That summer morning, Richard and I were discussing the subject of theory development in sociology. The "golden age" of sociology, according to Richard, was before the First World War. Since then, the theoretical debates have not reached the same level of liveliness. In recent years, sociology has expanded to include new topics, but it would have lacked a comparable ability to synthesize. I contradicted and defended contemporary sociology, which led to a lively debate.
We discuss Richard's thesis of a crescent development of possible sociology debates, the influences of other disciplines and the potential future of sociology in the multitude of scientific disciplines.