Word: guesswork
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Dates: during 1950-1959
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...Guesswork in GobbledygooL The psychologists are worse, torn as they are between gestaltists, behaviorists, functionalists, reflexologists and other -ists. They expend their energies formalizing the obvious ("Although other sensations have various degrees of hedonic tone," says one textbook, "pain is notoriously unpleasant"). But the result of all their efforts, Standen insists, is that they cannot say anything really important about man. "It is possible to go clear through a course in psychology without ever hearing what the various virtues...
...social sciences (sample thesis : "The relationship of population density to residential propinquity as a factor in marriage selection"), they are "guesswork clad in long, flowing robes of gobbledy-gook." Meanwhile, mathematics, the only exact science, has become merely the tool of all the others. Scientists deserve to be slapped, according to Standen, because they have substituted the is for the ought. "That is why we must never allow ourselves to be ruled by scientists. They must be our servants, not our masters...
...added a scientific touch to College fencing. Tuesday the team bought a set of electric epees, which will take the guesswork out of determining the winners of epee contests...