At present, the concept of «social class» is in a pauperized cultural state, fully integrated within political channels that are unfavorable to its identification, understanding and acceptance. As it has been defined in two previous works by the present author, the concept can only be associated with territorially undelimited and specialized societies, originated in postindustrial western Europe, under a division of labor based on productive objectives rather than professional roles. The notion of «social class» is nowadays subsumed within the communicative (...) peculiarities channeled by the ruling class, so that it has been practically abolished from the mass communicative scene. Given this social conjuncture, which deeply affects both its academic and popular conception, the present research intends to offer a critical and final vision, after the two previous works, of its contemporary sense. First of all, the pauperization and collapse of the concept will be addressed, to later expose the reasons that make social classes perpetual and, finally, to delineate its role within the world-system as it was defined in the second half of the twentieth century. (shrink)

An excellent account of one of those rare occasions in history when a number of great minds, working on a common problem independently, come up with sufficiently new answers as to send their science, and in this case a good part of human thinking, in a completely new direction.

Max Black has included approximately one half of the essays that he has published since Models and Metaphors in this collection entitled Margins of Precision. All but two of the essays have appeared in various professional journals, the two exceptions being Chapter V on "Induction" and Chapter VI on "Probability," which are articles in the Encyclopedia of Philosophy, edited by Paul Edwards. The final chapter, "Wittgenstein’s Views About Language," is an address delivered at the Israel Academy, Jerusalem in 1966 and (...) published in Iyyun. Margins of Precision is an apt title for this anthology. The problems of induction that are a perennial concern of Black lie at the basis for margins of precision. Among these problems are criteria for correct induction, reasoning with loose concepts, and the gap between "Is" and "Should." Professor Black states that "Only in recent times have serious efforts been made to escape from the spell of the deductive model, used by Hume and his innumerable followers, by inquiring whether there may not be other proper and relevant senses of ‘reasonable'." According to Black, there is a sense of "reasonable" according to which we can reason with loose concepts, and there is need to advance further in our search for criteria for induction. His discussion of the gap between "Is" and "Should" suggests that this problem in metaethics is basically one of induction. For those interested in the problems of induction, Professor Black’s book is stimulating. He admits that he has "chosen topics where there is still work to be done." Each chapter opens the door to further thought.—L. A. (shrink)

The need today, according to Cohen, is not for more criticism of old theories of induction but for new theories to criticize. In his recent book, he presents a new theory of induction in which he attempts to develop Bacon's seminal ideas "in a way that is not vitiated by obsession with the mathematical calculus of probabilities." Consequently, "induction" in the title would seem to refer to Baconian Induction, i.e. induction by variation of circumstances as distinct from induction by enumeration. (...) The author offers his book as an analysis of the logical syntax of "support" for such induction. He prefers the metaphor of "support" to Carnap's metaphor of "confirmation" since the former is spatial and the latter is temporal and "... inductive support is timeless support for timeless propositions...." The first six chapters, the bulk of the book, are philosophical in character, while the last chapter contains a formalization of a system of inductive logic based on C. I. Lewis. In the philosophical sections, the author proposes that induction as used in various fields, e.g. by the scientist or lawyer, does not differ in method or logical syntax but in subject-matter. For this reason, he finds it necessary to present a logical system of induction as a conclusion to the book. Cohen invites criticism of his new theory of induction. The present reviewer feels that the author has misunderstood Aristotelian induction. Aristotelian induction means, primarily, being led from one truth to another and not the enumeration of instances. Rhetorical example has, for Aristotle, the nature of induction. Furthermore, the author himself seems to introduce time as a factor when he assesses inductive support in legal reasoning. This seems inconsistent with "timeless support for timeless propositions." Cohen's new theory is one that is worth a critical examination.--L. A. (shrink)