An Horrific Caricature

Author(s): ROBERT K. MERTON

Source: The American Scholar, Vol. 21, No. 3 (Summer 1952), pp. 356-358
Published by: The Phi Beta Kappa Society
Stable URL: http://www.jstor.org/stable/41206919 .
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...............
Forum,
Scholar
American
THE SOCIAL SCIENTISTSREPLY
were invitedto participate
At leasta dozen practicingsocial scientists
Methodand
in theSpring
, iyj2, AmericanScholar Forum,"Scientific
Human Behavior."Since theycould not be presentat the timeof the
theScholar invitedthemto commenton thediscussionheld.
discussion,
- Editor.
here.
receivedareprinted
The threecomments

Caricature
An Horrific
ROBERT K. MERTON
We can suppose,therefore,
that your
thereare few
As manyof us can testify,
of
like
rest
us
in comthan
that
the
of
more
symposiasts,
chastening
experiences
will want to edit and
being forcedto read a verbatimaccount parablesituations,
discussionin which correct,to prunehereand to expandthere,
of an extemporaneous
of the discussion
one hastakenan activepart.It is notmerely the verbatimtranscript
thatour awkwardsentencesdismayus, al- which I have beforeme. They will unout the little
thoughtheywell might.Nor is it onlythe doubtedlywantto straighten
whichturnedup in the
ambiguousphrases,the seemingdenial of self-contradictions
of discussion.Mr. Krutch,
rulesoflogic,thediscontinuitiesgive-and-take
elementary
of thought(as each successivesentence forexample,will not wantto findhimself
dartsoffin somenew directionfora very saying,in one place,that"the"socialscienof real
shortdistance)thatordinarily
prove em- tistsare, at best, poor imitations
as
and
minor
scientists
after
These are,
because,
all,
everybodyknows,
barrassing.
superficialblemishes,easily removedby theycannotpredicthumanbehavior;and
in anotherplace,
laterediting.Secondthought
usuallyallows to findhimself
reporting,
us to deletethosethingswe wishhad not his profoundfear of the social scientists
been said- those occasional mistakesof who controlthesocialworldin whichwe
thatperversely live by meansof theirknowledgeof men's
andinference
fact,judgment
discussions behavior.Mr. Skinner,
into
to
again,will probably
impromptu
manage creep
not want to remain"unhappy"about staof thissort.
of group
uniformities
tisticallyestablished
"uniformities"
such
as
though
of so- behavior,
ROBERT K. MERTON is professor
could be expressedin any but statistical
associate
and
at
Columbia
University
ciology
of theBureauof AppliedSocialRe- terms.
director
There is, perhaps,a more worrisome
search.He is theauthorofSocialTheoryand
not so easilyexof thisdiscussion,
defect
Social Structureand the co-editorof Reader
editorial
or
cised
revision,
in Bureaucracy.
patchedup by

356

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AMERICAN SCHOLAR FRUM

that may disturb the participantsas they ican anthropologists,
that he is not a social
read, with some dismay and occasional as- scientist,but a humanist.The reader of the
the exact transcription
of what great Kroeber treatiseon anthropologywill
tonishment,
said
in
the
course
of
an
they
excessively discountthis as excessivemodesty,so charstimulatingdiscussion. It will become ap- acteristicof this most admired of contemparentto them,as it will to other readers, porary social scientists,and will continue
that nowhere in this conversation about to profitfrom his numerous contributions
"social scientists" do they satisfactorily to social science. If, at first,it seems a little
decide for themselvesjust what they mean unfair of Mr. Kroeber thus to lead his
by the term "social scientists."Through- associates in the symposiumup the garden
out this lengthydiscussion,they will find, path, it must be rememberedthat they are,
there are preciselytwo passing references, beyond dispute,distinguishedmen of learncasual and undeveloped, to contemporary ing- in literatureand the arts, in history
research in social science: one to Ruth and particularlyin the historyof ideas, and
Benedict's Patterns of Culture, and the in psychology.What is more,in describing
other,to an undesignatedbook by Ashley himselfas "the devil's advocate" of the soMontagu. They will probably be startled cial scientists,Mr. Kroeber gave his associto find,instead,that theirconversationwas ates fair warning of the path they were
studded with allusions 4to engineers and treading.For, as the ever-perceptiveFowler
girders,unpredictablelove affairsand pre- reminds us, "far from being the whitedictablecontraceptives,and with references washer of the wicked, the devil's advocate
to Plato, Shakespeare,Darwin and Marx; is the blackener of the good." And, we
to Hume, Locke and Hegel; and to the mightadd,thedevil's-advocate-with-tongueworlds of Aldous Huxley, Nietzsche and in-check is truly a case of undoing an
Samuel Butler. Apart from these scattered imaginary evil by making it plain, to all
allusions,which share the double charac- who would look, that it does not exist.He
teristicof being neitherabout social science can scarcely be blamed for misdirecting
nor about contemporarysocial research, his associates,if they take part in a conthe participantsrefer,by name, to two so- versation about social science and yet do
cial scientistswhom theyhad wiselywanted not know that with them sits one of the
to participatein the discussion.The revised most eminentsocial scientistsof our time,
text* will clearly benefitby removingthe simplybecause he has disclaimedthat honerroneous impression that they do not orific title. He was, perhaps,only seeking
know, at firsthand,the researchesof any to remove any occasion for excessive cau- an tion on the
other contemporary social scientist
part of his associates, and in
reader
with
the
left
record
as
the
this,
shows, he was entirely
impressionunavoidably
of the verbatimaccount. This would ap- successful.
When the symposiasts have corrected
pear all the more desirablesince the symposiasts,who complainabout the thin,float- these and other flaws of the kiud that
ing abstractionsof sociologists,will not wel- characteristicallymar an impromptu discome the thought that they condemn in cussion, what remains of the argument?
otherswhat they findin themselves.
The shortpassagesthatare likelyto survive
After these needed revisions are made, these minorself-corrections
can be quickly
some statementsin the original transcript summarized.
will undoubtedly remain intact. Among
First, the allegation,repeated on a halfthese is the repeated affirmationby Mr. dozen or so occasions,that social scientists,
Kroeber, the acknowledged dean of Amer- unidentifiedand undescribed,are primarily
motivated in their work by wanting "to
* It is an established
part of the procedure
thattheparticipants change a great varietyof things,"thatthey
of theseForumdiscussions
are not allowedto revisethetext,and thatthe are moved by "utilitarian"ends, that they
Editor does so only to clarifysentencestruc- want to remake the world in accord with
their own tacit values. Now, if this claim
ture,etc.- Editor.

357
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THE AMERICAN SCHOLAR

were sufficientlytidied up to allow one

to know what it affirms,
it might be possible to findout whetheror not it is true.
Does it mean that most social scientists
presentlyengaged in social researchare in
fact so motivated?Or does it mean thatthis
was once the case, long before disciplined
social research had fairlybegun? Presumably the latter. For in one of the rare
momentswhen a specific case in point is
cited,Mr. Brintonquicklycoverstheperiod
"from Plato down through Marx" as
ground for the conclusion. Centuriesmay
loom small in the chronology of a professorof both ancient and modernhistory,
yet Mr. Brinton does seem to stretchhis
point a bit too far when he cites the
ancient philosopheror the nineteenthcentury revolutionaryas evidence of the current motivation of contemporary social
scientists. Perhaps what is needed is a
social science inquiry into this hypothesis
about the motivationsof livingsocial scientists.
Secondly, anotherpart that may survive
is the discussionof the possibilityof predicting the behavior of individuals and
groups a discussion which might have
been carried on, almost without change, a
century or more ago again before there
was any substantialresearch in social science. The notion that the social scientist
must eitherbe able to predictthe behavior
of every individualin all its infinitedetail,
or confessto totalignorance,is one of those
commonplace errorswhich even Quetelet,
a century or so ago, thought he had laid
to well-deservedrest. But he was plainly
wrong. For here it is again, disinterred
ratherthanresurrected,and withoutbenefit
of specific referenceto the numerous researchesin social psychologyand sociology
(by Stouffer,Lazarsfeld, Bruner, Piaget,
Hull, Lewin, Allison Davis- to mention,
necessarily,only a few) which have shown
the distinctiveplace of statisticalpredictions
in currentsocial science.
Thirdly, as has been intimated, it is
affirmedin one breath, during this symposium,that social scientistscannot predict

because they do not understand human

behavior,and, in the nextbreath,thatsocial
scientistsare truly dangerouscreaturesbecause theyprovidethe knowledgeof human
behaviorwhich enables men to be manipulated and managed for bad or stupid ends.
Yet it would seem that knowledge will not
provide this evil power unless it be true.
(To choose one of the symposiasts'favorite
analogies: evil intentis not enough to build
an atom bomb; sound knowledge is also
required.) If social science is unsound, it
cannot be used to manage behavior,and if
it is being used to manage behavior, it
must,to that extent,be sound knowledge.
Even Mr. Krutch cannot have it both ways.
There are other similarly instructive
opinionsexpressedin thissymposiumwhich
deserveattention,but the space allottedme
for comment has almost run out. We
should, however, note in passing Mr.
Krutch's assertion that "what the social
scientistalways tries to do" is to find out
what people want, and "then [give] it to
them." Out of kindness,no doubt, he fails
to identifythe "kind of social scientist"
who discovers that people, "as a whole,"
preferless,ratherthanmore,classicalmusic
in radio programs,and then proceeds to
"give them" even less classical music. Yet
had he been less indulgent and more explicit, it would have been possible for the
reader to consult the few social science
studies of this very point and to learn for
himselfthat they are, instead,characteristicallyfocusedon the sourcesof thesepreferences, and on the circumstanceswhich
have led some people to prefer classical
music.
All in all, the symposiumhas yielded one
conclusion about contemporarysocial science which seems, on the evidence, to remain unimpeachable.This is the conclusion
that Mr. Krutch,and Mr. Brinton,and perhaps Mr. Skinner we really must exempt
the tongue-in-checksocial scientist, Mr.
Kroeber- simply do not like the social
scientists.And at this we cannot wonder,
afterseeing the horrificcaricatureof "the"
social scientistwith which they live.

358

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