물질론적 사회구성이론의 사고논리 - 사회성의 발생에 관한 사회생물학적 접근의 기여와 한계

Abstract

A theory of the constitution of society that explains its formation of society answers the question, How is social order possible? In this paper, I propose a theory of the constitution of society that is both a materialist and genetic one. While materialism attempts to explain that society is constituted from nature and not from the mind, a genetic theory states that only when the process of societys genesis is logically reconstructed from its beginning, can what presently exists be genuinely explained. The materialist theory of the constitution of society provides a theoretical basis for radically transforming the traditional understanding of human beings and the world. Examining sociobiological approaches are important for our discussion since they relate to what the materialist theory of the constitution of society essentially requires. Yet, many in the field of sociobiology lack clear awareness of this particular relation. We should not overlook, however, several difficulties that the sociobiological approach presents. The fundamental problem that underlies these difficulties is what I refer to as the logic of thinking. The constitution of society should be explained in terms of the logic of difference based on structural and developmental logic - not in terms of the traditional logic of identity. The transformation from the mind-priority-scheme into the nature-priority-scheme entails the transformation of the logic of thinking as such. Moreover, when sociobiology claims totality in that it should and can explain all the areas of the social, it faces the potential critique of biological reductionism. Hence by doing this, sociobiology falls in danger of annulling its contributions to the theory of the constitution of society as well as its legitimate claim that the explanation of the social should begin from the biological basis. Unlike the expectations of sociobiologists, the social cannot solely be constituted from a biological basis. Rather, it should be explained in a comprehensive framework; namely, a materialist theory of the constitution of society which involves not only the uniqueness of the socio-cultural evolution but the relationship between the biological and the socio-cultural. Only when what sociobiology claims is limited in this way, can its contributions to a grasp of the social be properly appreciated.