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SOCB43 Lecture 5 Weber: Science as a Vocation Durkheims Life Social Facts DOL: Agendas, Function and Mechanical Solidarity Create your own ideal type, in the same way Weber did. Use your type to illustrate what he need by an ideal type (explain what it is, how it works, what it does) - increasing power of rationalization the rise of science as a social authority - Science as a vocation: can it match religion, at, math being a noble leader, political leader, etc - Historically, science was not important - People who use science: Is it worth it? Is it important? - Weber says that the idea of trying to make school fun is a vocation of science because real science had qualities that make it incompatible - These qualitiesmain features of science are: 1. Specialization strive for perfection you have to understand something through and through to be a true scientist (not like journalists who scan an idea and write about it). In our world, it is impossible to know everything about something (old times, one was thought to know everything). The possibility of perfectly knowing something now is only possible in speculation. Weber describes it as your whole life hanging from getting the next thing right. 2. Fuses enthusiasm and discipline some argued that science needs more inspiration for discovery; Weber says it has moments of creativity but it is more to that. You cant only have inspiration and wait for ideas to come to you, it also come to people who ponder day and night and things just come to them. 3. Science defined by progress build a cumulative body of knowledge; if you are a true scientist, you want someone to disprove what you say to expand on it. In the world of art, for example, there is no such thing as progress (a great masterpiece cannot be changed and it is always seen as great; no false painting). What a scientist proposes is constantly attacked. Science is an example of where progress is the most important. Why do people do something when they know their contributions will be criticized, revamped and wont last? - people do science independent of results - they know their job prospects are close to zero www.notesolution.com