What was Herbert Spencer’s solution to the problem of method?
-he was a naturalist
What kind of laws did Spencer want to discover?
-laws of co-existence and sequence
What methods did Spencer use to discover laws for the problem of method?
- observation
- experiment
- comparative historical method
What did Spencer use the comparative historical method for?
-to classify societies
How did Spencer classify societies?
- by degree of integration
- by predominant social activity
What were the two predominant social activities Spencer observed?
- offense and defense
- sustenance
What was an offence and defence society?
- had hostile interactions with neighbouring countries
- militant type of society
What was a sustenance type of society?
- had peaceful interactions with neighbouring countries
- industrial type of society
What was Spencer’s solution to the problem of change?
-development or evolution
What does development mean in biology and sociology?
Biology;
-environment cannot create new potentials
-unfolding of pre-existing inherent potentials
Sociology;
-societies move along a pre-determined path toward a preset goal
What does evolution mean in biology and sociology?
Biology; -a creative process -environment created new potentials in 2 ways Sociology; -no predetermined path or preset goals -gives casual primacy to environment
What are the 2 ways environment creates potential in the biological definition of evolution?
- Use-inheritance; Lamarckism
- Natural selection; Darwinism
What assumptions about the nature of change did Spencer possess?
Developmentalism; -directional (towards a goal) -irreversible -deterministic -retrogression is bad Evolution; -relies on environment -probabilistic
Does Spencer believe in both development and evolution?
Yes;
- uses development to specify course
- uses evolution to specify mechanism
How did Spencer describe the course of social change (under the problem of change)?
-Using Von Baerian epigenesis
Define Von Baerian epigenesis
- movement from homogeneity of structure to heterogeneity of structure through a process of successive differentiations and integrations
- developmentalism
How did Spencer describe the mechanism of social change (under the problem of change)?
- evolutionary
- model of use-inheritance
What is the model of use-inheritance?
- differential use and disuse of organs in response to environmental occurrence
- inheritance of these acquired characters
- these cause social change through the changed individuals
How do you determine if a mechanism of social change is developmentalism or evolutionary?
- look at the role of the environment and if it creates new potentials;
- yes, evolution
- no, developmentalism
Is Spencers view on the problem of agency macro or micro-macro?
Micro-macro linkage
Did Spencer see himself as an evolutionary or developmental theorist?
-Evolutionary
