Dear Joe, I find this notion of Moral Time of interest, but only anecdotally. What I mean is that I attended an evolutionary biology meeting at Hunter College several years ago. The last presenter was an Emergency Medicine doctor from Seattle, WA. His hypothesis was that social violence in this country started in 1959 based on his data. I thought that date rang a bell, and in mulling it over and doing some fact checking, that was the year that the Interstate Highway system was started. Certainly such social upheavel could cause violence. Look at the turmoil caused by school busing in Boston back in the mid-70's. John Torday

On Fri, Feb 16, 2018 at 11:12 AM, Joseph Michalski <[log in to unmask]> wrote:

Dear TOK-Society Colleagues:


I have not yet commented on the many fascinating threads, but I wanted to offer my gratitude for being included. The discussions are excellent, respectful, and truly educational - regardless of where people stand on the various issues. This is academic discourse at its best, in my view.


As a former "sociological fundamentalist" (i.e., someone who chose to hitch his wagon to the 'purest' of sociological explanatory frameworks that excluded all other types of explanations for human social behavior), I thought I'd share with you an example of this type of thinking in regard to the most recent school shooting. This comes mainly from Donald Black, who claims to have developed purely sociological explanations of social behavior - including what you see attached, extrapolating from his book Moral Time.  Without commenting further, I'd be curious to hear your responses on the adequacy and problematic aspects of such explanations.


As an extra incentive, anyone who might be able to anticipate in her/his response why I left the church of "sociological fundamentalism" some years ago will earn a free bag of grapes (not cucumbers)!


With kind regards, -Joe


Dr. Joseph H. Michalski

Associate Academic Dean

King’s University College at Western University

266 Epworth Avenue

London, Ontario, Canada  N6A 2M3

Tel: (519) 433-3491, ext. 4439

Fax: (519) 433-0353

Email: [log in to unmask]

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eiπ + 1 = 0

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