Page:American Journal of Sociology Volume 1.djvu/120

 108 A serious question of sociological method concerns the relation of facts which have already engaged the attention of accredited sciences, to facts which seem to be less susceptible of classification and generalization. A form of the question is involved in the differences of policy between investigators who tend to confine their view to historical data, i. e., to facts belonging in the past, and the other class of investigators who tend to equally exclusive interest in contemporary social phenomena.

It cannot be too forcibly urged that past and present societary facts must serve as reciprocal interpreters; with this provision it seems to be timely to advocate at present the devotion of a larger proportion of sociologists' attention to scientific treatment of facts taking place before our eyes. Whatever be the ultimate success of scholars in reconstructing history, there is no single past period or past societary status of which relatively so complete knowledge is available as of our own civilization. There is more room for skepticism about conclusions drawn from assumed knowledge of past societary conditions than there would be in the case of conclusions derived by equally critical processes from interpretation of contemporary facts.

The portion of time which we easily and without important error think of as the present is sufficiently extended to exhibit the same relations of sequence as well as of order which we try to trace in the past. More complete evidence about this present is available than in case of past periods. The scientific value of contemporary phenomena, as the material for social philosophy, is not placed as high as it deserves to be by the most competent sociologists. Perhaps they instinctively avoid dealing with these facts, from dread of being confused with the unscientific people who make the name social science contemptible. At all events the men who have done the most to develop sociological methodology have given relatively excessive attention to sources of evidence which can never be as productive as contemporary sources.

The experience of men in the present generation, or better in some instances the present century, is a safer basis for the beginning of induction, dynamic as well as static, than the more imposing but less coherent evidence available about remote societary systems. Conclusive social philosophy will not be constructed chiefly out of the fragmentary data which remote centuries have reserved, but chiefly rather out of observation of present realities. The men who are at