Lynd Asserts U.S. Needs to Clarify Values

In order to formulate a workable set of values in the modern world, the American people must first reconcile a "hodgepodge" of contradictions, uncertainties, and inequalities in their own concepts of democracy, according to Robert Lynd, professor of Sociology at Columbia.

Speaking in the final Law School Forum of the term at a crowded Sanders Theatre on Friday night, Lynd deplored the contradiction which exists between the political democracy and the economic capitalism of the U. S. middle class. As a result of the comparatively favorable conditions and easy life in this country during the last fifty years, Lynd said, "we Americans present an extreme case of arrested development in ideological matters."

Our confusion in social theories such as progressive education and in our personal ways of life "makes us distrust all institutions, and even ourselves," he asserted, calling the manner in which present-day businessmen "compartmentalize" their lives "a typical middle-class evasion of the issues."

Northrop Urges Scientific Approach

At the same time, F. S. C. Northrop, professor of Philosophy at Yale and author of "Meeting of East and West," called for a scientific rather than esthetic approach to the problem of finding a universal criterion for modern ethics

"If you go underneath every one of the different standards of values, you will find that every one of them depends on scientific postulates of human nature," Northrop said.

Following the addresses by Lynd and Northrop, a round-table discussion was held by a panel which included: Henry D. Aiken, associate professor of Philosophy; Carleton S. Coon, associate professor of Anthropology; Orval H. Mowrer, associate professor of Education; and Talcott Parsons, professor of Sociology. The round-table phase of the Forum was broadcast over radio station WHDH.