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Warren Schmaus

Illinois Institute of Technology, Department of Humanities, Faculty Member

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Phone: (312) 567-3473
Address: Department of Humanities
Illinois Institute of Technology
3301 S Dearborn
Chicago, IL 60616

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Universidad Complutense de Madrid

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Michigan State University

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National & Kapodistrian University of Athens

University of British Columbia

Università degli Studi "G. d'Annunzio" Chieti Pescara

Universidade Federal do Rio Grande do Sul

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Universidade Federal Rural do Semi-Árido

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University of Graz

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Papers by Warren Schmaus

Durkheim and the Social Character of the Categories

Rethinking Durkheim and his Tradition, 2004

Rethinking Durkheim and his Tradition, 2004

Durkheim's Sociological Theory of the Categories

Rethinking Durkheim and his Tradition, 2004

The Early Development of Durkheim's Thought

Rethinking Durkheim and his Tradition, 2004

Historical Background: Aristotle and Kant

Rethinking Durkheim and his Tradition, 2004

Fraud and misrepresentation in research--whose rights?

IRB, 1984

1. IRB. 1984 Sep-Oct;6(5):10-1. Fraud and misrepresentation in research--whose rights? Schmaus W,... more

Special Issue Introduction

HOPOS: The Journal of the International Society for the History of Philosophy of Science

La nature de la soci�t�: Organicisme et sciences sociales au XIXe si�cle

Isis, 2006

Durkheim as a Teacher of Religion

Teaching Durkheim, 2005

Two Concepts of Social Situatedness in Science

The literature on the social situatedness of epistemic agents in science has tended to characteri... more

Book Review:Theories of Explanation Joseph C. Pitt

Isis, 1989

Categories and classification in the social sciences

Philosophy of anthropology and sociology, 2007

CATEGORIES AND CLASSIFICATION IN THE SOCIAL SCIENCES Warren Schmaus 1 INTRODUCTION Social scienti... more

Science and the Social Contract in Renouvier

HOPOS: The Journal of the International Society for the History of Philosophy of Science, 2011

ABSTRACT Charles Renouvier (1815-1903) regarded normative questions in epistemology and philosoph... more ABSTRACT Charles Renouvier (1815-1903) regarded normative questions in epistemology and philosophy of science as analogous to those in moral and political philosophy and proposed similar ways of dealing with both. He argued that it was not possible to achieve certainty or even complete consensus in either morality or science. In the social and ethical realm, people should deal with these problems through their voluntary agreement to a social contract that consists of what he called “positive conventions and laws.” This social contract has no normative force unless it is entered into voluntarily. Once it is agreed upon, it provides the basis for civil liberties. It should always remain open to criticism and revision. Denying Kant’s distinction between theoretical and practical reason, Renouvier held that knowledge also depends upon freedom of the will and individual liberty. Just as rules that one is forced to obey have no moral authority, propositions one is forced to accept have no epistemic authority. Renouvier also drew an analogy between the ways in which the social contract and science develop over time through the critical examination of accepted views, thus suggesting that scientific theories were conventional in the same way as the social contract. Science then appears to depend on two sorts of social contract for Renouvier: one that governs society at large and guarantees freedom of inquiry and another that is shared among the scientific community and consists in theories and methods that are conventionally held and subject to critical evaluation and modification.

Sociology and Hacking's Trousers

PSA: Proceedings of the Biennial Meeting of the Philosophy of Science Association, 1992

For Hacking, the word "real" is one of JL Austin's trouser-words, taking its meani... more For Hacking, the word "real" is one of JL Austin's trouser-words, taking its meaning from its negative uses in much the same way as the admittedly sexist expres-sion "wear the trousers". In Representing and Intervening, Hacking proposes that at least some scientific realists can be interpreted ...

Explanation and Essence in "The Rules of Sociological Method" and "The Division of Labor in Society

Sociological Perspectives, 1995

In The Rules of Sociological Method, Durkheim tried to remove the ambiguity of The Division of La... more In The Rules of Sociological Method, Durkheim tried to remove the ambiguity of The Division of Labor in Society that arose from his essentialist model of explanation, in which causes and effects are both necessary and sufficient conditions of each other. The resulting confusion of effects with causes made possible the materialist interpretation of the latter work, in which increasing population density was mistaken for the cause rather than the sign of changes in the social environment associated with an increase in specialization. The Rules tried to defeat this misinterpretation through clarifying such key concepts as cause, function, and social environment Durkheim's readers had failed to see that he had provided only a functional and not a causal explanation of the division of labor, which he took to be an adaptation to, not a result of, factors in the social rather than the physical environment.

Book Reviews : Steve Fuller, Social Epistemology. Indiana University Press, Bloomington/ Indianapolis, 1988. Pp. xv, 316, US$22.00

Philosophy of the Social Sciences, 1991

Research programs as intellectual niches

Http Dx Doi Org 10 1080 02691729208578638, Jun 19, 2008

Philosophy fettered? A review of Science Unfettered: A Philosophical Study In Sociohistorical Ontology by J. E. McGuire and Barbara Tuchanska

Social Epistemology, 2002

L�vy-Bruhl, Durkheim, and the positivist roots of the sociology of knowledge

J Hist Behav Sci, 1996

Whither Social Epistemology? A Reply to Fuller

Philosophy of the Social Sciences, 1991

Where is social epistemology going? When I read the book, I welcomed it as suggesting a new frame... more

Durkheim and the Social Character of the Categories

Rethinking Durkheim and his Tradition, 2004

Rethinking Durkheim and his Tradition, 2004

Durkheim's Sociological Theory of the Categories

Rethinking Durkheim and his Tradition, 2004

The Early Development of Durkheim's Thought

Rethinking Durkheim and his Tradition, 2004

Historical Background: Aristotle and Kant

Rethinking Durkheim and his Tradition, 2004

Fraud and misrepresentation in research--whose rights?

IRB, 1984

1. IRB. 1984 Sep-Oct;6(5):10-1. Fraud and misrepresentation in research--whose rights? Schmaus W,... more

Special Issue Introduction

HOPOS: The Journal of the International Society for the History of Philosophy of Science

La nature de la soci�t�: Organicisme et sciences sociales au XIXe si�cle

Isis, 2006

Durkheim as a Teacher of Religion

Teaching Durkheim, 2005

Two Concepts of Social Situatedness in Science

The literature on the social situatedness of epistemic agents in science has tended to characteri... more

Book Review:Theories of Explanation Joseph C. Pitt

Isis, 1989

Categories and classification in the social sciences

Philosophy of anthropology and sociology, 2007

CATEGORIES AND CLASSIFICATION IN THE SOCIAL SCIENCES Warren Schmaus 1 INTRODUCTION Social scienti... more

Science and the Social Contract in Renouvier

HOPOS: The Journal of the International Society for the History of Philosophy of Science, 2011

ABSTRACT Charles Renouvier (1815-1903) regarded normative questions in epistemology and philosoph... more ABSTRACT Charles Renouvier (1815-1903) regarded normative questions in epistemology and philosophy of science as analogous to those in moral and political philosophy and proposed similar ways of dealing with both. He argued that it was not possible to achieve certainty or even complete consensus in either morality or science. In the social and ethical realm, people should deal with these problems through their voluntary agreement to a social contract that consists of what he called “positive conventions and laws.” This social contract has no normative force unless it is entered into voluntarily. Once it is agreed upon, it provides the basis for civil liberties. It should always remain open to criticism and revision. Denying Kant’s distinction between theoretical and practical reason, Renouvier held that knowledge also depends upon freedom of the will and individual liberty. Just as rules that one is forced to obey have no moral authority, propositions one is forced to accept have no epistemic authority. Renouvier also drew an analogy between the ways in which the social contract and science develop over time through the critical examination of accepted views, thus suggesting that scientific theories were conventional in the same way as the social contract. Science then appears to depend on two sorts of social contract for Renouvier: one that governs society at large and guarantees freedom of inquiry and another that is shared among the scientific community and consists in theories and methods that are conventionally held and subject to critical evaluation and modification.

Sociology and Hacking's Trousers

PSA: Proceedings of the Biennial Meeting of the Philosophy of Science Association, 1992

For Hacking, the word "real" is one of JL Austin's trouser-words, taking its meani... more For Hacking, the word "real" is one of JL Austin's trouser-words, taking its meaning from its negative uses in much the same way as the admittedly sexist expres-sion "wear the trousers". In Representing and Intervening, Hacking proposes that at least some scientific realists can be interpreted ...

Explanation and Essence in "The Rules of Sociological Method" and "The Division of Labor in Society

Sociological Perspectives, 1995

In The Rules of Sociological Method, Durkheim tried to remove the ambiguity of The Division of La... more In The Rules of Sociological Method, Durkheim tried to remove the ambiguity of The Division of Labor in Society that arose from his essentialist model of explanation, in which causes and effects are both necessary and sufficient conditions of each other. The resulting confusion of effects with causes made possible the materialist interpretation of the latter work, in which increasing population density was mistaken for the cause rather than the sign of changes in the social environment associated with an increase in specialization. The Rules tried to defeat this misinterpretation through clarifying such key concepts as cause, function, and social environment Durkheim's readers had failed to see that he had provided only a functional and not a causal explanation of the division of labor, which he took to be an adaptation to, not a result of, factors in the social rather than the physical environment.

Book Reviews : Steve Fuller, Social Epistemology. Indiana University Press, Bloomington/ Indianapolis, 1988. Pp. xv, 316, US$22.00

Philosophy of the Social Sciences, 1991

Research programs as intellectual niches

Http Dx Doi Org 10 1080 02691729208578638, Jun 19, 2008

Philosophy fettered? A review of Science Unfettered: A Philosophical Study In Sociohistorical Ontology by J. E. McGuire and Barbara Tuchanska

Social Epistemology, 2002

L�vy-Bruhl, Durkheim, and the positivist roots of the sociology of knowledge

J Hist Behav Sci, 1996

Whither Social Epistemology? A Reply to Fuller

Philosophy of the Social Sciences, 1991

Where is social epistemology going? When I read the book, I welcomed it as suggesting a new frame... more