SOC 103 Chapter Notes - Chapter 2: Auguste Comte
17 Jan 2012
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Chapter 2 - sociological investigation empirical evidence: information we can verify with our senses. We have all grown up believing widely accepted truths, being bombarded by expert advice, and being pressured to accept the opinions of people around us. A lot of things we believe i. e. poor people are far more likely to commit crimes than rich people, are actually untrue. However the truth is that police are more lenient with rich people. As adults, we need to evaluate more critically what we read; sociology helps us do that. Scientific sociology (positivist sociology) scientific sociology: the study of society based on systematic observation of social behaviour. positivism---auguste comte :: scientific orientation to knowing, that assumes that an objective really exists out there . The job of the scientist is to discover this reality by gathering empirical evidence (facts we can verify by seeing/hearing/touching)
