2019 | OriginalPaper | Chapter
Conceptual Confusion is Not Always a Bad Thing – The Curious Case of European Radical Right Studies
Author : Kai Arzheimer
Published in: Demokratie und Entscheidung
Publisher: Springer Fachmedien Wiesbaden
Activate our intelligent search to find suitable subject content or patents.
Select sections of text to find matching patents with Artificial Intelligence. powered by
Select sections of text to find additional relevant content using AI-assisted search. powered by
Over the course of many years, as a teacher, scholar, and friend, Ruth Zimmerling has impressed on me the importance of precisely defining one’s concepts. After all, if there is no agreement on the intension and extension of a concept, it is impossible “to assess the truth or falsity or, more generally, the correctness or incorrectness, of propositions, hypotheses or theories” (Zimmerling 2005: 15). The statement is almost self-evident: Without precisely defined concepts, the whole endeavour of science becomes pointless, and scholarly discourses are bound to turn into dialogues of the deaf.