and then endorses Weber 's premise of subjec-t ive intentional ity: "If the social sciences aim indeed at explaining social reali ty," thentheir constructs "must include a reference tothe subject ive meaning anaction has for theactor. This is, I think, what Max Weber understood by his famous postulate ofsubjective understanding."

I 4. Compare Jack D. Douglas, ed., Understanding Everyday Lif e: Toward theReconstruction of Sociological Knowledge (Chicago: Aldine Publ ishing Co. , 1970) ;al so George Psathas , "Ethnorne thods and Phenomenology," Social Research , 35(1968): 509; and Fred R. Dal lmayr, "Phenomenology and Social Sci ence : An Over-view and Apprai sa l, " i nExplorations in Phenomenology, ed. David Carr and EdwardS. Cas ey (The Hague: Mart inus Nijhoff, 1974), pp. 133-66, es p. pp. 157-58.

15. Compare Jiirgen Habermas, Knowledge and Human Interests (Boston: BeaconPres s, 1971) ; Kar l-Ot to Apel, "Szi enti st ik , Hermeneutik, Ideologiekri ti k: Entwurfeiner Wissenschaftslehre in erkenntnisanthropologischer Sicht," inTransformation derPhilosophie , 2: 96-127; a lso Apel e t a I. , eds ., Hermeneutik und Ideologiekritik (Frank-furt-Main: Suhrkamp, 1971).

16. Compare Hans-Georg Gadamer, Wahrhei t und Methode: Grundzi ige einerphilosophischen Hermeneutik, 2d ed. (Ti ibingen : J . C. B. Mohr, 1965), Eng lishtranslation: Truth and Method, t rans . Gar ret t Barden and John Cumming (New York:Seabury Press, 1975); Paul Ricoeur, Freud and Philosophy: An Essay onInterpretation, t rans . Denis Savage (New Haven: Yale Univers it y Pres s, 1970), andThe Conflict of Interpretations: Essays in Hermeneutics, ed. Don Ihde (Evanston, Ill .:Northwestern Univers ity Press , 1974).


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Suggested ReadingsBROWN, R R Explanation in Social Science. Chicago: Aldine, 1963.BUHL, Walter L., ed. Verstehende Soziologie: Grundziige undEntwicklungstendenzen. Munich: Nymphenburger Veriagshandlung,

1972.CHAMBERS, F. P. Perception, Understanding, and Society: A Philosophi-

cal Essay on the Arts, Sciences, and Human Studies. London: Sidgwickand Jackson, 1961.

HODGES, H. A. The Philosophy of Wilhelm Dilthey. New York: HumanitiesPress, 1952.

____ . Wilhelm Dilthey: An Introduction. London: Routledge andKegan Paul, 1944.

MANNINEN J., and Tuomela, R., eds. Essays on Explanation andUnderstanding. Dordrecht, Holland: Reidel, 1975.

PARKINSON, G. H. R, ed. The Theory of Meaning. London: OxfordUniversity Press, 1968.RADNITZKY, Gerard. Contemporary Schools of Metascience. 2 vols.

Goteborg, Sweden: Akademiforlaget, 1968.RICKMAN, H. P. Understanding and the Human Studies. London: Heine-

man, 1967.RICKMAN, H. P., ed. Meaning in History: W. Dilthey's Thoughts on

History. London: George Allen and Unwin, 1961.RYAN, Alan, ed. The Philosophy of Social Explanation. London: Oxford

University Press, 1973.SKJER VHEIM, H. Objectivism and the Study of Man. Oslo: Univer-

sitetsvoriaget, 1959.TAYLOR. The Explanation of Behavior. London: Routledge and Kegan

Paul, 1964.TOULMIN, Stephen. Foresight and Understanding. London: Hutchison,

1961.----. Human Understanding. Vol. 1. Princeton, N.J.; Princeton

University Press, 1972.TRUZZI, Marcel lo, ed. Verstehen: Subjective Understanding in the Social

Sciences. Reading, Mass .: Addison-Wesley Publishing Co., 1974.VON WRIGHT, George H. Explanation and Understanding. Ithaca, N.Y.:

Cornell University Press, 1971.14

Suggested Reading 15WACH, Joachim. Das Verstehen: Grundzuge einer Geschichte der her-meneutischen Theorie. 3 vols. Ti ibingen: Mohr , 1926-33.ZIFF, Paul. Understanding Understanding. Ithaca, N.Y.: Cornell UniversityPress, 1972.


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74 M AX W EBER ON VERSTEHENSTARK, Werner. "Max Weber and the Heterogony of Purposes." SocialResearch 34 (1967): 249-64.STRA USS, Leo. Natural Right and History. Chicago: University of ChicagoPress, 1953.SYMPOSIUM. "Max Weber Today." The International Social Science

Journal 17 (1965): 9-70.SYMPOSIUM. "Papers on Max Weber." American Sociological Review 30(1965): 171-223.TUCKER, Will iam T. "Max Weber 's Verstehen." Sociological Quarterly 6

(1965): 157-65.WEBER, Max. The Methodology of the Social Sciences. Translated andedited by Edward A. Shils and Henry A. Finch. Glencoe, III.: Free

Press, 1949.----. The Protestant Ethic and the Spirit of Capitalism. Translated byTalcot t Parsons. New York: Scribner' s, 1930.____ . The Theory of Social and Economic Organization. Edited with

int roduct ion by Talcot t Parsons, t ransla ted by A. M. Henderson andTalcot t Parsons. New York: Oxford University Press, 1947.

,PART TW O

The Positivist Reception


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,1i

Introduction

THE TERM "POSITIVISM" NOW FUNCTIONS MORE AS A POLEMICAL EPITHETthan as a designation for a distinct phi losophical movement. Even if we leaveaside the positive phi losophy of Saint -Simon and Comte, the evolu tionarypositivism of Spencer and Haeckel, and the phenomenalism of Mach andAvenarius, and concent ra te on the "logical positivism" of the Vienna Circleand its descendents, it isdifficult to specify a common "positivist" perspective.For the subsequent development of the more or less unified program of theoriginal members of the circle has led to its disintegration as a distinctphilosophical movement . This is not to say that logical posi tivism has dis-appeared without a trace; on the contrary, it has been absorbed into suchinfluential traditions as empiricism, pragmatism, and linguistic analysis. Thenet resul t is that the "legacy of logical posit iv ism"-a legacy of convictionsand attitudes, problems and techniques, concepts and theories-pervades con-temporary thought. Methodological positions are most easily identified-be-cause they so identi fy themselves-wi th respect to this legacy, pro or con. Forour purposes i t wi ll be sufficient to indicate a few of the cent ra l "positivis t"tenets regarding the nature of social inquiry.

The str iking developments in the systematic study of the human world-from historiography and philology to sociology and anthropology-that tookplace in the course of the nineteenth century were generally viewed against thebackground of the establ ished natura l sciences. One or the other of these wasusually taken as a paradigm of "scient if ic ity" and a standard against whichprogress in the human sciences was to be measured. This perspect ive is a lsocharacteristic of the logical positivism of the twentieth century. The originalmembers of the Vienna Circle were, for the most part, neither social scientistsnor pure phi losophers , but they "had devoted a large part of thei r academicstudies-often including their doctoral work-to logic and mathematics, tophysics, or to a combination of these subjects." 1Itwas, then, quite natural thattheir attention was focused for the most part on logic, the foundations ofmathematics, and the methodology of the physical sciences and that the social

77


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78 THE POSITIVIST RECEPTIONsciences received comparatively lit tle attention from them. While the focus ofneopositivism gradually expanded to include the latter, the original commit-ment to the paradigmatic sta tus of the "exact" sciences remained firm. Thecharacteristic tenets of its approach to social inquiry derive from thiscommitment.f

(1) Regarding the unity of scientific method, despi te d ifferences in thespecific concepts and techniques proper to diverse domains of inquiry, themethodological procedures of natural science are applicable to the sciences ofman; the logic of inquiry is in both cases the same.

(2) More particularly, the goals of inquiry--explanation andprediction- areidentical, as is the form in which they are realized: the subsumption ofindivid-ual cases under hypothetically proposed general laws . Scientific investigation,whether of social or nonsocial phenomena, aims at the discovery of' ' law-like"generaliza tions that can function as premises in deductive explanat ions andpredictions. An event is explained by showing that it occurred in accordancewith certain laws of nature as a result of certain particular circumstances. Ifthelaws and circumstances are known, an event can bepredicted by employing thesame deductive form of argument.

(3) The relation oftheory topractice isprimarily technical. Ifthe appropriategeneral laws are known and the relevant initial conditions are manipulable, wecan produce a desi red state of affairs, natura l or social. But the question as towhich sta tes of affai rs are to be produced cannot it se lf be scienti fica lly re-solved. It isultimately a matter of decision, for no "ought" can be derived froman "is ," no "value" from a "fact." Scienti fic inquiry is it se lf "value-free"; itstrives only for objective (that is, intersubjectively testable, value-neutral)results.

(4) The hallmark of scientific knowledge is precisely its testability (inprinciple) . To test an hypothesis , we apply deductive logic in order to derivesingular observat ion sta tements whose falsehood would refute i t. Thus theempirical basis of science is composed of observation statements (that is,statements referring to publicly observable objects or events) that can be saideither to report perceptual experiences or, at least, to be mot ivated by them.

In recent decades, the applicability of these tenets to social inquiry hasbecome a subject of prolonged controversy. Questions concerning the natureand role of interpretive understanding have proved to be of fundamentalimportance at every point in these epistemological and methodological debates.Those who argue for the distinctiveness of the social f rom the natural sci-ences-whether in respect to the existence of general laws, the nature ofexplanation, the relation to values, the access to data, and so forth-typicallybase their arguments on the necessity in social inquiry of procedures designedto grasp the "meaning" of social phenomena. Conversely, those defending themethodological unity of the sciences typically proffer a rather low estimate of

~I Introduction 79

the importance of Verstehen for the logic of the social sciences. I t is eitherrejected as un- or pre-scientific, or analyzed as a "heuristic device" that, whileuseful, belongs in the anteroom of science proper. The selections by Abel andRudner exemplify this approach. Despite their different emphases, these au-thors share a particular conception of the role and nature of Verstehen and arriveat similar conclusions regarding its scientific status.

I. Verstehen is a procedure employed to gain understanding of individual orgroup behavior . Faced with an observed sequence of behavior, the socialscientist imputes to the agent certain "psychological states" (motives, beliefs,values, emotions) that might account for it. This is basically a matter ofpostu la ting "an intervening process ' located' inside the human organism"(Abel) , or of "recreating psychological sta tes" (Rudner) in order to make theobserved behavior comprehensible.

2. The procedure itself is based on acts of "sympathetic imagination" or"empathetic identification." The social scientist attempts to put himself in hissubject 's shoes. In his now classic article of 1948, which set the terms for muchof the later discussion, Abel breaks this down into three steps: a) internalizingthe stimulus, b) internalizing the response, and c)applying a behavior maxim toconnect them. Each step is "based on the application of personal experience toobserved behavior."

3. This definition ofthe problem goes a long way toward its resolution. Withfew exceptions-Scriven, for example-methodologists in this tradi tion arenot prepared to attribute a fundamental methodological role to psychologicalacts of empathy . So defined, Verstehen would, argues Abel , depend upon"personal experience" and "introspective capacity." Itcould not be a "methodof verif icat ion," but, at best, a heuris tic "aid in prel iminary explorat ions of asubject," with perhaps the additional capacity "to relieve us of a sense ofapprehension inconnection with behavior that isunfamiliar or unexpected." Inthe last analysis, the "probability of a connection" can be established "only bymeans of objective , experimenta l, and stat is tica l tests ." In a similar vein ,Rudner assigns the "technique" of Verstehen to the heuristic realm of hypoth-esis formulation or the "context of d iscovery"; i t i s not a "method" relevantto the "context of validat ion." The common result of these analyses is, then,that the employment of interpretive understanding does not affect the logic ofsocial inquiry; as a merely heuristic device it furnishes no grounds for distin-guishing the latter from the logic of the natural sciences.

Charles Taylor's discussion of interpretation challenges this account at everypoint. Verstehen has to do not with "inner-organic," "psychological" states,but with "intersubjective meanings" that are constitutive of social life. Theseare not grasped through acts of empathy, but through procedures not unl ikethose employed inthe hermeneutic interpretation of texts. And the logic ofsuchinterpretation is markedly different from that obtaining in the investigation of


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80 THE POSITIVIST RECEPTIONnonsocial phenomena. I n particular, hermeneutic understanding is inextricablyinvolved in a "circle" of readings (of texts or expressions), a circle that cannotbe broken by appeal to "brute data" of any kind. A reading can be correctedonly by other readings. Thus, in terpret ive understanding "cannot meet therequirements of intersubjective, non-arbitrary verification" that the neoposi-tivists consider essential to science.

The student of social life is not confronted merely with observable sequencesof uninterpreted behavior which he must then subsume under general laws.Since man is a "self-interpreting" animal, "what is interpreted is itself aninterpretation; a self-interpretation which is embedded in a stream of action."The agent experiences his situation "in terms of certain meanings"; the"explanation" we seek is "one which 'makes sense' of his behavior, whichshows a coherence of meaning." But these meanings are not merely subjectivemeanings "located" in the mind of the agent; they are in large part "thecommon property ofthe society," "intersubjective meanings which are consti-tutive of the social matrix in which individuals find themselves and act." Theycannot be grasped with the methods analyzed and universalized in the positivisttradition. Rather, they are the object of a hermeneutic science that requires ofi ts practit ioners "a certain measure of insight ." And insights may differ , notonly owing to divergent theoret ical posi tions, but as a resul t of "di fferentfundamental options in life" as well. Taylor's hermeneutic interpreter has littlein common with the value-neutral observer of behavioral science."

NOTES

I. Carl G. Hempel, "Logical Positivism andtheSocial Sciences," inThe Legacy ofLogical Positivism, ed. Peter Achinstein and Stephen F. Barker (Baltimore: JohnsHopkins Press, 1969), p. 163.

2. Thesketch thatfollows ignoresthe controversiesthat havedevelopedaround mostof thepoints mentioned, in particular questions concerning the structureof explanationandits relationto prediction, issues inconfirmationtheory, anddifficulties inspecifyingthenatureand functionof theempirical basis. Butthepositionpresentedhere hasservedas thepointof referencefor thesecontroversies andis no lessinfluentialfor havingbeenthe subject of prolonged debate.3. Cf. Karl-Otto Apel's essay in Part 5 for additional critical reflections on theneopositivist logic of "unified science."

The Operation Ca lle d Verstehen 1THEODORE ABEL

ABSTRACT

The postula~eof Verstehen is the main a~gumentof soci.~1h~orist~who a~:ert.theexistence of a dichotomybetween thephysical andthe ~ocJaIscrences. An analysis ~fthe operation of Verstehen shows that itdoes not p.rovldenew knowledge a?d that Itcannot be used as a means of verification. Lacking .t~efunda~ent~1 attributes of. tifi thod even thoughitdoesperformsomea u xi li ar y f u nc ti o ns Inresearch, thescien I IC me , . f d' hotomy of thefact of Verstehen cannot be used to validate the assumption 0 a ICsciences.

THE ADVOCATES OF VERSTEHEN DEFINE IT AS A SINGULAR FORM. OFoperation which we perform whenever we attempt to explai~ ~uman behavior.The idea behind this claim is by no means of German ongm '. Long beforeDilthey and Weber, Vico acclaimed mathematics and hu.man hls~ory as sub-jects about which wehave a special kind of'knowledge. This heattributed tot~efact that the abstractions and fictions of mathematics are cr~ated by us, whilehistory, too, is "made by men." He cla imed that human beings can .pos~essatype of knowledge concerning things they themselves produce which IS notobtainable about the phenomena of nature. ..'Comte too implied that a special procedure isinvolved m the interpretanonof human' beh~vior. He held that the methods used in sociolo~y e~brace ~otonly observation and experiment but a further process of verif icat ion whlC~makes use of what hevaguely referred toas "our knowledge ofhum~n nature.According to him, empirical general izat ions about human behavior are notval id unless they are in accord wi th our knowledge of human nature. C?,mtewas the first toestabl ish what may be termed "the postulate of Verstehen for

Theodore Abel, "The Operation Called Verstehen" T~e Americ~n Journal ofSociology 54(1948):211-18. c 1948bytheUniversityofChicago. Allrightsreserved.81


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82 THE POSITIVIST RECEPTION

sociological research, for he asserted that no sociological demonstrat ion iscomplete unt il the conclusions of historica l and stat is tica l analyses are inharmony with the "laws of human nature."

In the American sociological field Cooley is the outstanding protagonist ofthe idea that we understand the human and the socia l in ways di fferent fromthose in which we understand the material. His theory isthat we can understandthe behavior of human beings by being able to share their "state ofmind." Thisabili ty to share other people's minds is a special knowledge, distinct from thekind of percept ion gleaned from tests and sta ti stics . Stat is tica l knowledgewithout "emphatic" knowledge is superficial and unintelligent. Between thetwo, Cooley claims, "there is a difference inkind which it would be fatuous tooverlook. "2

The notion of Verstehen is included in Znaniecki's concept of the "humanis-tic coefficient" and particularly in the role he ascribes to "vicarious experi-ence" as a source of sociological data. According to Znaniecki , vicariousexperience enables the student of human behavior "to gain a speci fic k ind ofinformat ion which the natural experimenter . .. ignores altogether.?"

Similarly, Sorokin stresses the need for Verstehen when he insist s that thecausal-functional method is not applicable to the interpretation of culturalphenomena. He points out that the social sciences must employ the logico-meaningful method which enables us to perceive connections which "are muchmore intimately comprehensible, more readily perceived, than are causal-func-tional unities."!

MacIver, too, speaks of a special method which must be used whenever westudy social causation. He calls this process "imaginative reconstruction." Heclaims the causal formula of classical mechanics cannot be applied to humanbehavior. However, the student of human behavior will find this compensatedfor by "the advantage that some of the factors operative insocial causation areunderstandable as causes; are validated as causal by our own experience."5

As these brief references indicate, there isno dearth oftradition and authoritybehind the idea of Verstehen," I t is , therefore, surpris ing to find that, whi lemany social scientists have eloquently discoursed on the existence of a specialmethod in the study of human behavior, none has taken the trouble to describethe nature of this method. They have given itvarious names; they have insistedon i ts use; they have pointed to it as a specia l kind of operat ion which has nocounterpart inthe physical sciences; and they have extolled its superiority as aprocess of giving insight unobtainable by any other methods. Yet the advocatesof Verstehen have continually neglected to speci fy how this operat ion of"understanding" is performed-and what is singular about it. What, exactly,do wedo when wesay wepractice Verstehen? What significance can we give toresults achieved by Verstehen? Unless the operation is clearly defined, Ver-stehen is but a vague not ion, and, wi thout being dogmatic , we are unable toascertain how much validity can be att ributed to the resul ts achieved by i t.

~ I The Operation Called Verstehen 83I. The Operation Illustrated

Our first task is to ascertain the formula according to which the operation ofVerstehen i sperformed. To do so, we had best examine a few il lustrat ions ofbehavior analysis. For this purpose we shall use three examples: the first willdeal with a single case; the second, with a generalization; and the third, with astatistical regularity,Case I.-Last April 15a freezing spell suddenly set in, causing a tempera-

ture drop from 60 to 34 degrees. I saw my neighbor rise from his desk by thewindow, walk to the woodshed, pick up an ax, and chop some wood. I thenobserved him carrying the wood into the house and placing it in the fireplace.After he had l ighted the wood, he sat down at his desk and resumed his dai lytask of writing.

From these observations I concluded that , while working , my neighborbegan tofeel chilly and, inorder toget warm, lighted a fire. This conclusion hasall the earmarks of an "obvious fact." Yet it is obvious only because I havefitted the action of my neighbor into a sequential pattern by assuming that thestimulus "drop in temperature" induced the response "making a fire." Since Irecognize a relevant connection between the response and the stimulus, I statethat I understand the behavior of my neighbor. I may even say that I am certainof i t ("The case is obvious"), provided I note carefully to what this certaintyrefers. I cannot be certain that this is the correct or true explanation of hisconduct. To be sure my explanation is correct, I need additional information. Ican go over to him and ask him why he lighted the fire. He may confirm myinterpretation. However, I cannot stop there. Suppose he has another, hidden,intention? He may be expecting a guest and wish to show off his fireplace . Orsuppose he himself isnot aware ofthe "true" motive? Perhaps hewas impelledby a subconscious motive of wanting to bum down his house so asto punish thefellow who harasses him about paying off the mortgage. If so, his lighting thefire would have-a symbolic function. Of what, then, am I certain? I am certainonly that my interpretation could be correct.

Hence, Verstehen gives me the certainty that a given interpretation ofbehavior is a possib le one. I know that it can happen this way, even though Icannot be certain that such was the case in this instance. My interpretat ion initself is not a hypothesis; only its application to the stated case ishypothetical.

Whence comes this certainty that I achieve through Verstehen? Since thecase is simple, the answer is simple: I have enacted itmyself. Feeling chilled, Ihave gathered wood and lighted a fire; therefore, I know. The sense ofrelevance is the result of personal experience; the connection has been estab-lished by me before, so I am certain of its possibility.

However, the answer as stated does not give us a clear picture of theoperation the act of Verstehen involves. I t will , therefore, be necessary toschematize the evidence and show the steps taken to perform the operation.


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84 THE POSITIVIST RECEPTIONTwo sets of observations are given inour example. First , there isa sequence

of bodily movement (chopping wood, l ight ing a fire, etc.); second, there is athermometer reading of a near-freezing temperature. The act of Verstehen linksthese two facts into the conclusion that the freezing weather was the stimuluswhich set off the response "making a fire." Anelementary examination showsthat three items of information are utilized to reach this conclusion:l. Low temperature (A) reduces the temperature of the body (B).2. Heat is produced (C) by making a fire (D).3. A person "feel ing cold" (B') will "seek warmth" (C').Through this interpretation the three items are linked together as follows:

A-B C-DB'--C'

We immediately recognize the thi rd i tem as the significant e lement of theinterpretation. The two conditions (A-B), together with their known conse-quences (C-D) ,are disparate facts. We link them into a sequence and state thatC-D is the consequence ofA-B by "translating" BandC into feeling-states ofa human organism, namely, B' and C'. Introducing these intervening factorsenables us to apply a generalization concerning the function of the organism(behavior maxim), from which we deduce the drop intemperature asa possible"cause" of my neighbor'S behavior.

By specifying the steps which are implicit in the interpretation of our case,we have brought out two particulars which are characteristic of the act ofVerstehen. One is the "internalizing" of observed factors in a given situation;the other is the application of a behavior maxim which makes the connectionbetween these factors relevant. Thus we "understand" a given human action ifwe can apply to it a generaliza tion based upon personal experience. We canapply such a rule of behavior if we are able to "internalize" the facts of thesituation.

These propositions require further elucidation, but, before we attempt this,let us consider two other examples of behavior analysis.Case 2.-In one of Lundberg's articles we find the following generalization:

Faced by the insecurity of a changing and hostile world, we seeksecurity by creating "eternal verities" in our thoughts. The more inade-quate we feel, the more we indulge in this type of wishful thinking.Conversely, as the clergy has always complained, in times of prosperityand security, man tends toneglect his gods. Ithas been suggested that thePla tonic preference for the changeless may be due to the fact that theGreeks did not have a mathematica l technique such as the calculus fordealing with modes and rates of change."

The Operation Called Verstehen 85The opening sentence of this quotation asserts a relevant connection between

"belief in eternal verities" (verbal response) and "a changing and hostileworld" (stimulus). The subsequent sentences hint at a possible statistical basisfor the generalization and cite two historical examples as illustrations. Clearlythere is insufficient evidence to substantiate the validity of the interpretation asa tendency in some of us toward ideal is tic philosophy. We can recognize ,though, that the connection asserted by the generalization isrelevant; that is, we"understand" i t, and so consider it possib le .

The act of Verstehen which is implied here involves the same operation wehave observed in the first example. We internalize "change and hostility" (B),which we observe to be an attribute of "the world" (A), into "feel ing ofinadequacy" (B'). The connotation "changeless" (C), which the concept"eternal verities" (D) implies, we internalize into "feeling of security" (C').Having thus internalized the situation, we can now apply the behavior maximthat a person who feels inadequate (when facing change) will seek security (insomething changeless). This procedure provides the mediating links B'-C',which enable us to "understand," or recognize , the relevancy of the causalconnection brought out in the generalization.Case 3.-Competent statistical research has established a high correlation

(r=. 93) between the annual rate of crop production and the rate of marriage inagiven year. There are, of course, statistical methods for proving whether or notthis corre la tion is spurious. In this case, however, we feel that we can foregosuch tests because the correlation as such does not present a problem to us. Weregard the connect ion as relevant ; in short, we say we "understand" why therate of marriage infarming districts closely follows the rate of crop production.

The act of Verstehen which this reasoning implies can be shown to involvethe same procedure wehave observed inthe other examples. We use as items ofinformation the fact that failure of crops (A) materially lowers the farmer'sincome (B) and the fact that one is making new commitments (C) when onemarries (D). We then internalize B into "feeling of anxiety" (B'), and C-sincethe behavior in question is "postponement of marriage"-into "fear of newcommitments" (C'). We are now able to apply the behavior maxim: "Peoplewho experience anxiety will fear new commitments" (B '-C'). Since we can fitthe fact of fewer marriages when crops fai l into this rule, we say we "under-stand" the correlation.

II. The Operation AnalyzedThe examples show that the characteristic feature of the operation of

Verstehen i s the postula tion of an intervening process "located" inside thehuman organism, by means of which we recognize an observed-or


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86 THE POSITIVIST RECEPTION

assumed--connection as relevant or "meaningful." Verstehen, then, consistsof the act of bringing to the foreground the inner-organic sequence interveningbetween a stimulus and a response.

The examples also suggest that there are special conditions which determinethe need for making the intervening process explicit. Some connections appearto be obvious; that is, we recognize their relevancy instantaneously and withoutany awareness of the implicit assumptions upon which the recognition isbased.These are usually connections of which we have direct knowledge, because weourselves established such connections in the past; or they are connections wehave previously examined, so that their occurrence is accepted as an expectedor familiar happening.

The need for making the intervening process explicit arises whenever be-havior is not routine or commonplace. This is clearly the case when we arepuzzled. For example, when wewere confronted with the evidence that inarmyunits in which promotion was easy there was much more griping about "injus-tice" than in those units in which very few were promoted, we were puzzled.We would expect the cont rary. It is only by internalizing the situation-namely, by int roducing the intervening factor of "expectat ion"-that we areable to understand the connection. If we then assume that in uni ts in whichpromotion iseasy there will be greater expectation of promotion, we can applythe behavior maxim: "The higher one 's expectat ions, the greater one 's dis-appointment ifthose expectations are not fulfilled." This enables us to "under-stand" the seemingly paradoxical behavior.

Another condition for making the intervening inner-organic sequence ex-plicit arises whenever we are called upon to explain the reason for asserting aconnection between occurrences. This is particularly so when no experimentalor statistical data are available and recourse is taken to arguments in support ofan interpretation. This happens frequently when interpretations of individualhistorical events are attempted, as, for example, establishing the cause of a war.Here the behavior in question can be related to earlier events solely on the basisthat in terms of assumed feel ing-states such a relat ion is a plausible one.

As has been indicated, the operation of Verstehen involves three steps: (I)internalizing the stimulus, (2) internalizing the response, and (3) applyingbehavior maxims. The questions now arise as tohow togo about the process ofinternalizing and where we get our knowledge of behavior maxims.

1. Internalizing the StimulusTo the best of my knowledge, noone has yet specified a technique by which

we can objectively attribute certain feeling-states topersons faced by a particu-lar situation or event. The arbitrary procedure we employ to internalize a

lThe Operation Called Verstehen 87

stimulus consists of imagining what emot ions may have been aroused by theimpact of a given situation or event. Sometimes we are able to employ definiteclues which we have gathered while observing the impact. These may havebeen gestures, facial expressions, or exclamations or comments. Where thereare nosuch clues, we note the effect produced by anevent or situation. Then weimagine how we would have been affected by such an impact. For example, notbeing a farmer, I never experienced the consequence of crop failure. However,observing that it s effect i s a curtai lment of income, I at tr ibute to the farmer afeeling of anxiety which I recall having felt-or imagine I might feel-undersimilar circumstances. Thus the internalizing of a stimulus depends largelyupon our abili ty todescribe a situation orevent by categorizing itand evoking apersonal experience which fits into that category.

2. Internalizing the ResponseHere, too, no specific techniques are known which permit a definite associa-

tion between feeling-states and observed behavior. All that can again be said isthat we use our imagination when we ascribe a motive to a person's behavior-for example, "fear of new commitments" as the reason for postponing mar-riage; or, inanother instance, when we view the behavior asexpressive ofsomeemotion-namely, when we infer that the "griping" of soldiers over promo-tions evokes a feeling of disappointment. We generally infer the motive of anact from the known or observed modifica tion it produces. If we express thisconsequence of an act ingeneral terms, we can utilize our personal experiencewith motives or feelings we had when we ourselves acted inorder to produce asimilar result.

In cases where both stimulus and response are stated, imagination is facili-tated by the fact that both can be viewed as part of a complete situat ion. Thisenables us to relate to each other whatever inferences we make about thestimulus and the response. We then select the inferences which "f it" oneanother in such a way that the given behavior can be recognized as the"solution" (release of tension) of the "problem" (tension experience) createdby the impact of the sta ted event.

3. Behavior MaximsThe general izat ions which we cal l "behavior maxims" l ink two feeling-

sta tes together in a uniform sequence and imply a functional dependencebetween them. In the cases cited itcan be seen that the functional dependenceconsists of the fact that the feeling-state we ascribe to a given human action is


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88 THE POSITIVIST RECEPTIONdirected by the feeling-state wepresume isevoked by an impinging situation orevent. Anxiety directs caution; a feeling of cold, the seeking of warmth; afeeling of insecurity, a desire for something that will provide reassurance.

Behavior maxims are not recorded in any textbooks on human behavior. Infact, they can be constructed ad hoc and be acceptable to us as propositionseven though they have not been establi shed experimental ly. The rela tionasserted appears to us as self-evident.

This peculiarity of behavior maxims can be accounted for only by theassumption that they are generalizations of direct personal experience derivedfrom introspection and self-observation. Such personal experiences appearoriginally in the form of what Alexander has called "emotional syllogisms."He has this to say about them:

Our understanding of psychological connections is based on the tacitrecognition of certain causal relationships which we know from everydayexperience and the validity of which we accept as self-evident. Weunderstand anger and aggressive behavior as a reaction to an attack; fearand guilt as results of aggressiveness; envy as an outgrowth of the feelingof weakness and inadequacy. Such self-evident connect ions as "I hatehim because he attacks me" I shall call emotional syllogisms. The feelingof the self-evident validity of these emotional connections isderived fromdaily introspective experiences as we witness the emotional sequences inourselves ... Just as the logic of intellectual thinking is based on re-peated and accumulated experiences of relations in the external world,the logic of emotions isbased onthe accumulated experiences of our ownemotional reactions."

Emotional syllogisms when stated in the form of general propositions arebehavior maxims. This explains their familiar ring and accounts for the facilitywith which they can be formulated. In generalizing emotional syllogisms weproceed on the assumption that the emotions of others function similarly to ourown.

We find , then, that in all its essentia l features the operat ion of Verstehen isbased upon the application of personal experience to observed behavior. We"understand" an observed or assumed connect ion if we are able to paral le le ither one with something we know through sel f-observat ion does happen.Furthermore, since the operation consists of the application of knowledge wealready possess, it cannot serve as a means of discovery. At best it can onlyconfirm what we already know.

III. The Operation EvaluatedFrom the foregoing description of the operation of Verstehen we can draw

several inferences as to i ts limita tions and possibi li ties . The most obvious

, The Operation Called Verstehen 89limi ta tion of the operation is i ts dependence upon knowledge derived frompersonal experience. The ability to define behavior will vary with the amountand qual ity of the personal experience and the int rospective capacity of theinterpreter. It will also depend upon his ability to generalize his experiences. Insome cases itmay be possible to secure objective data on the basis of which theverification of an interpretation can be approximated. However, owing to tilerelative inaccessibili ty of emotional experiences, most interpretations willremain mere expressions of opinion, subject only to the "test" of plausibility.

Regardless ofthe relative abili ty ofpeople touse it, a second limitation totheuse of the operat ion i tself l ies in the fact that i t i s not a method of verification.This means that what inthe realm of scientific research weconsider a quality ofcrucia l importance is not an at tr ibute of the operation of Verstehen.

When we say we "understand" a connection, we imply nothing more thanrecognizing itas a possible one. We simply affirm that we have atleast once indirect experience observed and established the connection or its equivalent. Butfrom the affirmation of a possible connection we cannot conclude that it is alsoprobable. From the point of view of Verstehen alone, any connection that ispossible is equally certain. In any given case the test of the actual probabilitycalls for the application of objective methods ofobservation; e.g., experiments,comparative studies, statistical operations of mass data, etc. We do not acceptthe fact that farmers postpone intended marriages when faced with crop failuresbecause we can "understand" the connection. It is acceptable to usbecause wehave found through reliable statistical operations that the correlation betweenthe rate of marriage and the rate of crop production is extremely high. Wewould cont inue to accept the fact even i fwe could not "understand" i t. In thisinstance the operation of Verstehen does no more than relieve us of a sense ofapprehension which would undoubtedly haunt us if we were unable to under-stand the connection.

The postulate of Verstehen can now be viewed from a proper perspective. Itcannot be made to imply that if we do not "understand" a connection itsurely,or most probably, is false. Itdoes, however, imply that our curiosity concern-ing human behavior does not rest until we have in some way been able to relateit to our personal experience. The satisfaction of curiosity produces subjectiveincrement but adds nothing to the objective validity of a proposition. Thus, allassertions based solely on the evidence of "understandability" can be viewed ascases of "misplaced familiarity."

These limitations virtually preclude the use of the operation of Verstehen as ascientific tool of analysis. Still there is one positive function which the opera-tion can perform in scientific investigations: Itcan serve as anaid inpreliminaryexplorat ions of a subject. Furthermore, the operat ion can be particularlyhelpful in sett ing up hypotheses, even though it cannot be used to test them.

In dealing with human behavior, we create hypotheses whenever we ask for


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90 THE POSITIVIST RECEPTIONthe "stimulus" which produced agiven response, orwhen weattempt topredictwhat "response" wi ll follow from a given occurrence. I t i s an accepted factthat, in formulating hypotheses, we start wi th some "hunch" or "intuit ion ." .Now it appears highly probable that the hunches which lead us to certainhypotheses concerning human behavior originate from the application of theoperation of Verstehen. This fol lows from the fact that the operation-inaddi tion to using the stated stimulus or response-al lows the use of anotheritem ofknowledge (abehavior maxim), which permits usto "reach out" from ~given observation to its unknown counterpart. The diagram representing thereasoning about the neighbor seen chopping wood clearly indicates how be-havior maxims can serve as a source of"hunches. " SupposeC-D were given asan item of observation. By internalizing C, we obtain C I, to which we can thenapply a behavior maxim, which gives us B IB I,in turn, provides a clue to thenature of the situation or event which may be the possible stimulus (A-B) to thebehavior in question. Lundberg's general iza tion (Case 2) is an example of ahypothesis derived in this fashion. By postulat ing that people who assert"eternal verities" are seeking security, he inferred a strong feeling of anxiety asthe counterpart tothis motive. He then surmised that the "changing and hostileworld" might be the anxiety-producing condition. A "hunch" similarlyreached was used by Durkheim in his study of suicide. When he found the rateof suic ide varying in di fferent groups, he was confronted by the problem ofselecting the most likely determinant from a multitude of attributes of grouplife. From Merton's statement of the "paradigm of Durkheim's theoreticanalysis ," we can infer that Durkheim first internalized rates of suic ide as"functions of unrelieved anxieties and stresses to which persons aresubjected.?" He then viewed such emotional states as the result of a lack of"psychic support," such as is provided by intimate associations with others.This suggested the possibility of social cohesion

Abel Theodore 1977 the Operation Called Verstehen

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