Searle's Ideas

In today’s competitive market, companies rely on unique advertising slogans to market their product. Company slogans and trademarks have increased in popularity over the years. However, it sometimes becomes a challenging task to determine who has the right to a certain phrase. Such is the case evident in the exchange of letters between Mr. Herbert of Coca-Cola company and Mr. Seaver of Grove Press. Apparently, both companies utilize the slogan, “It’s the Real Thing,” to advertise their products causing a conflict regarding who has the rights to that slogan. Although Mr. Herbert of Coca-Cola delivered a professional and respectful sound and cordial argument using historical data, ethos, and logos to describe his points concerning the dual use of the slogan, Mr. Seaver thoroughly refuted his letter piece by piece in an ironic, sarcastic, and clever

This response addresses question four and define the provided theories, which include structural functionalism, conflict theory, and symbolic interactionism. In doing so, various components of the theories are identified in relation to the topic of social change. In doing so, it is important to point out that in sociology, theories are used to explain the patterns, the way groups of people decide to perform specific actions, and the way societies do certain things or rather experience a change in a different manner. On the other hand, social change implies the growth and development of a social order, which bears some significant consequences.

Sally Haslanger, in "But Mom, Crop-tops are Cute!", argues that false beliefs about social phenomena can become true beliefs (Haslanger, 70). This is because false beliefs cause change in the social world where people begin to believe that these false beliefs are true (Haslanger, 70). Since social institutions are constituted largely by shared beliefs and conventions that people share, if enough people believe a belief to be true, then it will become true, or at least, what people take to be true (Haslanger, 70). Haslanger argues that even if these beliefs are wrong, they will become part of reality (Haslanger, 71). As much as Haslanger is right about the effects of social institutions and structures ion the beliefs of various social groups, a potential objection that I will raise is if everything is social, then do humans not have any natural dispositions that set them apart from others who experience a similar social setting? Further, Haslanger's reply to this objection will be discussed as well.

Firstly one needs to define the two concepts at hand, namely (a) social facts by Durkheim and secondly, (b) pathological by Durkheim.

Although these examples are drawn from very different institutional environments, there is a common thread. In both kinds of contexts, the formal constraints have established the parameters of legitimate action, providing the institutional mold within which emergent norms and networks

Social institutions can be described as complex systems that comprise the structure of a society. While providing order to the society, they are also restricting as change must be maneuvered within the existing institutions. The structure of relationships caused by social institutions limits and determines the existence of individuals and peoples in their society (Social Institutions). Norms are established, though not always explicitly, through certain practices of behavior which in turn contribute to the existence of said institutions.

Social Reality is a theory of knowledge that examines the development of jointly constructed understandings of the world. It assumes that understanding, significance and meaning are developed not separately within the individual, but in coordination with other human beings. The elements most important to the theory are the assumption that human beings rationalize their experience by creating a model of the social world and how it functions and, that language is the most essential system through which humans construct reality. Without language we cannot understand the meaning of what we see; we cannot recognize the context in which the meaning of what we see is shared and constructed. Intentionality is based on the recognition that one knows what one sees or that one understands the meaning of what one sees. This means, again, intentionality is based on language, and more generally, the use of symbols.Social reality is all about a the group aspect of ethics.

John Searle developed a theory where he recognized there is a mental and a physical, like substance dualism for Rene Descartes, the difference is that he held they may be two aspect of a single substance. In the other hand, Descartes beliefs that dualism is composed of two different substances which are mind and body. One is physical, our body and the other is nonphysical, our mind where our thoughts and feelings exist. He also claims that these substances interact at some point in the body. They both have in common that they recognized mind and body as a different parts.

Institutions play a huge role in society. Whether one realizes it or not, everything our society is and does is because of the institutions that are set up. In “Animal Farm” by George Orwell, Napoleon, the dictatorial ambassador of Animal Farm, uses his different forms of manipulation to introduce different types of institutions. A few of the institutions he set up are: the ideology of Animalism, family, the judicial system (dogs/pigs) etc… However, the institutions I will talk about are: the community, media and propaganda, labor, and education.

However, metaphysical statements that may lack any means for being literally true, can still have moral significance. People who truly believe something is true may still reap the benefits of their belief; such as the confidence or inspiration they might draw from it. These metaphysical claims "may still serve to express or arouse, emotion, and thus be subject to ethical or aesthetic standards." Another distinction that Ayer makes in his writings is the difference between strong and weak factually significant propositions.

Emile Durkheim was the first in his time to introduce the concept of “Social Facts”. He defined these social facts as “ways of acting, thinking and feeling, external to the individual, and endowed with a power of coercion, by reason of which they control” (Hadden 1997). In other words, social facts are ideas that pass on through generation to generation which shapes a pattern for relationships and expectations for individuals in different societies. Social facts help to create and form the real world without ever being identified as a real fact. The concept of a social fact remains just that, a concept however, it is a concept that is conceptualized.

There is a constant debate about the primacy of structure or agency in forming human behavior in the social science. Carlsnaes (as cited in Hay, 1995) claimed that “the problem of structure and agency is … the central problem of social and political theory”. Radically, the agency-structure problem is an ontological problem which is related to the nature of structures, agents and their correlations (Wight, 2003). There are four influential positions in the structure-agency debate: structuralism, intentionalism, structuration theory and critical realism (Hay, 1995). In his book, structuralism emphasizes the dominance of structure rather than agency on behavior. It is a structure-centered approach, arguing that structures constrain and even determine agency in the relationship between structure and agency. However, intentionalism highlights the agents in explaining behavior. It is an agency-centered approach that regards structures as the product of intentional acts. Structuration theory presents a developed attempt to transcend the dualism in which structure and agency are connected externally. It argues for the “duality of structure”. Critical realism is based on a dialectical cognizance of structure and agency, striving to overcome the dualism of the two. It links to “strategic-relational approach”. This essay will argue that structure and agency is a dialectical unity of relationship, and they entail and affect each other. In exceptional circumstances, they can be

“the theory basically postulates the existence of a level of reality or world inhabited by the ideal or archetypal forms of all things and concepts. Thus a form exists for objects like tables and rocks and for concepts such as beauty and justice.”

According to Manza, J. (2013) Social institution is a structured and enduring practice of human life that tis built around well-established rules and norms or is centered in important organizations. (Pg. A-11).

As part of their study, a student of social science scrutinizes the theories of many social scientists. This task can be abstruse without a framework with which to analyze those theories. Tom Campbell describes five parameters that can be useful when studying or comparing social theories. These parameters aren’t clear-cut categories, but ranges or areas within which an idea or theory can fall. Despite these ranges, Hubert Blumer’s theory of symbolic interaction can be said to fall somewhat more to one part of these parameters than the other. Symbolic interaction, as described by Blumer, is more of an idealist than a materialist, more descriptive than normative, more individualistic than holistic, more related to conflict than to consensus, and more accurately understood through an interpretive model than through a positivist one. This paper will endeavor to demonstrate that his views primarily fall in line with these parameters, even though there are aspects of each contained within his theory.