Editing Talcott Parsons (section)

===Defender of modernity===
In contrast to some "radicals", Parsons was a defender of modernity.<ref>{{citation|first=Leon|last=Mayhew|title=In defence of Modernity: Talcott Parsons and the Utilitarian Tradition|journal=The American Journal of Sociology|volume=89|issue=6|date=May 1984|pages=1273–1305|doi=10.1086/228016|s2cid=145138376}}</ref> He believed that modern civilization, with its technology and its constantly evolving institutions, was ultimately strong, vibrant, and essentially progressive. He acknowledged that the future had no inherent guarantees, but as sociologists Robert Holton and [[Bryan S. Turner (sociologist)|Bryan Turner]] said that Parsons was not nostalgic<ref name="Turner">{{citation|last1=Turner|first1=Bryan S.|last2=Holton|first2=Robert J.|chapter=Against nostalgia: Talcott Parsons and a sociology for the modern world|editor1=B. S. Turner |editor2=R. J. Holton|title=Talcott Parsons on Economy and Society|publisher=Routledge|location=New York, NY|year=2015|orig-year=1986|isbn=978-1-317-65226-7}}</ref> and that he did not believe in the past as a lost "golden age" but that he maintained that modernity generally had improved conditions, admittedly often in troublesome and painful ways but usually positively. He had faith in humanity's potential but not naïvely. When asked at the Brown Seminary in 1973 if he was optimistic about the future, he answered, "Oh, I think I'm basically optimistic about the human prospects in the long run." Parsons pointed out that he had been a student at Heidelberg at the height of the vogue of [[Oswald Spengler]], author of ''[[The Decline of the West]]'', "and he didn't give the West more than 50 years of continuing vitality after the time he wrote.... Well, its more than 50 years later now, and I don't think the West has just simply declined. He was wrong in thinking it was the end."<ref>{{citation|chapter=A Seminar with Talcott Parsons at Brown University: My Life and Work, March, 1973|editor1=L. S. Moss |editor2=A. Savchenko|title=Talcott Parsons: Economist Sociologist of the 20th Century|location=Malden, Mass.|publisher=Blackwell|year=2006}}</ref>