In Anthropology (back in the day when all linguists were also anthropologists) glottochronology was developed as a method of using differences in languages as a dating technique. As an archaeologist and former linguist, I have yet to come across anyone who uses it.
Oh, I don’t know, just the other day I saw a scholarly looking gentleman begging for lead.
Analog computation and trinary digital computing are two that I can think off. Maybe geography as the defining input on a nations character?
I haven’t spent too much time talking to Social Science or Literary academics in awhile, so I may be off base, but what about Marxism/Socialism?
I would have to venture that they have died or at least been radically altered and toned down by the events of the last decade and a half.
The OP is rather broad, I’m afraid.
And I would say that the follow-up to post-modernism would be called pre-neo-modernism by its proponents, and quasi-idealism by its detractors.
Ah, excellent! You all have provided me with weeks worth of fascinating topics to explore!
How about the psychological theory of dissonance? Is this still an active area of research?
Cognitive dissonance is a valid way to describe certain states of mind. (To wit: The stress caused by a deeply held belief conflicting with one’s actions.) Are you thinking of something different?
Whe I lived in KC, I had a date with a woman with a PhD in postmodernist philosophy. Taught it full time at one of the area colleges, too.
Not sure if it’s what you’re looking for, but you might be amused by Lamarckian selection and Lamarckian biology.
To put it simply, Lamarckian biologists believed that the changes observed in the fossil record were due to the the acquisition of traits through behavior. In other words, Giraffes have long necks because they stretch 'em. They pass on their stretched necks to their offspring, who then stretch their own necks a little longer, etc. etc. It’s interesting to note that some bioligists held onto this theory even after Darwin published The Origin of Species.
Lamarckian selection is not as goofy as it sounds now. Darwin even praised Lamarck highly for being one of the first naturalists to acknowledge that species change over time.
I vaguely remember hearing it implied that memetics was dying. But I have no idea if it actually is, or how many people actually consider it a science.
How about Freudian psychoanalysis? I think that’s been pretty thoroughly debunked.
Yeah, I understand that chaos theory never got organized.
