[nitzy]

If they are attempting to paint a picture of the cultural differences between countries they have to find some way to categorize beliefs and values. While I admit that mind reading and truth serum would probably render more accurate results, that may be difficult to do. Ultimately, surveys of "interpretations and feelings" are going to be the best bet. You may not like the Rational/Secular vs Traditional label but I imagine that is probably an area which is widely different between different cultures and a good thing to measure. I think you are reading too much into it to assume one is preferable over the other.

They could simply say, "Measuring and categorizing culture it too difficult. We give up." I for one am glad they attempted it. I find it very interesting and being that we live in a global society where national political boundaries are having less meaning I think understanding cultural boundaries is going to be very important going forward.

I am accused by my liberal friends and relatives of being a racist and I say I am not. I am a proud "culturalist". I don't believe that any race is superior to any others but I do believe that certain cultures are superior to others.

[Gaffer]

“Cultural differences” is a term used by liberals to describe their differences with traditionalists. When they speak of problems with traditionalists, they actually mean race-haters, bigots and those opposed to horribly deformed liberaldom.

Sociology is not a science. It is interpretation and conjecture of supposed empirical data that is not tainted. Formulas, algorithms, tenets and beliefs derived therefrom are nothing more than one would find on Facebook or Twitter. Just because some to the tenets are widely expressed there does not make it ‘science’, and trying to put it in a graph that represents actual untainted data is crap.