Date: Wed, 06 Aug 1997 19:56:50
To: bhaskar-AT-jefferson.village.Virginia.EDU
Subject: Re: BHA: Non-experimental science (was "What must the ...")


Suppose we have a theory T about some subject matter S (racism,
urbanization, etc.).  I say (very loosely) that T, as a transitive social
object, has to be in some appropriate causal relation to its subject matter
S if T is not to count as ideological.  You ask how we could know the
appropriate relation is in place unless we first accept the theory.  Is
that a fair description of your objection?

I respond that indeed we cannot know that, nor should we expect to, at
least in so far as we are supporting T.  First we propose our theory T
about S.  We don't think it is ideological, but others might think we are
wrong in so thinking and engage in an ideology critique.  They would
propose a theory that would explain all or most of the subject matter in S
that T does, and more.  Then they would show a limitation of some kind that
is causing us to adopt T, this limitation exemplifying one of those
inappropriate causal relations.  They will not only have developed a theory
superior to T, but they will also have shown T to be ideological.  However,
there is no way, inside T, to guarantee that T is not ideology.  The
relation has to be uncovered in a wider ideology critique.

Louis Irwin

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At 09:21 AM 8/6/97 -0400, you wrote:
>Just a brief comment on Louis' latest posting:
>
>>5.
>>>I see several problems here.  First, how could we know if the thing
>>>under study "causes" the theory without having some theory about the thing
>>>to begin with.  In other words, isn't this circular in some sense.
>>
>>Suppose we are dealing with racism and propose that some set of social
>>conditions cause racist ideology to be adopted.  What would be circular
>>about that (assuming the social conditions are spelled out)?
>
>Yes, but we were talking about knowing if your hypothetical theory of
>racism were itself ideological.  The fact that the theory itself explains
>racism by reference to certain causal mechanisms that are in some sense
>independent of racism does not say much about circularity in one's
>assessment of the theory itself.
>
>Perhaps this would be clearer if we proposed a theory of, say, urbanization
>rather than racism.  In this case we are not theorizing something that's
>mainly ideational, so we are less likely to think of the theory's object as
>ideological (can Mexico City be an ideology?).  The question would be, how
>can we tell if this theory is ideology?  If the answer depends on the
>theory's causal relation to its object (e.g., to urbanization), how could
>we know about that relation without first having the theory?
>
       


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