Page:American Journal of Sociology Volume 11.djvu/147

 REVIEWS 131

(p. 54), and should we not guard the former term against com- promising associations?

1 am disposed to question Professor Ross's application of the terms " law " and " generalization " (p. 66) ; and it seems to me that in the last two paragraphs of the chapter (p. 69) he has said " social law " when he meant " sociological law."

The " Map of the Sociological Field " (p. 98) contains so many points of departure, and the lines of connection between them are so complicated, that comment must be reserved. At all events, the alterations that have been made since the scheme was first published 2 show that the author's plan of campaign is developing, and that in his mind there is a large tentative element in the whole perspective. On the other hand, even if our point of view brings out a very different correlation of social processes, we can have no doubt that the frontier of discovery will be securely advanced by using this plan as a base of operations.

Chap. 6, " The Properties of Group Units," fails to convince me at points which might not have been left equally questionable if the actual working approach to them had begun with p. 138, thus invert- ing the order of argument. It seems to me that this would have led to something more than mere transposition of paragraphs. Some closer criticism of the contents would have been suggested. My contention would be that we are at present disposing all too sum- marily of the perceptive and purposive element in the phenomena of group-action, and crediting to the purely affective element a ratio of influence which final analysis will considerably reduce.

In the beginning of chap. 7 Professor Ross has wisely qualified the language in which his dissent from Professor Giddings was originally expressed. 3 The change is merely verbal, however, and the chapter aims to weaken the prestige of the idea that "social facts admit of a double interpretation, the objective and the subjective." After all, are the two views as far apart as they are made to appear? Is not the gist of the matter that men are in part phenomena of physical nature, as really as the winds and the waves and the trees, while they are also in part virtually as distinct superimpositions upon nature as though they were shot upon the planet from another cosmic system? Do Giddings and Ross really differ here, or is the apparent difference merely in ways of getting at analysis and expres- sion of the different species of factors which they equally recognize ?

2 American Journal of Sociology, Vol. IX, p. 206. * Ibid., p. 526.