The antisemitism researchers relied more on personal empirical hunches than on theory.

Evidence

Taking these remarks on the top layer of society and on criminals and psychopaths together, it can be seen that they demonstrate a complex web of expectations in which it is remarkable how little the suppositions and hypotheses involved were drawn from any theory, and how much was expected from personal empirical research. Of course, their inner sensitivity to problems was much greater than appeared in the later publications, and it was possible for them to see fundamental difficulties without being able to take account of them consistently when concrete results were to be achieved. — Rolf Wiggershaus, The Frankfurt School, 400

Categorization

• XREF: Adds causal texture to Adorno as reluctant empiricist, complementing the Institute’s broader tension between philosophy and empirical social research. — connects to: Modern antisemitism is a learned theoretical product, not raw experience. — Zygmunt Bauman, Modernity and the Holocaust, 229; Horkheimer favored dialectical insight over empirical research into the facts. — Rolf Wiggershaus, The Frankfurt School: Its History,…, 745; Horkheimer attacked the study’s empirical handling as biased against ordinary people’s small hopes. — Rolf Wiggershaus, The Frankfurt School: Its History,…, 582
• yield-rescued: below the book’s yield-target cutoff, included anyway for connecting to: Modern antisemitism is a learned theoretical product, not raw experience. — Zygmunt Bauman, Modernity and the Holocaust, 229; Horkheimer favored dialectical insight over empirical research into the facts. — Rolf Wiggershaus, The Frankfurt School: Its History,…, 745; Horkheimer attacked the study’s empirical handling as biased against ordinary people’s small hopes. — Rolf Wiggershaus, The Frankfurt School: Its History,…, 582

Broader Connections

• Modern antisemitism is a learned theoretical product, not raw experience. #complicates (0.85) — Zygmunt Bauman, Modernity and the Holocaust, 229