One of the most memorable sociologists, Herbert Spencer, coined the phrase survival of the fittest. He used this phrase to describe social Darwinism. The belief of social Darwinism connects societies to eco-systems and says that people in societies are forced to adapt to changes in their enviornment just like the organisms in eco-systems. In both society and enviornment, the strong excel and the weak fall behind and eventually succumb to extinction. The above picture shows me, the fittest, beating my friend Jacob in the harsh battle of social Darwinism.
Those who live in less modern societies (such the amish) help one another in a more mechanical way. They are bonded together by the beliefs they share and can live peacefully. They feel like one society and can therefore can act as one.
From Research Methods
This picture of a modern city represents Emile Durkheim's idea of organic solidarity. People in cities help each other like organs in a body. I work at the local jewelers in Moorpark. I work for my teachers, my waiters at restaurants, my dry cleaners, and my cashiers, just as they work for me. People in this type of society help make things easier for the entire town by doing things for one another.
Today's world is filled with rationalization. Though this beaurocracy take-over seems to make life easier, it causes individuals to have to wear an iron cloak of rationality. In some situations, rationality has become necessary. When a man goes to buy a car, he is wearing his cloak. He goes there with a no-nonsense attitude to get the purchase done and overwith as quickly as possible. After driving his brand new car home and parking it in his driveway, he removes his cloak in order to act like a real human being with his family.
A survey is a type of quantitative research method that gathers information by distributing a list of questions to a random group of people (who usually fit into the same category). Each person anwers the same questions, usually with very vague answers such as marking yes, no, or sometimes or rating on a scale of one to five. Sociologists take the information they get from the surveys and convert it into statistics to explain large-scale social issues.
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