ABSTRACT
The title, ‘Sociology as a healthy human body’, summarizes the main theme of this article. The purpose of this article is to provide an alternative perspective and to allow people to discover what sociology would be like if it is analogically a healthy human body. Roslender (1992, p.6) describes sociology as a discipline that ‘has always been characterized by its multi-perspective constitution’. The beauty of having multi-perspective constitution lies in its potential to discover knowledge, but at the same time, it could potentially create equally as much ambiguity when utilized inappropriately. To fully comprehend my healthy human body perspective in sociological terms, it is then necessary to first understand my perspective of the healthy human body (including how human body relates to the society) and sociology. Though the analogy is not new, the element of health offers an alternative perspective which also leads to different sociological outcomes.
KEY WORDS
health / human body and society / organism analogy vs human body analogy / sociology and its purpose
Introduction
My personal interest in health and human body led me to realize how amazing our body is. I believe that we, the human beings and the society, could learn a great deal from our body and Game put forth a strong argument to support this idea:
‘My concern has been to argue that the body provides the basis for a different conception of knowledge: we know with our bodies. In this regard, the authentics of experience might be reclaimed; if there is any truth, it is the truth of the body’ (1991; cited in Scott and Morgan, 1993, p.4).
Moreover, I also believe there is a need to remind people that we are neglecting the most fundamental elements of life, and this neglect is essentially the seed to most, if not all, issues. ‘Whatever its form, however it behaves, the cell is the microscopic package that contains all the parts necessary to survive in an ever-changing world. It follows then that loss of cellular homeostasis underlies virtually every disease.’ (Marieb and Hoehn, 2007, page 65). Although Marieb and Hoehn (2007) are only referring to the health of the human body, in this article, I would relate how this is also true in terms of the society’s health, as human beings are akin to the cells of society. Before we get overly excited about everything else – politic; economy; culture; crime; the latest fashion, news, gossips, smartphone or gadgets; building bases on Mars or moon etc. – we should, at the very least, collaboratively make fulfilling the fundamental elements of life the top priority – the needs of our cells (for a healthy body) and the needs of the people (for healthy society).
Understanding Health – Healthy Human Body and Healthy Society
The element of health is the heart of this article; therefore, it is critical to first understand what health meant from my perspective. Just as Radley (2004, p.59) stated, ‘not every person has a clear concept of health, nor is keeping healthy a main priority for everyone’. The word health often triggers different meaning in different people (Blaxter, 2001), and for this article, the individual’s definition of health will affect their perspective of this analogy. So, what is health?
‘Some hold that the correct definition is that health is a commodity, others consider health an ideal state, others believe an individual is healthy so long as she is able to function normally, and yet others claim that health is a reserve of strength which helps us adapt to changing circumstances.’ (Seedhouse, 2006, p.5).
In the Croatian Medical Journal, Norman Sartorius (2006) divides the definition of health into three types; (1) The absence of any disease or impairment; (2) An extension of the first, but focuses on individual’s ability to cope with daily life; and (3) A state of balance, and equilibrium with personal, social and environmental factors as defined by the individual. Last, but not least, the most recognized health organization, World Health Organization (WHO), defines health as ‘a state of complete physical, mental and social well-being and not merely the absence of disease or infirmity’ (World Health Organization, 1946, p.100).
The WHO’s health definition ‘has been criticized over the past 60 years’ (Huber et al., 2001, p.1) due to its requirement for complete health. Smith (2008) and Huber et al. (2011) argued that ‘it’s a ludicrous definition that would leave most of us unhealthy most of the time’ (Smith, 2008), but I disagreed, as we are in fact unhealthy most of the time. It is a sad fact, but for those who are living in developing or developed countries, almost all elements (air, water, food and living environment) that we required to stay healthy is either modified, replaced, polluted or intoxicated. We pollute the air we breathe; strip nutrients from our food (Boobier, 2008, p.44); contaminate our body with artificial nutrients, chemicals, drugs and toxins (Aronoff, 2011; Aktar et al., 2009; Timbrell. 1999); contaminate our drinking water; created electromagnetic field pollution; and live in stressful environment. Therefore, it is only logical that most of us are unhealthy most of the time because externally (factors outside human body), ‘one cannot be healthy in an unhealthy society’ (Foucault, 2009, p.781), and internally (factors within human body), just as Lindlahr’s (1991) famous book title says, ‘you are what you eat’.
In this article, I would be using a slight variation of the WHO’s definition of health as the standard definition of health, purely because it is how I interpret health, and what Seedhouse (2006) described as the ‘ideal state – a state of supreme well-being’ (Seedhouse, D., 2006, p.41). Due to my Chinese background, I strongly believe in the Eastern philosophies of Buddhism, Taoism and traditional Chinese medicine that advocates the following principle of health:
‘Health is perceived as a harmonious equilibrium that exists between the interplay of “yin” and “yang”: the five internal elements (metal, wood, water, fire and earth), the six environmental conditions (dry, wet, hot, cold, wind and flame), other external sources of harm (physical injury, insect bites, poison, overeat and overwork), and the seven emotions (joy, sorrow, anger, worry, panic, anxiety and fear)’ (Chan, Petula Sik and Esther, 2008)
Hence, my definition of health is a state of balanced cellular, mental and social well-being and not merely the absence of disease or infirmity. Huber et al. (2011, p.2) think that ‘WHO definition becomes counterproductive as it declares people with chronic diseases and disabilities definitively ill’. I totally agree with the exclusion of disability, as it is not an illness, especially if the cause is an accident, but I strongly oppose the inclusion of chronic diseases. Chronic diseases, commonly known as noncommunicable disease in the United Kingdom or lifestyle diseases in Japan, resulted from unhealthy lifestyle (Jamison et al., 2006), so chronic diseases should remain as an unhealthy state.
My health definition may potentially put more people in the unhealthy category because of its focus on the cellular needs, but at the same time, I would contend that it provides a more holistic and honest indication of health. Although we may differ in many aspects, such as personalities, characteristics, preferences or appearance, our cells need the same elements (nutrients, water, oxygen and good living environment) to be healthy. From this perspective, health should, therefore have a universal definition, rather than an individualized definition that Smith (2008) and Huber et al. (2011) advocates. With this definition, if the individual usually or constantly neglects or ignore the needs of their body cells, the individual is unhealthy. In contrast, if the individual usually or constantly addresses the needs of their body cells, the individual is healthy.
Despite Smith (2008) and Huber et al.’s (2011) criticism on WHO’s definition, they were arguably aiming for their own version of ideal health state. For Smith (2008), he would consider himself healthy so long as he possesses the capacity to do what he wants. For Huber et al. (2011), the ideal health state is up to the individual to define; the individual is healthy as long as he/she could self-manage and possesses the ability to adapt to their everyday life. In pursuit of health, they are even willing to accept the abnormal as the norm, for the sake of identify themselves as healthy. Personally, I would consider this individualized definition of health as rule-bending rather than problem-solving. Although Smith (2008) and Huber et al. (2011) may be defining health from the fit for work perspective, changing the definition of health simply because modern medicine declared them incurable, is at best, a white lie to confuse people into thinking that they are healthy. The mindset of, since so many people are having it, it must be normal – ‘ageing with chronic illnesses has become the norm’ (Huber et al., 2011, p.1). From my health’s perspective, an unhealthy individual may still be fit for work, but being fit for work does not necessarily mean that the individual is healthy. It thus makes no sense to change the definition to make unhealthy people definitively healthy, purely because they are still fit in some form.
Having defined the health of human body, in terms of a healthy society, I would define it as, a state of optimum population well-being and not merely an advancement in civilization or a statistical measurement of economic/political growth. ‘Traditionally, the main criterion on which a society’s level of well-being has been judged is “standard of living”. This is essentially a measure of the wealth and spending power of a country's citizens’ (Jordan, 2010, p.2). The standard of living, which is mainly based on economic stability (distribution of wealth & resources among the population), is akin to the cardiovascular system (distribution of resources to all the cells) in terms of the human body. Studies have shown that the wealth does not guarantee health (Meer, Miller and Rosen, 2003), so I would aver that it is not a good indication of a healthy society, just as the health of the cardiovascular system alone is insufficient to represent the health of the overall human body. The health of the population, on the other hand, accounted for all individual, social and environmental factors, hence it would be a holistic indication of a society’s health. In this case, it would be unlikely for the society to be unhealthy when its population is healthy and vice versa.
The human body, quite commonly known as God’s masterpiece (Paturi, J., n.d.), is both a very complex and a very simple system. Complex in the sense that we still do not know every detail of it until this day, yet very simple in the sense that all the complicated operations within the body happen fully automatically. The only thing that we need to do for our body is to provide it with all the elements it required. Other than that, our body will be able to do everything else for us automatically – healing injuries and wounds; distribute nutrients; fight invasive microorganisms and diseases; neutralize toxins or harmful substances we consumed; digest food; produce enzymes and hormones; growing hair, nails and new cells, etc. Therefore, this article proposes, what Meili (2012) suggested in his book, ‘A Healthy Society’, that the health of the population shall be used as the determinant of the health of the society.
If we are willing to remind ourselves of the simplicity of life, it is easy to realize that the foundation of our society is the human being and the foundation of a human being is the body cell. Therefore, to solve societal issues, we need to ensure that the people are living well; to ensure that the people are living well, we need to ensure that the body cells are living well; to ensure that the body cells are living well, we need to provide it with all the elements that it needs. In other words, healthy cells build a healthy body and healthy bodies build a healthy society that continually provides healthy elements for the cells. Confucius once said, ‘life is simple, but we insist on making it complicated’ (Krieger, R., 2002). Creating a healthy society is literary that simple, yet we rejected such simplicity and created our current immensely complex and unhealthy society in the name of professionalism.
Understanding the Similarity between the Human Body and the Society
Society, in this article, refers to the place that we, the human beings, live. Society is created by human beings and therefore only exist for as long as human beings exist. If human beings cease to exist, it is the end of society, but not the end of the world. Whether it is a coincidence or a reflection of our consciousness, the society seems to be a projection of the human body. ‘Douglas argues that everything, in fact, symbolizes the body, and that the body symbolizes everything else’ (Williams and Bendelow, 1998, p.27). To a certain extent, it could be said that the human body and the society are the same as they are technically made up of the same thing; cells form the human body and human beings, in turn, forms the society. This is probably why Douglas describes the two bodies, the self (human body) and society, as ‘sometimes they are so near as to be almost merged’ (Douglas, 1970, p.87).
A society could be referred to as a village, a town, a city, a state, a country or even the entire planet earth, but regardless of which one it is representing, Table 1 below (see Table 1: Similarity between the Human Body and the Society), shows how they are still analogically like the human body. Bear in mind that Table 1 is only intended to show how analogically similar they could be and not trying to claim they are the same. In Shilling’s (2003, p.64) word, ‘the body is above all a metaphor of society as a whole’. Nonetheless, their similarities facilitate a two-way reflection – the human body analogically reflects how society works and vice versa. Starobinski (1990, p.23) goes further to claim that ‘everything is related to the body, as if it had just been rediscovered after being long forgotten’.
Understanding Sociology – What is Sociology and its purpose?
In 1876, William Graham Sumner (1840-1910) taught the first course identified as 'sociology' in the Yale University in the United States (Kumar, 2011). This shows that the discipline of sociology has been around for over a century, but despite having such a long history, the purpose of sociology remained ambiguous, even among the presidents of the American Sociological Association (ASA). Burawoy (2004) thinks that its purpose is to make the world a better place to live in; Gans (2002) thinks that its purpose is to contribute knowledge to both society and literature; and Ogburn (1930, p.2) thinks that its purpose is simply ‘to wit and discover knowledge’. Some argued that sociology is a purely scientific discipline, while others argued that sociology is a humanistic discipline; so, ‘what is sociology?’ and ‘what is its purpose?’ These are, arguably, the two most debated questions within the discipline. Between 1885 and 1930, sociology possesses both scientific and humanistic elements (Lengermann and Brantley, 2007, p.7); between 1920 and 1930, sociology, led by Ogburn (1930), decided to abandon the humanistic element to become purely scientific (LoConto, 2011). Up until today, the struggle between scientific and humanistic elements in sociology remained as a hot topic, but with new terms, popularized by Buroway (2004) – professional sociology (scientific) and public sociology (humanistic) or more specifically, organic public sociology. Rather than abandoning the humanistic element in sociology, I prefer to integrate it as Ogburn himself, one of the many ASA president who advocates a purely scientific sociology, acknowledged that the humanistic element ‘may be just as important or more so, perhaps, than discovering new knowledge’ (Ogburn, 1930, p.2).
According to Burawoy (2005, p.11), ‘the questions – “knowledge for whom?” and “knowledge for what?” – define the fundamental character of our discipline’. To answer these two questions, I would suggest the same answer as what the humanist sociologists such as Lee, Du Bois and Wright would; Sociology for humanity (for self and the public) and ‘sociology for the service of humanity’ (Lee, 1978; cited in Du Bois and Wright, 2008, p.105). Personally, I consider and envision sociology as a discipline that has the following two characteristics:
· A discipline that studies and seeks to understand everything that is related to the society (American Sociological Association., n.d.; Britsoc.co.uk, n.d.; Symonds and Hunt, 1996;) – from individuals (health, lifestyle, personalities, behaviors, family, social interaction etc.) to the states (economic, culture, politics, law etc.), from art (history, geography, music, etc.) to science (chemistry, biology, physics, engineering, etc.), from the center of earth to the space (understanding how our environment affects us and vice versa), from non-science (art, traditions, religion etc.) to science, and from the visible (physical items that we consume or use) to the invisible (non-physical elements, such as feelings and beliefs)
· A discipline that threads all pieces of knowledge (from all other disciplines including sociology itself) together to form the big picture. If other disciplines are the five senses (visual, hearing, taste, smell and touch) and the brain of a human body, sociology is the mind, without which, we would be in the situation of the ‘three blind men and an elephant’ – each blind man provides correct and accurate descriptions about the elephant, but the description is limited to the area that they are assigned to and ‘touched’. Sociologists, in this scenario, is the one who combines the descriptions from all three blind men to form the complete elephant, which is why sociological knowledge is often mistaken or discredited as common sense (Candee, 2012; Taylor, 1947; Thomas, 2017)
To sum it up in a sentence, from my perspective, sociology is an all-in-one discipline that studies the world holistically to create ‘utopistics’, ‘the sober, rational, and realistic evaluation of human social systems’ (Wallerstein, 1998, p.1-2). I have chosen to borrow Wallerstein’s (1998) term ‘utopistics’ instead of using the term utopia, which is more often referred to as the perfect world (Levitas, 2013; Dawson, 2016), because I agree with him that creating a better place to live in does not necessarily mean creating the perfect place. It simply means creating ‘an alternative, credibly better, and historically possible (but far from certain) future’ (Wallerstein, 1998, p.2). So, what should the purpose of such a discipline be? I would undoubtedly agree with British Sociological Association (Britsoc.co.uk, n.d.), Burawoy (2004), Collins (2007), Du Bois & Wright (2002), Lee (1976), and many others that the purpose of sociology is to make the world a better place to live in. What other purposes shall sociology serve if it is not for the betterment of the world or the society? Levitas advocates my exact same thought:
‘Sociology must reclaim utopia, those normative, prescriptive, future-oriented elements that have suffused the discipline from the beginning, but are too often a cause of embarrassment rather than celebration. It needs to be released from damaging self-censorship, and turn to the vision of a better world that is so often what draws people to the discipline in the first place. If sociologists have no claim to superior imagination or ethical competence, they are no less capable of or responsible for this than anyone else. They should have something to contribute to understanding systemic connections and thus mapping alternatives. If sociology has nothing to offer here, I really don’t know quite what it is for.’ (2013, p.217)
Regardless of disciplines and motives (for self, for others or both; for fun, for a greater cause or both), we arguably, always seek knowledge with a purpose. To explain how things work, to understand how things happen, to uncover the truth, to earn a living, to seek the origin of life, to solve problems, to self-improve, to change something, to entertain, to help someone, to satisfy personal curiosity, to pass time, etc.
‘All events are interwoven in a grand scheme outside of our comprehension. Events we observe on a daily basis may appear to be random, but each event has a way of affecting something else, creating a new possible event or circumstance. When we apply this to events taking place in our lives, we can easily connect action events to resulting events. This connectedness allows us to choose actions that create positive results and avoid actions that create negative ones.’ (Adams, 2010, p.132)
In other words, whatever we do, it directly or indirectly contributes something (good or bad) to the society, and, most importantly, we could choose. Since each one of us is a part of the society, seemingly miniscule events such as self-improvement and self-entertainment indirectly contribute to the betterment of the society in some form, though to a lesser visible degree. From this perspective, I would proclaim that all disciplines collectively share a universal purpose, which is, to create a better world through different means (physical, emotional, spiritual, political, economic, educational, entertainment etc.). Unfortunately, this universal purpose is, too often, hidden away in the shadow, generally because it is deemed to be unrealistic, naïve, fanciful or impossible (Dawson, 2016; Geoghegan, 2010).
Ever since the discipline attempted to abandon the humanistic elements, ‘sociology as a discipline has never fully developed its promise to apply the tools and knowledge of sociology beyond the academy’ (American Sociological Association Task Force, 2005). Ironically, science itself is not widely accepted because it could explain or prove how things work with its theories and researches. Science is widely accepted because of its applied science, which convinced people to believe in their theories and researches after it helped to change or bring convenience to the society. Adopting scientific methodologies or pursuing a scientific sociology is indeed a widely accepted way to gain trust and credibility for sociological works, but even Ogburn (1930), the one who led sociology away from serving humanity, agreed that serving humanity is more important. Therefore, I propose that sociology should revive and embrace its humanistic elements. If sociology inspired to become like science, it should also include applied sociology just as science did – not just in terms of scientific research methodologies, but also in terms of Du Bois & Wright’s (2002) humanistic sociology, Burawoy’s (2004) organic public sociology, or Scambler’s (2016) active sociology, a sociology that creates utopistics.
Sociology and the Human Body
In her book, “Natural Symbols”, Douglas (2013, p.xxxviii) stated, ‘the human body is the most readily available image of a system’, and I totally concurred. ‘We do not simply have bodies that we do things with and to, but we are bodies, our sense of who we are is inseparable from our own body’ (Howson, 2013, p.13), so this analogy is, in my opinion, inseparable from sociological studies, where its main subject of interest is the human and the society. This analogy is by no means new and according to Shilling (2004, p.17), ‘it is also possible to argue that the body has been present at the very heart of the sociological imagination’. Howson (2013), Malacrida and Low (2008), Scott and Morgan (1993), Shilling (2004), Turner B (2008), and Williams and Bendelow (1998) have shown in their work that through critical re-reading in corporeal terms, the human body is present but hidden in most classical sociology.
Having grown up with an unhealthy body, I have always been drawn to health knowledge due to my desire to regain health. This has led me to learn more about health, and subsequently to produce this article. Upon further research, it turns out that this analogy is more common than I thought. Scott and Morgan (1993, p.3) claimed that ‘much of the credit for this growth of interest in the body, must go to Bryan Turner’ as his book, ‘The Body and Society (1984) may be viewed as setting the agenda for a wide range of research and theoretical work’, putting the human body in the limelight of sociological analysis. This is not an easy task as hinted in Howson’s statement, ‘the body has become more interesting to sociologists because of social developments that force us to think about it’ (Howson, 2013, p.5), which sort of suggested that sociology is gradually being forced to get interested. I share the opinion of Turner and Abrutyn (2016, page 529) that, ‘sociology can no longer avoid engagement with biological ideas, but it can incorporate them where they are useful’.
Before The Body and Society (1984), there was an apparent absence of sociological interest in the human body (Bendelow and Williams, 1998; Shilling, 2004). This is largely due to the adaptation of the ‘Cartesian legacy’ (Howson, 2013, p.3) or medical model (Freund, McGuire and Podhurst, 2003) that created the mind/body dichotomy of the body in sociology (Kasulis, Aimes and Dissanayake, 1993; Scott and Morgan, 1993; Shilling, 2004; Turner, 2008, 2013). This is essentially like the science/humanistic dichotomy of sociology itself. As a result, prior to this, ‘the body is always placed in an ancillary position to the mind’ (Kasulis, Aimes and Dissanayake, 1993, p.22).
During his presidential address, Burawoy (2004) mapped out the four types of knowledge in the division of sociological labour; professional, critical, policy and public; arguing that they are interdependent on one and other. Scambler (2016) further extended them to six by introducing what he called the ‘foresight sociology’ and ‘action sociology’. For this article, however, I would suggest a much simpler model of sociological labour: scientific (specializing in discovering knowledge – professional, critical and foresight) and humanistic (specializing in applying knowledge – policy, public and action). In terms of the human body analogy, the mind represents the scientific division and the body represents the humanistic division. Just as I mentioned above, I envision sociology as a discipline that threads all knowledge together to form the big picture. Therefore, before branching sociology into more subdivisions, as a discipline, it should, perhaps, firstly acknowledge the importance of both scientific and humanistic elements.
Tittle (2004) and Turner (2005) would probably oppose to this idea. Tittle (2004, p.1642) ‘believes that public sociology gets in the way of good professional sociology’. Similarly, Turner thinks that
‘to be a scientist, it is necessary to suspend biases and beliefs in order to understand how the world actually works, whereas to be an advocate is not let science get in the way of biases and beliefs about how the world should work’ (2005, p.43-44)
For them, sociology could only choose one path, either purely scientific or purely humanistic. In terms of the human body, it is basically a choice between having a mind without body and having a body without the mind. Analogically speaking, sociology needs both the mind (scientific element) and the body (humanistic element) to be a healthy human being (a sociology that creates utopistics); in the sense that a mind without body makes you unable to interact with the physical world (having knowledge but cannot apply) while a body without mind reduces you from human being to a living being like other animals (acting without knowledge/layman sociology). Instead of imposing scientific sociology standards over humanistic sociology and vice versa, this analogy implies that they should remain unique – i.e. scientific sociologists conduct unbiased researches while humanistic sociologists are allowed some degree of bias in applying sociological knowledge – and instead of being seen as getting in the way, they should collaborate – one seek, accumulate and provide knowledge; one apply knowledge; and both provide feedback to assist each other to advance.
Spencer’s Organism Analogy vs Healthy Human Body Analogy
As someone who has used a very similar analogy, Spencer’s work is therefore indispensable in this article. Herbert Spencer (1820-1903), is a British philosopher and sociologist, who was born in Derby, England. He is the first sociologist to apply the theory of evolution to the study of sociology (Rumney, 2017). Besides being the first, ‘the influence of Spencer’s evolutionary theory was on a par with that of Charles Darwin’ (Sweet, n.d.), but as Taylor (2007, p.58) postulated, ‘Spencer’s evolutionism is by its nature and origin essentially philosophical, not biological’. In Spencer’s own words,
‘organic evolution consists in a change from the homogeneous to the heterogeneous…Whether it be in the development of the Earth, in the development of Life upon its surface, in the development of Society, of Government, of Manufactures, of Commerce, of Language, Literature, Science, Art, this same advance from the simple to the complex, through successive differentiations, holds uniformly’ (1862, p.148).
This description fits the human body analogy nicely, because it originates from the biology group, animal, that it belongs to – ‘the development of a seed into a tree, or an ovum into an animal, constitute an advance from homogeneity of structure to heterogeneity of structure’ (Spencer, 1862, p.148).
It would be impossible to cover all Spencer’s sociological views here so I would be focusing on the three that are relevant to his use of organism analogy: individual liberty, altruism and survival of fittest. Hiskes (1983, p.45) found Spencer’s organic metaphor and Spencer’s devotion to the idea of individual liberty, contradictory; ‘organic metaphor seems to grant a large role to the state in governing the affairs of the social organism’ and this will compromise individual liberty. This is probably due to Hiskes’s interpretation on how organism body works:
‘If society resembles a biological organism, then like all such organisms it must be arranged hierarchically with a single control centre analogous to the brain which directs all bodily activities. This control centre must be the government, which if the metaphor is to be isomorphically correct, must possess supreme dictatorial power and authority.’ (1983, p.46)
Contrary to Hiskes’s (1983) interpretation, the brain of organisms does not exert control over the operation or functions of individual cells, it simply coordinates all the activities within the body. Far from holding dictatorial authority, the brain is more like the butler for the cells, taking care of its needs and assisting them to solve issues. Hiskes (1983), also finds it hard to believe that Spencer is an advocate of altruism because he is so concerned with self-interest, but this is not the case from Spencer’s organism perspective. Biologically, the body cell is concerned with its self-interest (obtaining the elements such as nutrients, water and oxygen for it to live - individualism), but at the same time, its concern of self-interest is to allow it to function optimally (cell metabolism), which in turn contributes altruistically to the health of the overall body. Though Spencer maintains that society is best understood when compared to an organism (Priya, R., 2016), in this case, it even helps to clarify Spencer’s seemingly contradicting ideologies, showing that they are in line.
More than a sociologist, Spencer was better known among his peers as, ‘the philosopher’ (Allen, 1894, PRS.12). One of his most famous work, which is still widely known today, is the famous phrase he coined back in 1864, ‘survival of the fittest’ (Offer, 2000). The majority, if not all, of the arguments circulating the phrase, sprung from the term fittest, which most argued as being ambiguous (Howert, 1917; Waters, 1986; Resnik, 1988). Based on Allen’s (1894) impression of Spencer, it is possible to conclude that Spencer has chosen survival of the fittest as his generalization of the elements that are involved in Darwin’s natural selection, of which many failed to appreciate.
‘That organisms which live, thereby prove themselves fit to live, in so far as they have been tried; while organisms which die, thereby prove themselves in some respects unfitted for living; are facts no less manifest, than is the fact that this self-acting purification of a species, must tend ever to insure adaptation between it and its environment. This adaptation may be either so maintained or so produced.’ (Spencer, 1864, p.445)
Spencer’s description of the fittest, by no means refer to the strongest, the mightiest, the fastest or the most powerful; it, as reflected in his own words, refers to the ability to adapt. In contrast with health, fittest is unique to everyone – ‘in society as well as in nature, fittest means only best adapted to the prevailing conditions. Conditions, including man, determine the type.’ (Howerth, 1917, p.256). Identically to how Smith (2008) and Hubert et al.’s (2011) fit for work perspective lead them to a defence of individualized health, Spencer translated ‘the evolutionary doctrine of survival of the fittest into a defence of laissez-faire individualism’ (Bloom, 2002, p.31). This fittest perspective is also the point where Spencer’s organism analogy differs from the health perspective of human body analogy.
Instead of applying the analogy to his sociological ideology, it appears that Spencer’s ideology is being led by his analogy here. Spencer views war as a natural part of survival of fittest (Delaney, 2003; McGee and Warms, 2008; Pritchard, 1972; Rumney, 2017). In terms of an organism, war is like virus infections, where the viruses have grown strong enough to invade and colonize. For general organisms, it is indeed a pure struggle of survival of the fittest – if the viruses thrive, the organism dies and vice versa. Spencer’s organism perspective deduced that it is only logical for humans, who are part of nature, to act like one – to let nature decide who survive and who perish without interfering; and unsurprisingly, this also aligns with his scientific sociology. From the health perspective of human body analogy, survival of the fittest can be conditioned (making the unfit fit) or even avoided altogether (taking good care of health). Therefore, unlike Spencer’s organism (body without mind) analogy that leaves everything to nature, the healthy human body (body with the mind) analogy encourages positive human actions.
Conclusion
The healthy human body analogy serves as a reminder for two key messages: to not lose sight of the overall picture in sociological works – preventing the three blind men and an elephant situation; and the importance of basics – we know, yet we neglected it, just as we neglected the basic needs of our body cells while pursuing everything else. The use of this analogy could provide insight to aid the understanding of complex sociological ideologies, but it does require a fair amount of biological knowledge. Hiskes's case, in a way, strengthens my initial belief that we could learn a lot from our body. However, it is more important to note that the choice of analogy and the application of it indirectly plays a very critical role. As in Spencer's case, the perspective of human as general organisms (body without mind) and the perspective of human as a unique organism (body with the mind) lead to completely different sociological outcomes - purely scientific sociology vs bringing scientific and humanistic sociology together.
Just as I have maintained throughout this article, 'human health cannot be separated from the health of our total planetary biodiversity' (Foucault, 2009, p.781) - healthy cells form healthy body, healthy people form healthy society and healthy society supplies cells with healthy elements. This healthy human body perspective serves to provide a framework to an alternative sociology with the purpose to create utopistics - a healthy world as this article implies. Though the acceptance of this perspective in sociology remains debatable in terms of practicality (lack of authority from government and internal support from fellow sociologists) and where to begin (how to implement and minimize the impact of change), it is worth to be further developed.
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Table
Table 1: Similarity between the Human Body and the Society
Similarity between the Human Body and the Society
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Human body
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Society
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Characteristics
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Made up of multiple organisms – the various types of cells have its own needs; they function, both independently and as part of the whole, within the body
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Made up of multiple organisms – the diverse human beings have their own needs; they function both independently and also as part of the whole, within the society
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Body cells co-exist with other microorganisms within the body
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Human beings co-exist with other animals, plants and microbes
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The growth of the human body is greatly affected by the environment that it lives in, the better the living environment, the healthier the human body is
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The growth of the society is also greatly affected by the environment where it is formed, i.e. places with strategic locations, fertile soil, rich natural resources or abundance of food advances faster than places with extreme living conditions such as the desert or the arctic
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The interior terrain/internal environment that the body cells live in determines the health of the body cells, which in turn determines the overall health of the human body
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The environment (house, neighbourhood, work condition, living standard, etc.) that the population of the society lives in influences the health of the people, which in turn determines the overall health of the society
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Structure
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Cells form tissues
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Individuals get together to form pairs, teams, groups or families
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Tissues form organs
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Families, teams or groups get together to form communities (organizations, associations, clubs, village, town, city, etc.)
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Organs form organ system – circulation system, musculoskeletal system, digestive system, nervous system, etc.
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Communities get together and form systems that standardize how things works (governing bodies, culture, division of labour, education system, transportation systems, communication systems, etc.)
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Organ systems work together interdependently to operates the overall human body
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These systems work together interdependently to allow the society to function
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What do they need?
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For the human body to continue its existence, it needs to provide its body cells with oxygen, water, nutrients and good environment to live
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For the society to continue its existence, it needs to provide its population (cells) with water, food and good living environment
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Root of illnesses and diseases: When the organ systems, the organs, the tissues, or the cells did not get sufficient amount of their daily needs (food, water, oxygen, etc.), the human body gets sick – cells have survival instincts, but it may not choose to survive for the body’s well-being (Ingeno, 2016)
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Root of social issues: When the community, family or individuals did not get sufficient amount of their daily needs (food, water, shelter, etc.), social issues rises, creating problems within the society – human beings has survival instincts; may resort to violence for personal survival
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How do they operate?
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When foreign microorganism attacked, our antibody would protect or try to minimize the damage done to the body. If our antibody got confused, it will attack the healthy cells (autoimmune diseases)
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If terrorists or foreign forces attacked, the military or police force would try to protect the society and minimize the damage caused. If the military or police force were being misused, they will terrorize the citizens, like what is happening in North Korea
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When cancerous cells are formed, we tend to treat it like a foreign object and forcibly try to remove it (surgery, radiotherapy, chemotherapy, etc.)
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When individuals/groups cause trouble in the society, we labelled them as criminals that need to be isolated or even eliminated from the society (mental illness Centre, prison, death sentence, etc.)
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The human body has auto recovery system – the cells (as long as they have sufficient resources) would heal cuts and wounds, maintain pH balance, regulate body temperature etc.
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The society also has auto recovery system – human beings (as long as they have the resources), the cells of the society, will initiate repairs to any damages within the society they live in
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