Book Cover -- Half-title -- Title -- Copyright -- Contents -- Acknowledgments -- Introduction -- part one The history of the idea of progress -- I The roots of the idea of progress -- The classical roots -- The threshold of the 'modern' world -- II Progress and the European enlightenment -- The philosophes -- Germany and Britain -- III Progress through order and progress through revolution: Comte and Marx -- Comte and the idea of progress -- Positivism and progress after Comte -- Marx's theory of progress -- A note on Hegel -- IV Progress and evolution -- Evolution: new and old -- Darwinisticism and social evolution -- V The decline of optimism -- Durkheim and Weber -- Spengler, Toynbee and Sorokin -- VI Progress as a contemporary problem -- The modernity of progress -- The reaction against technology -- part two A sociological theory of progress -- VII Two concepts of progress -- History, theory and aspiration -- Innovation -- Appendix -- VIII The sociological ethic (1) -- Innovational and non-innovational progress -- The redefinition of ethical problems -- IX The sociological ethic (2) -- Logical analysis and sociological analysis -- Why a sociological ethic? -- X The search for functional requisites -- Malinowski and the functional theory of basic needs -- The functional prerequisites of a society -- Levy-research and development -- Parsons and the functional problems -- XI Needs, morals and society -- XII The sociological theory of progress and some criticisms -- XIII Progress and some problems of the sociology of science -- The biological time-bomb -- The space race -- XIV Conclusion -- References -- Chapter I -- Chapter II -- Chapter III -- Chapter IV -- Chapter V -- Chapter VI -- Chapter VII -- Chapter VIII -- Chapter IX -- Chapter X -- Chapter XI -- Chapter XII -- Chapter XIII -- Chapter XIV -- Name index -- Subject index.