I was done with Trump months ago. The guy is a liar, entirely untrustworthy, and he's not worth this sort of analysis. He needs to be impeached immediately and jailed. Some things are simple--this is one of them.
7
I find Williams' essay puzzling. If, as Williams seems to believe, "Truth is not found, but made, and making truth means exercising power," one what basis can one assert that any statement is a deception? Any statement, including the statement that another statement is a deception (or that "past presidents have lied," for example), is an assertion of power that reflects social position. The "facts" by which the truth could be known, can, according to Williams' philosophy, themselves never be known. If we accept this position, on what basis do words like "lie" and "deception" not have to be given up?
7
Repetition is the key to Trump’s ad-hominem insults like “lying Ted” & “crooked Hillary”. They’re repeated like the persistent TV commercials I am bombarded with every time I watch a program & the evening news. I and my fellow Americans experience this every day in front of our TV.
Trump knows this unpleasant reality & uses it effectively to vilify & slander his opponents. Therefore, we are susceptible to his slogans like “crooked Hillary”. And after hearing him say it repeatedly & aggressively we start to believe it.
There’s nothing new about this kind of “dirty politics”, it’s being going on since the Greeks who recognized its powerful force & named it rhetoric. Political rhetoric is what Trump is engaged in like any other politician, except he’s not experienced enough to make it into an art of deception like the others.
Trump knows this unpleasant reality & uses it effectively to vilify & slander his opponents. Therefore, we are susceptible to his slogans like “crooked Hillary”. And after hearing him say it repeatedly & aggressively we start to believe it.
There’s nothing new about this kind of “dirty politics”, it’s being going on since the Greeks who recognized its powerful force & named it rhetoric. Political rhetoric is what Trump is engaged in like any other politician, except he’s not experienced enough to make it into an art of deception like the others.
3
All so much inside the ivy halls tiddilywinks. The relevancy of this to people who must get up in the morning, put on their shoes, go to work, feed their children, worry about terrorists and crazed FB killers escapes most human being who know that facts are facts, and truth is objective, even if some can't identify it because of their "perspective".
1
Mr. Williams, there's a reason why only critical theorists believe in critical theory, and why it is truly utter nonsense to the rest of us.
7
This article makes a non sequitur argument. From the premise that we cannot be completely certain about anything, it does not follow that facts are "socially constructed." Although no fact is incontrovertibly true (I might be dreaming that I am sitting on a chair right now), many facts (like this one) come with only a tinge of doubt. There are degrees of certainty; doubt itself does not render truth null and void.
Rejecting the very concept of truth, the author concludes, "We can ask not whether a statement is true or false, but how and why it was made and what effects it produces when people feel it to be true." Under such a system, people would be shouted down for saying things that others did not want to hear or that came from the "wrong" source. The author seems eager to reduce everything to social analysis and judgment.
But doubt does not negate the possibility of a cautious *pursuit* of truth--the recognition that no one possesses full truth but that everyone can move toward fuller and more accurate understanding of a given phenomenon. To give up this cautious pursuit is to give up both intellectual inquiry and public discourse. The author has given up too rashly and too soon.
Rejecting the very concept of truth, the author concludes, "We can ask not whether a statement is true or false, but how and why it was made and what effects it produces when people feel it to be true." Under such a system, people would be shouted down for saying things that others did not want to hear or that came from the "wrong" source. The author seems eager to reduce everything to social analysis and judgment.
But doubt does not negate the possibility of a cautious *pursuit* of truth--the recognition that no one possesses full truth but that everyone can move toward fuller and more accurate understanding of a given phenomenon. To give up this cautious pursuit is to give up both intellectual inquiry and public discourse. The author has given up too rashly and too soon.
10
DS: 'This article makes a non sequitur argument. ... it does not follow that facts are "socially constructed."'
The essay uses the term "socially constructed" once and that is in a paragraph that is PARAPHRASING "philosophers and theorists". So the fault could lie with the paraphrase or with the "philosophers and theorists". Since Williams does not explicitly identify those "philosophers and theorists", it is impossible to determine where the fault lies.
The essay uses the term "socially constructed" once and that is in a paragraph that is PARAPHRASING "philosophers and theorists". So the fault could lie with the paraphrase or with the "philosophers and theorists". Since Williams does not explicitly identify those "philosophers and theorists", it is impossible to determine where the fault lies.
So K. Conway was right. There are alternative facts and turning alternative facts, aka lies, into truths is simply a matter of repeating them often enough and loudly enough to those whose biases make them most receptive. Or, in the alternative, truth is a work in progress, arrived at retrospectively after those to whom it mattered threw their votes away on whichever shape-shifting demagogue was most skilled at manipulation. In my depressing version, truth is either an illusory mirage or an ultimately unknowable reality. Either way, in our current weird world, it's done. Stick it with a big-tonged fork.
This essay fails clearly to distinguish between the appropriation of certain critical theory tools and critical theory itself. In that sense, this essay is flawed as it runs the risk of helping to promote the simplistic, popularized view that critical theory amounts to rampant relativism and anything goes.
5
Conservatives have stolen critical theory? Yes, but it also shows a fault in the way critical thinking was handled by theorists for a long time. Instead of criticising the “truths” of different authorities, they should have talked about probability. And instead of claiming that “all facts are created” (as the author of this article still does), they should simply acknowledge that no piece of evidence or fact should be regarded without its context. This is an old hat in historiography and it is a fault of the theorist to have driven their deconstruction to extremes, leaving the rubble to the conservatives and right wingers.
10
What a pity. You go to the brink and then you pull back, realising that if you went any further you'd have to start demolishing a philosophical tradition that is now moribund and in its decay, as you point out, spawning monsters. What you have to start from is to dispute this statement: "Facts are socially constructed" by saying that if they ARE socially constructed, then they are not 'facts', and having an exact and exacting definition of what a 'fact' is. In a world where we will not survive unless we find solutions to the problems of climate change, environmental degradation, overpopulation, warfare and our own evolutionary legacy, we need a new, militantly empirical, political philosophy that is based on painstaking scientific investigation, including of ourselves, and solutions to our intractable problems based on scientific method. Let's leave "The Truth" out of this: we've had enough absolutes: one fact at a time is quite enough.
5
Like The Boy Who Cried Wolf, Trump will lose credibility even with Fox News, and eventually the diehards.
Casey, I do get tired of those who say "And Trump said, when he wrote Art of the Deal, ..... "
Art of the Deal was ghost written by a ghost writer, Tony Schwartz. Tony has clearly indicated in interviews that Trump would not have been capable of writing any portion of his own book. Further, the author indicated that Trump was a casual and constant liar. The author reframed this casual lying into an "art." Thus, "Art of a Deal" was born.
Please stop giving Donald Trump Credit for authoring his own book.
http://www.newyorker.com/magazine/2016/07/25/donald-trumps-ghostwriter-t...
Art of the Deal was ghost written by a ghost writer, Tony Schwartz. Tony has clearly indicated in interviews that Trump would not have been capable of writing any portion of his own book. Further, the author indicated that Trump was a casual and constant liar. The author reframed this casual lying into an "art." Thus, "Art of a Deal" was born.
Please stop giving Donald Trump Credit for authoring his own book.
http://www.newyorker.com/magazine/2016/07/25/donald-trumps-ghostwriter-t...
4
Americans make all attempts at foreclosing Trump's presidency into an imposture of some kind. And strange that the French theorists of all boards mixed up without differentiation ( a specialty of Americans too...) still occupy that space in the fabricated Ideal of Truth .
But Trump is very American and real.
Bannon claims Julius Evola,italian fascist of the 30's,Charles Maurras and Jean Raspail but there was an American fascist in the 30/40 ;s graduate Magna Cum Laude from Harvard : Lothrop Stoddard ,with a strange resemblance to Trump's Great Amerika and the hate of immigrants.
But Trump is very American and real.
Bannon claims Julius Evola,italian fascist of the 30's,Charles Maurras and Jean Raspail but there was an American fascist in the 30/40 ;s graduate Magna Cum Laude from Harvard : Lothrop Stoddard ,with a strange resemblance to Trump's Great Amerika and the hate of immigrants.
Remember when Republicans in the Texas State legislature voted to remove Fri TTY iCal thinking from the highschool curriculum--the argument being that it to SD Terre challenge to parental authority. Face it: in many ways--maybe in all--America is over.
This essay does great disservice to critical theory. If we follow the essay's argument to its logical conclusion, it would follow that critical theory and continental philosophy from Kant onwards have been the promoters of lies and alternative facts. That is the underlying dubious claim of this piece. Nothing could be further from the intent of critical theory and critical philosophy which seek to lay bare the power mechanisms in the social consolidation of knowledge. It is not because a politician engages in self contradictory, relativistic or false statements that he becomes the mouthpiece or "weaponizer" of critical theory, especially not if his rhetorical moves are meant to yield greater political power. To the contrary, critical theory allows us to analyze Trump's rhetoric of power, which is something completely different from this essay's underlying claims. Does anyone here really believe that Derrida and Foucault would be doubting scientific facts like global warming? This opinion piece presents a simplistic view of critical theory and its critical tools. Foucault, for sure, will be turning in his grave.
3
"We can ask not whether a statement is true or false, but how and why it was made and what effects it produces when people feel it to be true."
And when we get the answers to the questions we ARE allowed to ask, are THEY true, or false? If not, what's the point of getting them?
Do we learn anything when we are told how and why a statement is made, or when we are told what effects the statement produces when people feel it to be true? If we do, how can this be unless what we are told is true?
And when we get the answers to the questions we ARE allowed to ask, are THEY true, or false? If not, what's the point of getting them?
Do we learn anything when we are told how and why a statement is made, or when we are told what effects the statement produces when people feel it to be true? If we do, how can this be unless what we are told is true?
2
I'll sum this up for the author: "The chickens are coming home to roost."
And science will be fine. Although our author probably thinks it's socially constructed for the benefit of the white, male, ruling class (or some such nonsense), see the Sokal Affair for how such ideas can be ridiculed and therefore, eventually, replaced.
And science will be fine. Although our author probably thinks it's socially constructed for the benefit of the white, male, ruling class (or some such nonsense), see the Sokal Affair for how such ideas can be ridiculed and therefore, eventually, replaced.
3
Odd that Mr. Casey does not mention those philosophical approach to Truth whose vulnerabilities the new critiques ruthlessly exposed, the varieties of logical Empiricism that have been the ideological bulwark of Neo-Liberalism since WWII. Then again, the failure of Liberal ideology to deal with radical populist myths was predicted by the Marxist sociologist Georges Sorel as early as 1909. Sorel, as things turned out, was a major influence on Fascist movements of all stripes, and it would be truly surprising if those who actively promote "alternative truths" were not inspired by him in one way or another.
Paul Werner
Editor, WOID
Paul Werner
Editor, WOID
1
"Truth is not found, but made, and making truth means exercising power" Our massive technological environment that allows us to function in so many different ways could be characterized as a huge compendium of truths. For example when I turn on a light switch, that the light comes on is dependent upon truths about power generation , transmission, and distribution to the pole in the street. Then there are truths about a line between the pole and my house, wiring to the switch and connection to the light bulb. The light bulb itself is the product all the truths needed to manufacture it and make it available at my local store. Think about the truths necessary to buy a stock online.
These are the truths that bind us together.
These are the truths that bind us together.
1
Is the statement "the ancestors of today's African Americans were slaves in the antebellum South" true? If you think it wasn't true, you don't have much chance of treating African Americans justly. Although we can certainly ask a)how it was made b)why it was made c)what effects it produces, we can also ask d)is it true? Do you think it is true?
I don't think Mr. Trump's been pouring over Foucault, so neither will I. Cut to the chase, Donald Trump has shown himself consistently throughout his life to be a hedonist, an egoist, a hypocrite, and a prevaricator. I rate hypocrisy the worst of these, because it speaks to a deliberate effort to control an outcome through deception. I don't think there's any profound philosophizing going on here. Mr. Trump has hit on an act that a Hollywood agent couldn't buy. His schtick worked so he repeats it. Truth doesn't enter into it. Truth is not a mountain Mr. Trump seeks to climb.
There is a place for philosophy in public life, but it is not for justifying, or even explicating, the antics and tactics of a madman. The key to understanding Donald Trump's appeal lies in sociology and cultural decay, not philosophy. Let's not denigrate the discipline by using it to explain irrationality.
'Critical Theory' epitomizes the pseudo-intellectual arrogance that initially galvanized a large chunk of working class people to vote against a leftist boogeyman (i.e. for Donald Trump).
Not all facts are influenced by the social position of the person who 'produces'/disseminates them. I would challenge the author to articulate specifically how the conclusions of, say, Linus Pauling, Alan Turing, Noam Chomsky or Newton are at all related to the fact that they were white men. The use of left wing jargon about power dynamics makes many insinuations about the relationship between facts and race or economics but fails to make any concrete logical connection. I must, however, commend the author who, after thousands of hours of educations has circled back around to a rhetorical style he correctly identifies as being similar to our witless President. Horseshoe theory wins again.
All this postmodern nonsense can only hope to deepen the fissure in this country between the left and right.
Not all facts are influenced by the social position of the person who 'produces'/disseminates them. I would challenge the author to articulate specifically how the conclusions of, say, Linus Pauling, Alan Turing, Noam Chomsky or Newton are at all related to the fact that they were white men. The use of left wing jargon about power dynamics makes many insinuations about the relationship between facts and race or economics but fails to make any concrete logical connection. I must, however, commend the author who, after thousands of hours of educations has circled back around to a rhetorical style he correctly identifies as being similar to our witless President. Horseshoe theory wins again.
All this postmodern nonsense can only hope to deepen the fissure in this country between the left and right.
2
A little philosophy is a dangerous thing.
Cell phones prove modern physics true-enough. That's pretty certain. Are physicists infallible--incapable of error? Certainly not. Academic discourse is essentially dialectical--idea, logical critique, better idea--on and on. A better theory might come along. That's what physicists are paid to do. And with it more amazing technology.
Yes--philosophy has a few theories of truth. They relate propositions (references + attributions--truth bearers) to belief, assertion and knowledge (true propositions + belief--[accepted as representing reality] + proof) and to reality and ideality. Of course knowledge is power; ignorance a disability--hardly mysterious.
The main theories are Realism, Idea(l)ism and Pragmatism. "Critical Theory" is a variation on Idealism. Kant never argued we can't have "certain knowledge about the world in its entirety;" rather we cannot know reality as it is "in-it-self". Kant thought this a human limitation; not so--even gods can't know without prior categories--perception and conception. That's Idea-ism.
Realism says reality has an identity in-it-self; true propositions "tell it like it is." That's incoherent.
Peircean Pragmatism is the fruition of idea-ism. Rational belief is the best belief given available evidence; perfect truth is rational belief given perfect evidence--an idealization. Truth works--withstanding tests on proving grounds. Marketing is NOT proving. Post-realism is NOT post-truth.
Cell phones prove modern physics true-enough. That's pretty certain. Are physicists infallible--incapable of error? Certainly not. Academic discourse is essentially dialectical--idea, logical critique, better idea--on and on. A better theory might come along. That's what physicists are paid to do. And with it more amazing technology.
Yes--philosophy has a few theories of truth. They relate propositions (references + attributions--truth bearers) to belief, assertion and knowledge (true propositions + belief--[accepted as representing reality] + proof) and to reality and ideality. Of course knowledge is power; ignorance a disability--hardly mysterious.
The main theories are Realism, Idea(l)ism and Pragmatism. "Critical Theory" is a variation on Idealism. Kant never argued we can't have "certain knowledge about the world in its entirety;" rather we cannot know reality as it is "in-it-self". Kant thought this a human limitation; not so--even gods can't know without prior categories--perception and conception. That's Idea-ism.
Realism says reality has an identity in-it-self; true propositions "tell it like it is." That's incoherent.
Peircean Pragmatism is the fruition of idea-ism. Rational belief is the best belief given available evidence; perfect truth is rational belief given perfect evidence--an idealization. Truth works--withstanding tests on proving grounds. Marketing is NOT proving. Post-realism is NOT post-truth.
5
The truth can never be determined. it is only what one believes or wants to believe. In fifth century BC Athens, the Sophists abandoned the search for truth in favor of the idea that it doesn't matter what one says, but how one says it. Trump is a modern day Sophist, but he doesn't pretend otherwise. In fact, he almost seems to glory in being a huckster and the belief of P.T. Barnum that there's a sucker born every minute. It's the American way. Contrast that with the attempts of science and, oddly, even journalism, to portray itself as searching for truth which turns out not only to be relativist but, not unlike Sophistry, often glib and misleading. Ironically Trump is more like Socrates than they because at least he knows that he knows nothing. The danger, however, is that he can become a demagogue if he uses his powers of persuasion for selfish ends. Does he or does he not do so? This is a question which cannot easily be answered if one is really searching for the truth.
This article smugly and conveniently writes of the real harm that has been done by critical theory and deconstructivism. These ways of thinking have contributed to the near death of liberal education. They have created a generation of Americans who don't understand or care about the basic tenets of democratic government. Deconstructivism has been used to deconstruct the science behind global warming and has certainly been used by the right and very effectively by Donald Trump.
The proponents of critical theory should be much more repentant of the harm they have done. Terry Eagleton has started down that path, but we have much farther to go.
The proponents of critical theory should be much more repentant of the harm they have done. Terry Eagleton has started down that path, but we have much farther to go.
3
Trump is not worth the time and effort spent trying to analyze him. In my opinion, it's over analysis. He's not that complicated. He is a common huckster, conman, grifter - pure and simple.
The more disturbing question to me is why so many Americans believed he was their beacon of hope.
The more disturbing question to me is why so many Americans believed he was their beacon of hope.
1
This is why public education and science are so important to a thriving democracy. Science is the only process through which we can ultimately understand the world in which we live. Through the application of the scientific method we hone in on the probability that a theory is true — maybe not certain, but surely often as workable as knowing that the sun rises in the east, an accepted fact regardless of nationality, race, gender, religion, Democrat or Republican. Add to this Bayes theorem, informally or formally, and you can test any proposition whether it is likely to be true or not. President Trumps tweets and utterances are often easily falsifiable and not even remotely probable and this is why to my chagrin and others he has become the laughing stock of the world.
1
"If you like your doctor, you can keep your doctor."
This phrase was restated many ways and dozens of times by President Obama. Was this an alternative fact? No. It was a whopper.
The truth may be pliable in Trumpland, but sometimes it was nowhere to be found in Obamaland.
This phrase was restated many ways and dozens of times by President Obama. Was this an alternative fact? No. It was a whopper.
The truth may be pliable in Trumpland, but sometimes it was nowhere to be found in Obamaland.
"The reductive version is simpler and easier to abuse: Fact is fiction, and
anything goes. It’s this version of critical social theory that the populist right has
seized on and that Trump has made into a powerful weapon."
This isn't a version of any sort of critical social theory.
anything goes. It’s this version of critical social theory that the populist right has
seized on and that Trump has made into a powerful weapon."
This isn't a version of any sort of critical social theory.
Occam's Razor simply does not apply to Williams essay. Too bad. How's this?
"Fear an ignorant man more than a lion."
Bulgarian Proverb
"Fear an ignorant man more than a lion."
Bulgarian Proverb
As an aspiring mathematician, I will testify that truth is in fact found and not constructed. Decades of postmodern theory have done nothing to unseat the supremacy of ideas such as Shape, Number, and Consequence.
1
Steal isn't the right metaphor and philosophy isn't the right object. What is described as "philosophy" here is a short-sided snippet that isn't consonant with the Anglo-American tradition, or, for that matter, much of the history of philosophy. Of the humanities, philosophy in this country tends to be most hard-nosed about objectivity. That might be why a literature student wrote this column. (And I would add that the road that goes through Kant by no means leads to Foucault and Derrida.)
What was "stolen" is a certain "post-modernism" that thrives in some humanities departments, like literature. And it wasn't stolen. Trumpism is a natural result of these academic tendencies, and the academic erosion of knowledge and ethics was likely to lead to this sort of debacle. Students who learn this sort of soft relativism have no defense against Trumpism, and have all the intellectual excuses to believe whatever they prefer to believe, and defend it against all comers, closing themselves off to truly critical, rational argument and inquiry. It happens on the left too, where smugness replaces argument.
What was "stolen" is a certain "post-modernism" that thrives in some humanities departments, like literature. And it wasn't stolen. Trumpism is a natural result of these academic tendencies, and the academic erosion of knowledge and ethics was likely to lead to this sort of debacle. Students who learn this sort of soft relativism have no defense against Trumpism, and have all the intellectual excuses to believe whatever they prefer to believe, and defend it against all comers, closing themselves off to truly critical, rational argument and inquiry. It happens on the left too, where smugness replaces argument.
1
If your critical theory does not have room for the notion of truth or reality, then it is fatally flawed. Consider the case of the Manhattan Project. The collective work of a large team of brilliant scientists revealed truths about reality that could be used to predict new behaviors. A nuclear weapon does not explode because of "how and why it was made" or the "effects it produces when people feel it to be true." Truth is greater than humankind.
Right-wing developments like Trump and Infowars are, in part, the Academic Left's nonsense coming back home to roost. The downright silliness of the cultural academic left is, frankly, a big part of how we got Trump in the first place. When you start your arguments from a position with no foundation, like the notion that "all truth is relative," you're already wandering in the dark. It's not difficult to stumble along from here to the completely insane, like "college students eating sushi or having Mexican food night is a racist cultural appropriation." This kind of nonsense played no small role in convincing much of America that the Left is just too out of touch to be trusted.
Mr Williams, I have to wonder whether you've stopped to consider that maybe it's academic philosophy that has lost its grip on truth and reality.
Right-wing developments like Trump and Infowars are, in part, the Academic Left's nonsense coming back home to roost. The downright silliness of the cultural academic left is, frankly, a big part of how we got Trump in the first place. When you start your arguments from a position with no foundation, like the notion that "all truth is relative," you're already wandering in the dark. It's not difficult to stumble along from here to the completely insane, like "college students eating sushi or having Mexican food night is a racist cultural appropriation." This kind of nonsense played no small role in convincing much of America that the Left is just too out of touch to be trusted.
Mr Williams, I have to wonder whether you've stopped to consider that maybe it's academic philosophy that has lost its grip on truth and reality.
2
At least since Kant there have been philosophers who both respected empirically verified scientific "truth" and the practical "truths" such as "freedom" which cannot be empirically proved but without which we cannot think and act. Kierkegaard also respects the role of science in its sphere, but speaks as well of existential "truth"--- that which is chosen and made real by our living it, rather than by empirical verification. Our complex minds must hold fast to the ongoing dialectic between these two standpoints. Relativism and deconstructionism are easy ways out of our responsibility for both scientific and moral/existential truth.
OMG. This stuff -- "We’ve deconstructed facts, insisted that knowledge is situated and denied the existence of objectivity." -- is indeed a contributing cause of the miserable confusion all around us. It is a total crock. There most certainly is objective truth, and it is determined by the empirical method. That's the _whole point_. You describe a reproducible experiment and let the apparatus do the talking. You count particle events. You record voltage levels, or temperatures. You compare DNA sequences. You measure mass and volume of chemical processes. These are not subjective activities. Anyone can do them, and they don't (or should not) change for valid, reproducible experiments. The result does _not_ depend on who and when and where the measurement is done. That's what we mean by "objective". What did you think it meant? I don't get it. Why do philosophy departments persist in wasting time and energy on this relativist nonsense? There is serious and useful work that needs doing. It's called moral philosophy - the antidote to the present eruption of religious nonsense that we are being subjected to from all sides.
3
A name dropping aimless piece making it into print because it appears to discuss Trump.
3
Uh...hate to burst your fantasy bubble...but it's pretty obvious our intelligence agencies were surveilling Trump and his team. Just "not for political purposes" if you can believe Rice. In fact, everything the left has scoffed at has come true--and nothing they've claimed about Russia has. I think you might have an issue with what constitutes evidence and what doesn't. But stop crying about the use of your "tools" against you. You weaponized them ages ago...you just finally got a dose of your own medicine and it was about time.
Jacques Derrida, the French philosopher associated with 'deconstruction', served on the South African Truth and Reconciliation authority tasked with articulating the events of Apartheid. There is theory and there is practice.
That things are relative does not mean anything goes. The Bible and the American Constitution can be interpreted in many ways but not in any way; fundamentalism and originalism may be derelictions of responsibility and usurpations of authority, but there are limits - we can be fairly certain little green men do not appear in either text. There are inept practitioners who bungle their attempts at clarification. And then there are charlatans who purposefully muddy the waters.
I fear that some our current confusion, stalemate, and rancor involves inappropriately inserting religious concepts (such as faith, belief, and absolute truth) into our civic and political discourse. The profound "leap of faith" and inspired belief in what cannot be substantiated are appropriate, even essential, to religion; credo can be uncompromising and does not require proof. Our civic life is better based on the mundane hard work of searching out empirical facts and reaching reasoned consensus; in this context compromise is not only possible but desirable. The Founders were enlightened in separating Church and State. When a politician says "believe me" - best respond "show me".
That things are relative does not mean anything goes. The Bible and the American Constitution can be interpreted in many ways but not in any way; fundamentalism and originalism may be derelictions of responsibility and usurpations of authority, but there are limits - we can be fairly certain little green men do not appear in either text. There are inept practitioners who bungle their attempts at clarification. And then there are charlatans who purposefully muddy the waters.
I fear that some our current confusion, stalemate, and rancor involves inappropriately inserting religious concepts (such as faith, belief, and absolute truth) into our civic and political discourse. The profound "leap of faith" and inspired belief in what cannot be substantiated are appropriate, even essential, to religion; credo can be uncompromising and does not require proof. Our civic life is better based on the mundane hard work of searching out empirical facts and reaching reasoned consensus; in this context compromise is not only possible but desirable. The Founders were enlightened in separating Church and State. When a politician says "believe me" - best respond "show me".
I can't decide whether C. Williams is having us on, or if the author expects us to take seriously the proposition that one can conjure "parallels between Trump’s attacks on accepted knowledge and critical philosophy’s insistence that we interrogate truth." Nope, I've decided. He or she must be joking.
1
Manipulation and lies in the service of self is different from critical theory. Mr. Trump does not appear to have a philosophy that can be called coherent except, perhaps, that when he is hit, he hits back harder (two eyes for an eye?).
He feeds his supporters what they want to hear no matter if there is or is not any empirical basis for his claims. This is the philosophy of an autocrat (and an autodidact) performing propaganda -- the new (political) opium for the masses.
He feeds his supporters what they want to hear no matter if there is or is not any empirical basis for his claims. This is the philosophy of an autocrat (and an autodidact) performing propaganda -- the new (political) opium for the masses.
Trump doesn't have to work so hard on his alternative facts. The country is full of voters who want to believe the outrageous
Similar to folks who buy lottery tickets even when knowing the odds, many voters prefer the idea of a conspiracy theory than reality.
Trump in effect is preying on them.
Similar to folks who buy lottery tickets even when knowing the odds, many voters prefer the idea of a conspiracy theory than reality.
Trump in effect is preying on them.
2
It hasn't been a secret since at least the Athenians that context matters. They voted to execute Socrates because he exposed the illogic of too many Athenian males. In contemporary America, as your colleague and my grandson Sam Bagg discovered a few years ago, only one member of Congress admitted to being an atheist. For a politician to admit to being an atheist would, in contemporary America, be to commit political suicide. But to admit one's atheism to friends and family would not carry the same risk. As you rightly note, Trump lies reflexively. But all Presidents lie. It's the job of both the Press and the public to identify and denounce the lies that matter. Obama's lies have been identified––there were hundreds––yet his presidency enjoyed many successes. Trump's lies are likely to destroy his presidency. A further essay from you on why this is the case would be welcome.
1
Trump says something to get a response as if he's negotiating a deal. If the adverse negotiator responds positively Trump will pursue if the adverse response negatively he will abandon from the go she ate it with his base he said things that they like they responded positively he kept saying it then they voted for him it made no difference that it was true or not they voted for him he made the deal and now he's president. it's simple he says things and if you agree I'll keep going and if you don't he'll stop in the meantime you spending millions of dollars traveling and not doing his job what you didn't want to do in the first place that is do his job as a president.
Facts are discovered, not created.
In 2014 80% of Americans assumed an afterlife existed and although it is likely a few less believe now, the percent is undoubtedly still very high. Insofar as there is no proof of an afterlife, belief will remain a fiction until some god somewhere reveals him or herself in a way which is clear to all of us.
As stated "Paying attention to how knowledge is created and used can help us hold leaders like Trump accountable for what they say." It should also make us question how the earliest knowledge of religious "truths" were created, by whom and for what purpose.
While it was a surprise to me that Mr Trump won the election it is no wonder a majority of religious believers were the ones who put him in office.
In 2014 80% of Americans assumed an afterlife existed and although it is likely a few less believe now, the percent is undoubtedly still very high. Insofar as there is no proof of an afterlife, belief will remain a fiction until some god somewhere reveals him or herself in a way which is clear to all of us.
As stated "Paying attention to how knowledge is created and used can help us hold leaders like Trump accountable for what they say." It should also make us question how the earliest knowledge of religious "truths" were created, by whom and for what purpose.
While it was a surprise to me that Mr Trump won the election it is no wonder a majority of religious believers were the ones who put him in office.
No one can bar the road to truth, and to advance its cause I am prepared to accept even death. Solzhenitsyn
1
To claim that facts are "flexible" is to state a fact. If facts are indeed flexible, situational and/or mutable, as the claimant may seem believe; the claimant is confronted with a dilemma. In such an instance the "fact" cannot be argued because it lays in opposition to the person's original claim.
Ther's an ironic quantity of dichotomous comments declaring happiness to have chosen pure science over humanities in the wake of Trumpian deconstructionism. But the very quagmire that the USA is in is partly driven by this tragic dichotomous separation of the humanities from science. Engineers, hundreds of thousands of them, working like lemmings on the next MOAB and worse , oh ya baby, much much worse. Where is the philosophy of ethics for all those pure applied scientists who are feeding the military industrial complex? Pure science is not objective when such self proclaimed pure scientist actually learn about the state of cosmology and the quagmire of quantum physics. Allot has been impressively achieved since Einstein and Heisenberg and Schroedinger etc. bit quantum physicists and cosmologists alike are at a cross roads between ontology and epistompology where the fate of our insight into the nature of consciousness and the origins of the universe come down to philosophical bias for or against materialism. Guess whose prevailing? So is there such a thing as Pure Science? How is the tooth fairy and a discount lawyer alike? They are both purely figments of your imagination.
Attaching Mr. Trump to Philosophy and/or philosophers in any shape or form is a crime against Humanities (sic!). The man is truly void of any intellectual depth. He has been judging people all his life based on their looks and/or how much money they make. In my dictionary, that is the definition of an extremely superficial, shallow, individual.
1
This article resonates with my experience. The debate about "freedom of speech" emanates from a twisting or reversing of critical theory. Now it's the liberals who are silencing "critical" and "liminal" ideas such as those of Charles Murray and Milo.
Certainly this is an epistemological crisis. It didn't start in 2004, but I think it picked up steam on September 11, 2001. The fact--excuse me--is that few people have the intellect, training and time to understand and examine all the available facts surrounding that event, or the Kennedy assassination. We can't know, so we suspect a plot: government lies; therefore, everyone lies, including scientists and The Times.
However, despite the Breitbart News Network, despite Kellyanne Conway and despite Alex Jones, there are such things as facts. They are statements that most reasonable people agree are true, such as the time that the sun will come up tomorrow, or the melting of the polar ice caps, or the curvature of the earth.
Trump might indeed sound at times like some arrogant Literary Studies major from the 90s, but he has not co-opted Derrida; he doesn't need to. It's only in recent years that average Americans have had access to all of human knowledge. Sorry to sound elitist, but rural America has had these tools for even less time than the rest of us. In part due to fundamentalist Christianity, that is the sector most likely to be suspicious of knowledge, and I suspect some genius told Trump to exploit exactly that sector for exactly that reason.
The internet has proven to be way too much for most people. In that sense, this is indeed a crisis of knowledge--or the beginning of the end of an insignificant smudge in the universe known as the human race.
However, despite the Breitbart News Network, despite Kellyanne Conway and despite Alex Jones, there are such things as facts. They are statements that most reasonable people agree are true, such as the time that the sun will come up tomorrow, or the melting of the polar ice caps, or the curvature of the earth.
Trump might indeed sound at times like some arrogant Literary Studies major from the 90s, but he has not co-opted Derrida; he doesn't need to. It's only in recent years that average Americans have had access to all of human knowledge. Sorry to sound elitist, but rural America has had these tools for even less time than the rest of us. In part due to fundamentalist Christianity, that is the sector most likely to be suspicious of knowledge, and I suspect some genius told Trump to exploit exactly that sector for exactly that reason.
The internet has proven to be way too much for most people. In that sense, this is indeed a crisis of knowledge--or the beginning of the end of an insignificant smudge in the universe known as the human race.
1
No argument could be more compelling as reason that we must separate ourselves from Trump supporters. Let them believe what they believe and act accordingly; if their beliefs are in error, they will be only punishing themselves. If we are correct, our success will show them the errors of their ways.
Do not let those people drag us down. To paraphrase the Bible, the wages of lies are death. #calexit
Do not let those people drag us down. To paraphrase the Bible, the wages of lies are death. #calexit
"critique can help those who oppose him question the Trumpian version of reality"
Many people in fact already ask Trump to explain how and why his alternative facts were created. In reply there is either silence or a repeat of those statements. Trump's supporters don't care about such trivialities and aren't interested in accountability.
It's all about the "feel good" effect of his statements and until his supporters no longer feel good, they will continue to hang on his every utterance as divine. Even when the feel good effect has gone, there will be denial and then face-saving.
The downfall of Trump will be long and onerous but hopefully will result in deeply learned lessons.
Many people in fact already ask Trump to explain how and why his alternative facts were created. In reply there is either silence or a repeat of those statements. Trump's supporters don't care about such trivialities and aren't interested in accountability.
It's all about the "feel good" effect of his statements and until his supporters no longer feel good, they will continue to hang on his every utterance as divine. Even when the feel good effect has gone, there will be denial and then face-saving.
The downfall of Trump will be long and onerous but hopefully will result in deeply learned lessons.
Dear Mr. Williams,
It is called Marxism. You use every derivative possible without citing the one common forefather of these "schools of thought."
Without Marx there is no "constructivism" etc. i applaud you for this op-ed, but your ignorance of this basic fact is appalling.
The recent derivatives of Marx that claim to be their own "theories" are all frauds in this regard. The sooner we embrace Marx, the sooner we start moving towards solidarity and peace.
It is called Marxism. You use every derivative possible without citing the one common forefather of these "schools of thought."
Without Marx there is no "constructivism" etc. i applaud you for this op-ed, but your ignorance of this basic fact is appalling.
The recent derivatives of Marx that claim to be their own "theories" are all frauds in this regard. The sooner we embrace Marx, the sooner we start moving towards solidarity and peace.
The world today, especially in the U.S., is not a Duke grad student talk seminar. It is a political battle of good vs. evil. Unfortunately, those who care don't matter and those who matter don't care.
2
Scientific 'findings' are never 'certainties' or 'absolutes'. They are based on the relative strengths of statistical correlations between, and the probabilities of the occurrences of, measured variables and always subject to change pending additional measurements and calculations. Determinations of 'risk' are based on calculations of the probabilities (likelihood) that one or more events will occur, and the potential magnitude of the impact(s) of those events on other events "Scientific findings" are always subject to question. That is what science is about. In science, nothing is certain. However, every effort is made to undertake objective, rigorous, repeatable and verifiable measurements of, correlations between, and probabilities of past and projected occurrences of the variables. In science, so-called 'alternative facts' would be different, testable hypotheses about probabilities of and correlations between variables. However, even a hypothesis that is found to describe the strongest probability of and correlation between the studied variables is not considered "the truth". “Truth” has no meaning in science. In that sense, Mr. Trump is correct. Nothing in science is certain. However, while qualified statements of hypothetical probabilities and correlations may be considered ‘scientific', intentional misrepresentation (lying) about anything, claimed to be ‘scientific’ or otherwise, is simply dishonest.
11
Authoritarians do not depend on critical theorists in order to further their power grabs. Tried and true propaganda techniques, devoid of any sophisticated theoretical framework, are up to that task.
Authoritarianism is on the rise. What are we to think of Putin's stranglehold on Russia? Of Erdogan's concentration of dictatorial power in Turkey? Of the rise of Orban in Hungary? Of Putin's fan,Trump, in America?
Perhaps the following is worthy of reflection: The kleptocrat's immediate goal may be self-enrichment, but kleptocracy's longer term consequences are the desensitization and demoralization of the broader public. Authoritarian kleptocrats succeed only when there is a widespread cynical conviction that institutionalized avarice is to be expected and tolerated--and has no limits.
Indeed, what constitutes theft once kleptocracy is no longer countered by public outrage?
Authoritarianism is on the rise. What are we to think of Putin's stranglehold on Russia? Of Erdogan's concentration of dictatorial power in Turkey? Of the rise of Orban in Hungary? Of Putin's fan,Trump, in America?
Perhaps the following is worthy of reflection: The kleptocrat's immediate goal may be self-enrichment, but kleptocracy's longer term consequences are the desensitization and demoralization of the broader public. Authoritarian kleptocrats succeed only when there is a widespread cynical conviction that institutionalized avarice is to be expected and tolerated--and has no limits.
Indeed, what constitutes theft once kleptocracy is no longer countered by public outrage?
The folly here is in analyzing this as if it is worthy. If i said the sky was green or that up was down, i would be viewed as insane. Not someone who questions settled knowledge.
Perhaps the sun goes around the earth? Worthy of discussion; or i am just insane.
The problem here is that the president has no truths. And he needs to be called out as often as possible. Not for his sake, but for the sake of those vulnerable believing in his alternate reality.
Perhaps the sun goes around the earth? Worthy of discussion; or i am just insane.
The problem here is that the president has no truths. And he needs to be called out as often as possible. Not for his sake, but for the sake of those vulnerable believing in his alternate reality.
1
There can never be compromise with a liar. There can be no trust - only bad faith, which is just what our markets and the value of our currency needs - the king of bad faith and lies.
If there is no good will there can be no chance of a synthesis of ideas. No dialectic. So, please stop trying to form one. Our president is incapable of living up to his constitutional duties. You might say that he is, "constitutionally incapable," of doing it. Let's exercise the 25th Amendment and holler, "next," like it's Katz' Deli. All I ask the Republicans to do is to find one honest person . . .
If there is no good will there can be no chance of a synthesis of ideas. No dialectic. So, please stop trying to form one. Our president is incapable of living up to his constitutional duties. You might say that he is, "constitutionally incapable," of doing it. Let's exercise the 25th Amendment and holler, "next," like it's Katz' Deli. All I ask the Republicans to do is to find one honest person . . .
"Hey, world! Is my theory true or false?" "It's false!" says the world. Or, "close, but no cigar." Once this naive story is abandoned, can some methodological sophistication save the day? Yes, says much of analytic philosophy. No, says critical theory, the enemy of reason.
Philosophy and Critical Thinking are in retreat, all over the planet. Carl Sagan's "A Candle In The Dark', and his fears of a return to Dark Age rule, are gaining relevancy. Erdogan displaces Ataturk. The fundamentalists of all major religions are clearly winning the war of the loins, and this in time will negate science and rational thought. Ross Douthat wants secular humanists to come back to his church, insidious pressures from all corners trying to neuter critical thought. An over-populated planet with diminishing natural resources is a global Rapa Nui disaster writ large. Our species unworthy of having dominion over the creation. Philosophers will end their days in depression, such promise but such failure to bring our species to a sustainable existence.
1
Casey is in sore need of an education. Sure doesn't understand Kant, if he thinks that Kant is the foundation for the later view that knowledge is socially constructed.
"The bedrock claim of critical philosophy, going back to Kant, is simple: We can never have certain knowledge about the world in its entirety. Claiming to know the truth is therefore a kind of assertion of power."
This is not a bedrock of critical philosophy.
For some critical philosophies yes, for others no.
Marx, can we call him a critical philosophy--and if not Marx, who?, surely believed in both the possibility of factual knowledge and in theoretical truths. The established knowledge of his day he thought was neither factual nor theoretically valid, in his view, but he did believe that his own writings were factual and theoretically valid, hence he was not attacking the possibility of empirical and theoretical truths.
This, once again, is the type of article you expect to see over at WSJ.
NYTimes should not license this sort of drivel. It is the fake news of the new academia.
"The bedrock claim of critical philosophy, going back to Kant, is simple: We can never have certain knowledge about the world in its entirety. Claiming to know the truth is therefore a kind of assertion of power."
This is not a bedrock of critical philosophy.
For some critical philosophies yes, for others no.
Marx, can we call him a critical philosophy--and if not Marx, who?, surely believed in both the possibility of factual knowledge and in theoretical truths. The established knowledge of his day he thought was neither factual nor theoretically valid, in his view, but he did believe that his own writings were factual and theoretically valid, hence he was not attacking the possibility of empirical and theoretical truths.
This, once again, is the type of article you expect to see over at WSJ.
NYTimes should not license this sort of drivel. It is the fake news of the new academia.
Post-modernist deconstruction of truth had sent quite a few chickens home to roost before Trump.
Remember the Iraq War and the Dowing Street Memo? "The facts and the intelligence are being fixed around the policy."
When there is no valid project of even trying to get to the truth--mediated by valid critique--neither is there is a valid vision of justice...
Remember the Iraq War and the Dowing Street Memo? "The facts and the intelligence are being fixed around the policy."
When there is no valid project of even trying to get to the truth--mediated by valid critique--neither is there is a valid vision of justice...
I think we can give up the myth of the factually given without putting "truth" in scare quotes. Realism, metaphysical and scientific, is well-trodden, hard-won ground in analytic philosophy, and it does not amount to "blind faith in objectivity and factual truth."
This article is more of the sort of muddled thinking that has discredited science, proliferated lies, and empowered charlatans. It's fine for social theorists to question truth in their own domains, but for a while now they have been claiming that mathematics, physics, and chemistry are just as questionable as Lacanian psycho-analysis or Freudian dream-interpretation.
It's absurd to claim the subjectivity of truth as objective fact. The typical social constructionist's assertions about truth, when applied outside their domains, become utter trivialities that merely sound profound and revolutionary. They are correct, but in petty, pedantic ways that contribute nothing to humanity, and mislead more than illuminate.
The line must be drawn where it starts to cost lives. An anti-vaccine epidemic is resurrecting diseases like polio and measles in North America. Dangerous demagogues are increasing their sway over gullible masses, and climate change is about to unleash chaos.
We are emerging from a brief post-WWII period of respite from war, wherein we were comfortable enough to question Truth. Now an old harsh world is slowly reasserting itself. We can not prove that living is better than dying; we have to make that choice. It's that value judgement that ultimately determines whether bridges and planes must be designed by engineers or social theorists. However we choose, the future is inhabited by the children of those whose constructed truths valued life over death.
It's absurd to claim the subjectivity of truth as objective fact. The typical social constructionist's assertions about truth, when applied outside their domains, become utter trivialities that merely sound profound and revolutionary. They are correct, but in petty, pedantic ways that contribute nothing to humanity, and mislead more than illuminate.
The line must be drawn where it starts to cost lives. An anti-vaccine epidemic is resurrecting diseases like polio and measles in North America. Dangerous demagogues are increasing their sway over gullible masses, and climate change is about to unleash chaos.
We are emerging from a brief post-WWII period of respite from war, wherein we were comfortable enough to question Truth. Now an old harsh world is slowly reasserting itself. We can not prove that living is better than dying; we have to make that choice. It's that value judgement that ultimately determines whether bridges and planes must be designed by engineers or social theorists. However we choose, the future is inhabited by the children of those whose constructed truths valued life over death.
1
It's not that deep. Trump lies. He lied about Obama to divert from investigations into his Russian connections. He lies when he changes his mind--as Spicer falsely said, circumstances changed, not Trump. NATO is outdated, then--NATO listened to Trump and is no longer outdated. He lies when he promises his tax records, then lies again as to why he can't produce them, then lies again when he says no one is interested--despite thousands marching in protest of his refusal.
Trump lies as a child lies--to avoid detection, to avoid self-acknowledgement, to avoid seeing himself thru others' eyes as not perfect.
It's not philosophical; it's habitual avoidance of self-knowledge, it's what he has been able to get away with working for himself. And, he has learned that if he blusters and yells, people don't challenge him (even if they don't believe him.)
Trump lies as a child lies--to avoid detection, to avoid self-acknowledgement, to avoid seeing himself thru others' eyes as not perfect.
It's not philosophical; it's habitual avoidance of self-knowledge, it's what he has been able to get away with working for himself. And, he has learned that if he blusters and yells, people don't challenge him (even if they don't believe him.)
I have spent my professional life as an engineer/scientist. The idea that there are no such things as facts seems crazy to me. It is true that statements by politicians are often vague and subject to interpretations, but this is not the issue people have with Trump. It is pretty clear that Trump's claim that Obama tapped his phone was not true, and he did not have credible evidence to support it. It is not a question of Trump hiding relativism. His version of reality is whatever he feels will benefit him at the moment. Knowledge and truth for its own sake is a concept that is beyond him. His entire career has shown him to be devoted to fooling people and getting the most he can out of them.
America's problem is that children don't learn the art of critical thinking in school.
America's problem is that children don't learn the art of critical thinking in school.
I don't think Trump the snake oil salesman of rhetoric has a great deal In common with the philosophy of Derrida or Foucault. Rather, it is his supporters who are so blinded by ideology that they will allow themselves to believe that objective truth is relative. Reason can be stretched, bent, distorted, and subverted fairly easily when one is frightened, angry, and bigoted.
This piece can be summarized as saying "critique" and "critical appraisal" remain useful even in a world of alternative facts, because "not all facts are created equal".
Unfortunately, the basis for critique is declared to be shaky, and how it is to be put on firmer ground is unexplored. In sum, a useless essay with a useless recommendation.
Unfortunately, the basis for critique is declared to be shaky, and how it is to be put on firmer ground is unexplored. In sum, a useless essay with a useless recommendation.
1
It is very easy to pose a lie, dangerously easy for politicians, often using a lie combined with for many easily understandable demagogies as used now by Trump, Putin, Erdogan (publicly his apparent doubts about the fairness of yesterday’s referendum masking by such demagogy today expressing the opposite), the Brexit deceivers, etc. Unfortunately, it is extremely hard to disprove the lie, such often ending up in complex language explaining "stuff". Those susceptible to such lies do not expect nor understand such explanations, these only serve "us" that are concerned about the lies, the current article being an example of this. The one way to perhaps counter the lies, reaching the masses, is to phrase objective "truths" or something approaching these "truths” in a same simplistic way as they spout their lies. Articles like this one only serve us that know, Trump, Erdogan and their ilk won’t care one iota and will continue spouting their foul.
Trump is a liar. everyone knows that. Unfortunately, those who have critiqued him in the Times & other news media have usually done so in such a simple minded fashion that anyone with a brain has got to think "duh".
What are we supposed to make of the phrase, "making truth means exercising power"? I do not consider it to be a true statement, or even a helpful generalization. What is "making truth"? What are the qualities of "power"? What is meant by "exercising power"? Over whom? An inquiry into the basis of knowledge is never fully investigated or even referenced by most critical theorists. This is because their statements are rhetorical rather than factual or properly theoretical. I wonder, indeed, what training Casey Williams has in the theoretical disciplines of philosophy, logic, or science. Not all facts are created equal. Not all theories are either.
This editorial asserts, correctly, the villainy of the man who sits in the Oval Office without suggesting any ways in which we might combat his malfeasance. Additionally, what about the millions of Americans who KNOW that they're being fed nothing but lies and yet still support the perpetrator because their desire to achieve hateful "results" allows them to excuse any assertion on the part of the man in the Oval Office which is questionably truthful, at best. What do we do about those Americans and how do we combat them? "Truth seems to have little or at least diminished meaning in today's political world. People believe not what they KNOW is correct but what they WANT TO BELIEVE is correct. It's all too sickening and depressing to bear and bodes very very badly for the continuation of our country as a "unified" conglomeration of states, some of which share practically nothing with others. I feel, as a New Yorker, that I have more in common with the man in the moon than the average Alabamian OR the so-called "New Yorker" who was born in this state but shares almost no values of the people that live here. I can think of no place on the planet where he is more hated than Manhattan and for that reason alone I am proud to live here.
1
In one short article this author unwittingly demonstrated how utterly irrelevant and self-indulgent a large swath of critical philosophy has become.
1
Others below have expressed this better than I, but in response to "truth is not found, but made" I offer this. Get in a car and drive. Keep driving. Eventually it *will* run out of fuel. It will stop. It does not matter whether you think it will stop, or even whether the gas gauge is functioning correctly. Some things are true.
This is almost laughable in the obvious.
I have come to appreciate the value of truth through many years of trying to see, understand and live truth.
A wise friend told me 'how do you know when a politician is lying? His lips are moving.'
Political scientists are writing papers, essays and books as fast as they can type at their computers in the hope that they can explain the obvious. Good luck. I'm waiting for the movie to come out. It will be far more entertaining.
I have come to appreciate the value of truth through many years of trying to see, understand and live truth.
A wise friend told me 'how do you know when a politician is lying? His lips are moving.'
Political scientists are writing papers, essays and books as fast as they can type at their computers in the hope that they can explain the obvious. Good luck. I'm waiting for the movie to come out. It will be far more entertaining.
The greenhouse effect was discovered and proven during the 19th century:
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Greenhouse_effect
This is a physical phenomenon. The laws of physics are not passed by republicans or democrats and they can't be repealed. They are not situational and do not belong to one social or economic class.
Carbon dioxide traps heat in the atmosphere. If it didn't we would all freeze, liberals and conservatives alike.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Greenhouse_effect
This is a physical phenomenon. The laws of physics are not passed by republicans or democrats and they can't be repealed. They are not situational and do not belong to one social or economic class.
Carbon dioxide traps heat in the atmosphere. If it didn't we would all freeze, liberals and conservatives alike.
Given that one definition of insanity is to repeat the same experiment, but expecting different results. Throwing away all empirical evidence so that you can go for what the great philosopher Colbert called "truthiness", is a surefire path to madness. We might not be smart to fight for pure truth, but if we can get anywhere in the ballpark of truth after Trump, then we will have been victorious. First, his voters will have to come to terms with what they have done, and we need to let them come back without egg on their face.
Don't dress it up in academic philosophy drivel. He's a liar, bigly.
How about the possibility that a capricious dunce has no qualms that need consideration in a rational world?
This headline is awful. It implies agency on the part of Trump.
Do we really need to question our reality for us to know that the emperor has no clothes?
Seems like the liberal elites are using their position of privilege to attack our president and his supporters. I am glad president Trump is using scientific method to fight back against so-called "facts" and ideological "truth".
If you are going to make these point about how Truth with a capital T is sort of patriarchal, then you have to add all the factors, in particular the genealogy of a set of ideas, and the work out how paradigms change from there. Foucault and Kuhn got this from Nietzsche, but the point is: we as humans are shot through with historical context.
The Alt-Right ignores this part of the critical system, and claims you can go into a stream of discourse and dismantle it at any point. This is exactly where Heidegger got to fascism: the idea that you can jump around in a historical timeline and attack at will.
That mode right there is fascism. Fascism is anachronistic, ignores historical situations, ignores genealogy, and ignores the contingent and appropriate points where Truth sometimes turns into an overwhelming fantasy. The answer to the alt right can be summed up by Calvino's memos:
Lightness
Quickness
Exactitude (often this is missing for alt right)
Visibility
Multiplicity
You can't be a post-modernist without all these pieces of the puzzle in place.
The Alt-Right ignores this part of the critical system, and claims you can go into a stream of discourse and dismantle it at any point. This is exactly where Heidegger got to fascism: the idea that you can jump around in a historical timeline and attack at will.
That mode right there is fascism. Fascism is anachronistic, ignores historical situations, ignores genealogy, and ignores the contingent and appropriate points where Truth sometimes turns into an overwhelming fantasy. The answer to the alt right can be summed up by Calvino's memos:
Lightness
Quickness
Exactitude (often this is missing for alt right)
Visibility
Multiplicity
You can't be a post-modernist without all these pieces of the puzzle in place.
1
What a bunch of nonsense. Yes, facts are difficult and there are lots of disagreements about what exactly "truth" is, and it is true that the "truth" changes depending on your viewpoint. Nevertheless, as difficult as it may be to state the truth, some statements are simply and obviously false, since they can be disproven with scientific methods. If somebody says "the earth is flat", that is a lie. I don't have to go and verify it for myself, but can rather trust tens of thousands of scientists, not to mention astronauts who saw it from space.
Many of Trumps statements fall into this category, and this whole "but what is truth, anyway" defense of Trump is laughable.
Many of Trumps statements fall into this category, and this whole "but what is truth, anyway" defense of Trump is laughable.
The entire premise that 'relativism', 'postmodernism', etc, call it what you like but exemplified in your statement that 'facts are socially constructed' can be applied to the physical sciences is deeply flawed, and often veers into outright idiotic and/or dangerous.
It is precisely this kind of attitude that has for years been utilised by those who present the existence of anthropogenic climate change, or the carcinogens in tobacco smoke, as a 'debate'.
The examples you give for taking in information about the world, microscopes, cameras, even eyeballs, are not 'non-neutral'. They are entirely neutral, they simply record the world that appears in front of them. The interpretation of the records obtained by those microscopes, cameras or eyeballs might be subject to the biased processing of the person doing the interpreting, but the entire point of the scientific method is to have a framework that allows us to get rid of those biases.
This is not to say that scientists are entirely without bias, or that we should not always be looking for places that bias might creep in, but the key point of science is that any hypothesis is testable and falsifiable. The whole point of science is to continually question everything, but that questioning can be done objectively and ideas that survive that gauntlet emerge as our closest approximation to the 'truth'.
It is precisely this kind of attitude that has for years been utilised by those who present the existence of anthropogenic climate change, or the carcinogens in tobacco smoke, as a 'debate'.
The examples you give for taking in information about the world, microscopes, cameras, even eyeballs, are not 'non-neutral'. They are entirely neutral, they simply record the world that appears in front of them. The interpretation of the records obtained by those microscopes, cameras or eyeballs might be subject to the biased processing of the person doing the interpreting, but the entire point of the scientific method is to have a framework that allows us to get rid of those biases.
This is not to say that scientists are entirely without bias, or that we should not always be looking for places that bias might creep in, but the key point of science is that any hypothesis is testable and falsifiable. The whole point of science is to continually question everything, but that questioning can be done objectively and ideas that survive that gauntlet emerge as our closest approximation to the 'truth'.
1
Nope. Foucault did not say that. You're probably also misreading Latour's statement. Haven't read the piece you're citing, but I really doubt that he would support the reading you're putting on him. The whole point of ANT is an attempt to think beyond the sort of simplistic constructivism you are putting forward by conflating a bunch of very different thinkers. Putting together a bunch of French and other European sounding names does not a good argument make.
Trump's modus operandi is unworthy of any critical, philosophical analysis. He's a loudmouthed, self-agrandizing, cynical, petulant liar, full stop. He instinctively does what Goebels articulated- lie big, lie often. It works, sad to say.
The author loads his argument when he writes, "But blind faith in objectivity and factual truth alone has not proven to be a promising way forward" with the inclusion of "blind." Of course, belief in facts is always conditional, predicated on an accumulation of confirmation. It is not necessary to insist on having reached the absolute truth to operationally distinguish a fact from an unsupported assertion. It is a lie to suggest it is impossible to reach a meaningful distinction between fact and fiction, even if not all propositions may be readily decidable. I lay much of the blame for this state of affairs on religion, which has long been a kind of "safe space" where there is general agreement to tolerate ideas that are impossible, preposterous, or self-contradictory. This notion has now spread out into the civic space at large, as a kind of misguided egalitarianism: If all men are created equal, their opinions must be equal as well. If facts are created, all facts are not created equal.
We have entered absurd land and must respond to absurdities and hold them with equal conviction. I suggest when Trump says something like "Obama tapped Trump Tower phones" one should reply, "is it true you lick the frosting off a dozen cupcakes every night before bed?" Or when Trump tweets his election was the widest electoral win in decades insist he explain why he has ordered screen doors installed throughout the White House. Treat nonsense with nonsense. We will never be able to have a rational discussion with this man about anything so we might as well give back exactly what he give to us.
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Been removed from college scene for over fifty years. Maybe my understanding of fact and fiction, right from wrong, ethically correct needs revision. However, when I hear a fart is not smelly but my fart ometer goes Alert Will Smith Alert, I listen and gag. When the Nazis propagated the Big Lie Technique and sadly advertisers too I'm alert.
Big words, dead philosophers, literary theories never ever will replace if it walks like a duck, quacks like a duck, it is a duck. Until water stops freezing at 32 degrees fahrenheit. I know it is a fact the tooth fairy is alive and well.
Big words, dead philosophers, literary theories never ever will replace if it walks like a duck, quacks like a duck, it is a duck. Until water stops freezing at 32 degrees fahrenheit. I know it is a fact the tooth fairy is alive and well.
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There is a consensus among people all over this world that a rock
thrown through the air(without anything stopping it such as
someone's face) will fall. "Cause and effect" ARE reality; interpretation
of this comprises most of all conversation and thought. The cause of
most of the suffering in this world is selfish thought and selfish action.
Direct observation yields this result.
thrown through the air(without anything stopping it such as
someone's face) will fall. "Cause and effect" ARE reality; interpretation
of this comprises most of all conversation and thought. The cause of
most of the suffering in this world is selfish thought and selfish action.
Direct observation yields this result.
I am not sure whether Trump has hijacked philosophy's tools, but I am pretty sure that he has not read Nietzsche, Foucault or Derrida. If Mr. Trump were to embark on a reading campaign to better himself, I'd suggest he start with "Goofus and Gallant."
Trump and his team lie constantly. This is not because of a philosophical search for truth. They simply lie to get away with corrupt things.
Please do not equate this with Foucault or philosophy or anything other than corruption.
Please do not equate this with Foucault or philosophy or anything other than corruption.
Analyzing Trump's eccentricities may be interesting but they can't be analyzed away. They are the symptoms of some kind of mental condition that he has acquired from his out-of-this-world aristocratic self-esteem that leads him to see the world from looking down his nose and shouting insults at things he does not like. Heaven help us as he looks around the world with his strange outlook and shouts one insult too many. It behooves us to remove this self-absorbed individual from the office to which a strange merging of events propelled him. We have the basic impeachment process for correcting unsuited presidential officeholders. It is time we looked to the country's needs instead of amusing ourselves analyzing Mr. Trumps personal oddities and unqualified advisories collection.
Not to immune the great value to society that the study and writing of philosophy is, this essay makes me want to reply, stop whining. You guys are smart. Stop whining and figure out a response.
This is a very muddled essay. I think one problem is the notion that if there is complete certainty, then any statement is as credible as any other. But if a proposition is supported by all available evidence, it is almost certainly true, It might be overturned in the future by the discovery of new, disconfirming evidence, but until and unless that happens, it is our best approximation to the truth. An assertion supported by no evidence but the speaker's self-certainty should not be accepted as true unless someone produces evidence for it. And an assertion that is contradicted by massive existing evidence (e.g., there is no anthropogenic climate change; millions of illegal votes were cast in California in 2016) should be dismissed as false.
Generally, ascertaining the truth may involve various levels of belief since each individual hasn't the resources to to his own statistical evaluation.
Nevertheless, there are some truths, like: 1 + 1 = 2 that defy evaluation and debate. The answer is never 3, nor 7.158. Similarly with a Wall with Mexico or the existence of an affordable health plan. Trump played with the truth and was successful in those areas before he actually had to perform. Then he collapsed and his sophistry caught up with him. It will continue.
Nevertheless, there are some truths, like: 1 + 1 = 2 that defy evaluation and debate. The answer is never 3, nor 7.158. Similarly with a Wall with Mexico or the existence of an affordable health plan. Trump played with the truth and was successful in those areas before he actually had to perform. Then he collapsed and his sophistry caught up with him. It will continue.
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As long as we concern ourselves with deductive propositional logic we can be assured that if the argument is valid and the assumptions are true and complete, that our inferences will usually be true. Unfortunately, life requires acquiring facts that cannot be deduced and uncertainty dogs the reliability of our inferences. Once it was believed that the geniuses amongst the ancients had understood all truths and only by studying what they knew could knowledge be fixed in our minds. We no longer believe such things. We have replaced certainty with skepticism. We accept that even the most reliable fact based knowledge might be proven less than reliable due to some as yet undetermined fact. We can play with our thoughts, interject our imaginations into our contemplations, and even dream of flying without aids but the world in which we live functions without such magical interventions by prescient beings. Gravity varies but no person can affect it with thoughts alone, no natural forces can be removed at the will of anyone. They can be understood and utilized if we are clever but they never change for us. We might invent something called by a name with our imaginations but it will not exist apart from our imaginations.
So... Donald Trump, who famously never reads, has invented for himself, de novo, the analytic and rhetorical tools of modern philosophy. It would seem that he is the Grandma Moses of his, ahem, trade.
Is it that philosophy is actually that simple or is it that Trump is, underneath it all, a genius? Or is that itself a false dichotomy?
Is it that philosophy is actually that simple or is it that Trump is, underneath it all, a genius? Or is that itself a false dichotomy?
Even for an arch libertarian like me, this is a useful article. You desribe the panorama well.
But the "truth", if there is such a thing, which I belive there is, is much simpler, much more mundane, than you describe.
Virtually everything Trump says contains a grain of truth. His followers, most of whom are not the ignorant boobs of liberal fantasies, saw that early on. Thats how he won.
Take "make America great again". Take "America first". How are those slogans invalidated by bombing Syria in recompense for a chemical weapons atttack, or by telling the North Korean hoodlum, make my day?
But the "truth", if there is such a thing, which I belive there is, is much simpler, much more mundane, than you describe.
Virtually everything Trump says contains a grain of truth. His followers, most of whom are not the ignorant boobs of liberal fantasies, saw that early on. Thats how he won.
Take "make America great again". Take "America first". How are those slogans invalidated by bombing Syria in recompense for a chemical weapons atttack, or by telling the North Korean hoodlum, make my day?
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@John Xavier III
Just curious but ever meet a non-sequitur you didn't like? Or maybe you hang out at the Society for the Prevention of Cruelty to Non-sequiturs and adopt strays? Just wondering about your obvious knack for corralling such frisky critters into a comment. I'll spare you my opinions regarding libertarian hobbyhorses such as arches, viaducts, overpasses and flying buttresses (c'mon...not remotely related to who Trump invites to fly on Trumpjet 1 and why).
Just curious but ever meet a non-sequitur you didn't like? Or maybe you hang out at the Society for the Prevention of Cruelty to Non-sequiturs and adopt strays? Just wondering about your obvious knack for corralling such frisky critters into a comment. I'll spare you my opinions regarding libertarian hobbyhorses such as arches, viaducts, overpasses and flying buttresses (c'mon...not remotely related to who Trump invites to fly on Trumpjet 1 and why).
Williams makes, and misses the point. It's true that perceptions and beliefs are relative, and that we cannot rely on our reason to convince others of their truth. He then misses that point. Yes, there are textbooks and lectures all about relativism. But, this is not a time when any of that philosophical exercise is at work, or useful. Trump doesn't lie because of his alternative beliefs, and his supporters don't buy his snake oil because of any philosophical or political/scientific construct. Trump lies because he thinks it helps him win over supporters. His supporters buy it because they suspend their disbelief. They do this because they think he's their hero, no matter what he actually says or does. (They wouldn't believe the same lies from Hillary, or even Paul Ryan. They believe because they want to, and are desperate. There is no parallel for this in recent memory (not in the US, anyway. Perhaps in Venezuela).
Nice to know that when the nukes start flying, we don't have to accept the "fact" that we'll all soon be dead.
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I'd hate to be this person's thesis adviser. There's a difference between the nuances of social construction and perspectivalism, on one hand, and outright cynicism on the other.
And that is not even to mention the problem of personal or ideological precommitment (which could very be what's going on with Trump). Maybe the author should read this other Times piece on the evangelical roots of "post-truth." https://www.nytimes.com/2017/04/13/opinion/sunday/the-evangelical-roots-...
For those who don't know the literature, this is just a the (bad) philosophical version of red-baiting.
And that is not even to mention the problem of personal or ideological precommitment (which could very be what's going on with Trump). Maybe the author should read this other Times piece on the evangelical roots of "post-truth." https://www.nytimes.com/2017/04/13/opinion/sunday/the-evangelical-roots-...
For those who don't know the literature, this is just a the (bad) philosophical version of red-baiting.
There are three sides to every issue. His side, her side, and somewhere in the middle what really happened. We like to think that truth is black and white but it's more subjective than people are willing to admit.
Facts on the other hand are black and white. They can be backed up using the scientific method and reduplicated by others resulting in the same conclusion.
This is why philosophy makes your head hurt because it's so subjective. Unless you are comfortable with shades of grey you will hate philosophy.
Trump isn't a philosopher he just lies. Much of what he says is easily disputed by facts.
Facts on the other hand are black and white. They can be backed up using the scientific method and reduplicated by others resulting in the same conclusion.
This is why philosophy makes your head hurt because it's so subjective. Unless you are comfortable with shades of grey you will hate philosophy.
Trump isn't a philosopher he just lies. Much of what he says is easily disputed by facts.
We humans live in a world of dualities - hot/cold, good/bad, ugly/pretty, and so on. The Truth is possibly that which contains these dualities and allows them to flourish.
Sometimes we believe something to be true, but we're wrong. Newton thought gravity was a pull, Dr. Einstein proved it was a push.
But this is just talk.
What's important regarding "the Truth" is when it becomes state owned. State TV, state radio, and state newspapers dictate the Truth... and one is punished if he doesn't believe and speak that Truth.
trump, bannon, miller, and sessions are working toward the ability to control the truth. They've already succeeded to some degree - our rights are being narrowed, and they are gaining power and control at all levels, both Federal and State. In spite of the appearance of chaos and ineptitude, they are diligently striving to achieve that goal day by day, and they are succeeding in harming our democracy. Breitbart is potentially the state news outlet.
All this is conjecture, and certainly only my opinion. But the occurrences since trump's campaign and election are inarguably alarming if you value our democracy the freedom it gives us to each have our own truths.
We must stay vigilant, insist on getting trump's tax returns, and vote in the mid-term elections on Nov. 7, 2018.
Sometimes we believe something to be true, but we're wrong. Newton thought gravity was a pull, Dr. Einstein proved it was a push.
But this is just talk.
What's important regarding "the Truth" is when it becomes state owned. State TV, state radio, and state newspapers dictate the Truth... and one is punished if he doesn't believe and speak that Truth.
trump, bannon, miller, and sessions are working toward the ability to control the truth. They've already succeeded to some degree - our rights are being narrowed, and they are gaining power and control at all levels, both Federal and State. In spite of the appearance of chaos and ineptitude, they are diligently striving to achieve that goal day by day, and they are succeeding in harming our democracy. Breitbart is potentially the state news outlet.
All this is conjecture, and certainly only my opinion. But the occurrences since trump's campaign and election are inarguably alarming if you value our democracy the freedom it gives us to each have our own truths.
We must stay vigilant, insist on getting trump's tax returns, and vote in the mid-term elections on Nov. 7, 2018.
1
Trying to dress up a pathological narcissistic personality with post-grad intellectual detritus is pathetic and futile. A desperate stab at making Casey Williams' higher education relevant and economic benefits tangible -- as one more junk peddler at the great media flea market of all things Trump.
This paean to pseudo punditry comes too late and too early (a Foucault mike drop) as the first wave of hyperventilating horror at a national self-inflicted gun shot wound that shattered one of Lady Liberty's feet of clay still sweeps over us. And the second wave of deep entrails scholarship still forming in the recesses of academia's rumbling gastrointestinal tract.
Elsewhere in the Opinion Pages is Krugman's musings about the MIA of the World War on Jobs failing to count the 100,000s who fought on the side of print media and never came home. Krugman failed -- as his contingent of rabid detractors croak in a swampy frog din -- to note a robust cottage industry of morbid Trump fascination that nearly qualifies as a kept Trump promise of so many menial jobs we'll need a boundary wall to keep workers from fleeing.
The only way Casey Williams' headline makes any sense is as a reference to Trump's White House and Cabinet appointments -- not as critical tools but the least sharp and useless but for demolition.
Or just maybe Williams is accusing Trump of kidnapping the Philosophy 101 name-drops as yet another speculative deal that'll end in bankruptcy.
Cogito zero sum.
This paean to pseudo punditry comes too late and too early (a Foucault mike drop) as the first wave of hyperventilating horror at a national self-inflicted gun shot wound that shattered one of Lady Liberty's feet of clay still sweeps over us. And the second wave of deep entrails scholarship still forming in the recesses of academia's rumbling gastrointestinal tract.
Elsewhere in the Opinion Pages is Krugman's musings about the MIA of the World War on Jobs failing to count the 100,000s who fought on the side of print media and never came home. Krugman failed -- as his contingent of rabid detractors croak in a swampy frog din -- to note a robust cottage industry of morbid Trump fascination that nearly qualifies as a kept Trump promise of so many menial jobs we'll need a boundary wall to keep workers from fleeing.
The only way Casey Williams' headline makes any sense is as a reference to Trump's White House and Cabinet appointments -- not as critical tools but the least sharp and useless but for demolition.
Or just maybe Williams is accusing Trump of kidnapping the Philosophy 101 name-drops as yet another speculative deal that'll end in bankruptcy.
Cogito zero sum.
2
"...Call it what you want: relativism, constructivism, deconstruction, postmodernism, critique. The idea is the same: Truth is not found, but made, and making truth means exercising power..."
Truths about reality are discovered and confirmed by repetitive confirming evidence -- these are the most reliable facts that we have even though they lack the absolute authority which absolute truths require. Once one has studied science, this kind of thinking about truth just seems like imagination not disciplined by confirmation by empirical methods. It harkens back to scholastics sincere concerns about how many angels may dance upon the head of a pin. The power of people's imaginations and their tendency to hold fast to anything about which they have strong feelings renders good philosophical work into nonsense before the practitioner has any grasp of what is going on. Science requires that a well considered guess actually produce the results in the real world that it logically should before one accepts it to be true, and others much be able to duplicate one's achievements. Thus we can describe the physical world from the big bang to today with a plethora of very precise mathematical models and descriptions, unlike anything people could do two thousand years, ago. When people try to trivialize or deny scientifically determined facts because they dislike the conclusions about the world that are subsequently made, it's not an attempt to free themselves from unjust authorities.
Truths about reality are discovered and confirmed by repetitive confirming evidence -- these are the most reliable facts that we have even though they lack the absolute authority which absolute truths require. Once one has studied science, this kind of thinking about truth just seems like imagination not disciplined by confirmation by empirical methods. It harkens back to scholastics sincere concerns about how many angels may dance upon the head of a pin. The power of people's imaginations and their tendency to hold fast to anything about which they have strong feelings renders good philosophical work into nonsense before the practitioner has any grasp of what is going on. Science requires that a well considered guess actually produce the results in the real world that it logically should before one accepts it to be true, and others much be able to duplicate one's achievements. Thus we can describe the physical world from the big bang to today with a plethora of very precise mathematical models and descriptions, unlike anything people could do two thousand years, ago. When people try to trivialize or deny scientifically determined facts because they dislike the conclusions about the world that are subsequently made, it's not an attempt to free themselves from unjust authorities.
To paraphrase "Amadeus," too many words.
To understand the PIW's (Trump) thinking, all you need to understand are two words: Roy Cohn.
Everything else is ... to quote a good friend ... superfluous.
To understand the PIW's (Trump) thinking, all you need to understand are two words: Roy Cohn.
Everything else is ... to quote a good friend ... superfluous.
While at times, as I read this article, I said to myself, what is this writer talking about, I noted glimmers of common sense! Nonetheless, where I come from, something is true, or it's not! And most of us knew or know the difference!!!
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Who knew Trump was so deep. But considering how shallow the pond was to begin with . . . .
He tweets, therefore he is.
I think Mr. Williams is missing the point. "Facts" can mean different things. Facts in a social context are certainly constructed, and can vary. The physical world is not socially constructed. The famous example is the joke article the physicist Alan Sokal got published in Social Text (published by Duke interestingly). "Transgressing the Boundaries: Toward a Transformative Hermeneutics of Quantum Gravity" All a joke, and nonsense. The world is the world, and you might not want to think you're about to get hit by a truck, but you are.
I think perhaps we give too much credit to Trump, as if his contradictory double-speak is some kind of philosophy worthy of academic dissection.
He feeds the duped who put him in office and simultaneously aggravates everyone else. A strategy that was effective no doubt but the novelty will eventually wear off for many of his supporters as time moves on.
Trump's core strategy is no more intellectually deep then the old Monty Python argument bit;
M: An argument is a connected series of statements intended to establish a proposition.
O: No it isn't!
M: Yes it is! 'tisn't just contradiction.
O: Look, if I *argue* with you, I must take up a contrary position!
M: Yes but it isn't just saying "no it isn't".
O: Yes it is!
He feeds the duped who put him in office and simultaneously aggravates everyone else. A strategy that was effective no doubt but the novelty will eventually wear off for many of his supporters as time moves on.
Trump's core strategy is no more intellectually deep then the old Monty Python argument bit;
M: An argument is a connected series of statements intended to establish a proposition.
O: No it isn't!
M: Yes it is! 'tisn't just contradiction.
O: Look, if I *argue* with you, I must take up a contrary position!
M: Yes but it isn't just saying "no it isn't".
O: Yes it is!
1
"But blind faith in objectivity and factual truth alone has not proven to be a promising way forward." On the other hand: "One might object that Trump’s disregard for the truth is nothing new." How do these statement harmonize, Mr. Williams? Do you have blind faith in the truth you acknowledge, by speaking of Trump's disregard for it; or is your faith grounded in some objective standard?
Maybe if your version of philosophy, "critical theory," is so easily coopted by Trump, there's something wrong with your version of philosophy.
Ach! I abandoned the notion of pursuing an advanced degree in Philosophy, decades ago, after listening to a highly lauded PhD candidate present an argument for the existence of an orange.
If one is to take the cynical view that no one ever tells the full truth or acts without self-interest, the only way to sort and value the barrage of constant lies is too look at intention. What you perceive as (or know to be) a falsehood might be what the speaker knows as truth. What matters is whether the speaker intends to deceive, mislead, or hurt. What Trump does is particularly harmful because he consciously intends to stir up trouble, to hurt, to lie, yet he does so without taking ownership of his words. It's a bullying, childish style of picking fights. I don't see it as anything deep. On the contrary, it's behavior that reveals a stunted social development.
If one is to take the cynical view that no one ever tells the full truth or acts without self-interest, the only way to sort and value the barrage of constant lies is too look at intention. What you perceive as (or know to be) a falsehood might be what the speaker knows as truth. What matters is whether the speaker intends to deceive, mislead, or hurt. What Trump does is particularly harmful because he consciously intends to stir up trouble, to hurt, to lie, yet he does so without taking ownership of his words. It's a bullying, childish style of picking fights. I don't see it as anything deep. On the contrary, it's behavior that reveals a stunted social development.
Many have no knowledge of a well-known fact among educated theologians and deeply spiritual individuals, that science is the “other book of revelations”.
Most Christian nowadays are unaware that liberal arts including astronomy, arithmetic, (Medicine), Geometry, but also Music, were also part of the religious aspirants’ training. The study of Wisdom was built on the study of those subjects, as it was also understood that the study of sciences was essential for the ascension of the spirit toward the ultimate Knowledge (the 12th century stained glass of the cathedral of Laon in France bear witness to this!)
The study of wisdom is certainly lacking in the educational background not only of most political leaders around the world but in most education setting. Surely if teaching wisdom was an essential and integral part of every individual’s education (and taught by those who truly incarnate knowledge and wisdom), we would certainly not be in the mess in which we are right now! And we would be fulfilling our human mandate and be on our way to become true noble beings!....friction is needed to polish the diamond!! Embracing it we become fully human!
And unfortunately many philosopher aspirants nowadays have no clue on the existential meaning of seeking true knowledge; they are so absorbed in their intellectual masturbation that they have forgotten what is at the root of their philosophical quest.
Most Christian nowadays are unaware that liberal arts including astronomy, arithmetic, (Medicine), Geometry, but also Music, were also part of the religious aspirants’ training. The study of Wisdom was built on the study of those subjects, as it was also understood that the study of sciences was essential for the ascension of the spirit toward the ultimate Knowledge (the 12th century stained glass of the cathedral of Laon in France bear witness to this!)
The study of wisdom is certainly lacking in the educational background not only of most political leaders around the world but in most education setting. Surely if teaching wisdom was an essential and integral part of every individual’s education (and taught by those who truly incarnate knowledge and wisdom), we would certainly not be in the mess in which we are right now! And we would be fulfilling our human mandate and be on our way to become true noble beings!....friction is needed to polish the diamond!! Embracing it we become fully human!
And unfortunately many philosopher aspirants nowadays have no clue on the existential meaning of seeking true knowledge; they are so absorbed in their intellectual masturbation that they have forgotten what is at the root of their philosophical quest.
You're not talking about philosophy as I know it. Mainstream philosophy in America, and in the English-speaking world generally, is hostile to relativism.
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There is no deconstruction, only the re-prioritization of intellectual contexts.
A quick example: mathematics can be viewed as the result of socially defined needs to organize our thoughts about the world, but social structures and human needs can also be viewed as the product of complex mathematical formulas.
Either intellectual framework can be used to place the other "in context." Neither is by definition dominant, and it would be impossible to assert the relative dominance of either without framing them both together in the setting of yet a third intellectual context, which would then be just as subject to re-prioritization.
None of this should be taken to suggest that there is no truth. But it should give us pause any time we think the Truth can be simply defined by recourse to a single intellectual framework.
A quick example: mathematics can be viewed as the result of socially defined needs to organize our thoughts about the world, but social structures and human needs can also be viewed as the product of complex mathematical formulas.
Either intellectual framework can be used to place the other "in context." Neither is by definition dominant, and it would be impossible to assert the relative dominance of either without framing them both together in the setting of yet a third intellectual context, which would then be just as subject to re-prioritization.
None of this should be taken to suggest that there is no truth. But it should give us pause any time we think the Truth can be simply defined by recourse to a single intellectual framework.
You seem to have described a house of mirrors. In Trump's case the mirrors are all funny-mirrors that make his hands look big but also confuse him and his supporters as to which end is up.
The GOP itself is so confused they no longer know the difference between right and wrong, good and bad, compassion and cruelty, fake and real, Constitutional versus unconstitutional, justice and injustice.
Then again, I could be wrong and the Republicans are correct to claim they can get rid of the deficit by giving tax cuts to billionaires and throw billions more to the military.
Imagine if the religious right applied their weapons of uncertainty to their own beliefs and Book. IMAGINE! Then again, they seem to be following a "post 'what would Jesus do' era" and path that no longer resembles the advertised Christian ethos.
Welcome to the flat, I mean warped Earth thinking.
The GOP itself is so confused they no longer know the difference between right and wrong, good and bad, compassion and cruelty, fake and real, Constitutional versus unconstitutional, justice and injustice.
Then again, I could be wrong and the Republicans are correct to claim they can get rid of the deficit by giving tax cuts to billionaires and throw billions more to the military.
Imagine if the religious right applied their weapons of uncertainty to their own beliefs and Book. IMAGINE! Then again, they seem to be following a "post 'what would Jesus do' era" and path that no longer resembles the advertised Christian ethos.
Welcome to the flat, I mean warped Earth thinking.
With respect, it is ill-advised to locate anything whatsoever about Trump within the context of the history of philosophy. I am no stranger to the details of this grand tradition (I am ABD, and the last surviving Straussian Platonist not in captivity); and it makes no more sense to locate this monster within the tradition of critical thinking or deconstruction (or even of relativism and sophistry itself) than it does to locate my hungry Labradoodle within the science of gastroenterology.
It is not merely that Trump is utterly uninterested in that tradition and is as ignorant of it as he is of healthcare, economics, or Korean-peninsula politics. It is not *even* a Trumpian position that 'truth is more about how people feel than what may be empirically verifiable.' His only interest in 'truth' is not even 'what he feels', but what he can make others feel. (Look, e.g., at his preposterous charade of “beautiful babies” as a catapult from which to be lauded for launching missiles.)
No. Trump is a nihilist, that rarest of rare birds; he believes in nothing, believes nothing, knows nothing, and his sole 'interest' is scratching whatever bizarre personal itch he has that demands attention, money, and adulation. If he is to be understood in any tradition at all it is the one that begins with Thrasymachus.
It is not merely that Trump is utterly uninterested in that tradition and is as ignorant of it as he is of healthcare, economics, or Korean-peninsula politics. It is not *even* a Trumpian position that 'truth is more about how people feel than what may be empirically verifiable.' His only interest in 'truth' is not even 'what he feels', but what he can make others feel. (Look, e.g., at his preposterous charade of “beautiful babies” as a catapult from which to be lauded for launching missiles.)
No. Trump is a nihilist, that rarest of rare birds; he believes in nothing, believes nothing, knows nothing, and his sole 'interest' is scratching whatever bizarre personal itch he has that demands attention, money, and adulation. If he is to be understood in any tradition at all it is the one that begins with Thrasymachus.
I don't think Nietzsche or Foucault would ever call into question whether it was raining or not, the quantifiable numbers of a crowd in, say, a presidential election, or the presence of a state-issued birth certificate, just a few realities or facts that Donald Trump has called into question but which signify nothing other than his cynicism, the extraordinary ignorance of a fairly small group of Americans, and a media caught up, increasingly, in the crassest kind of commercialism.
Nietzsche and Foucault were interested, though, in complex narratives about concepts like morality or the notion of justice and how these can be used by various groups to get or maintain power. One of the greatest accomplishments of modern scholarship is the deconstruction of how political, religious and other cultural institutions use notions like good and evil or crime and punishment to their own ends. Let's not make the mistake of saying that efforts to understand how power is constructed have essentially made all facts or truth relative, when this is clearly not the case, and is not supported in the least in the writings of Nietzsche or Foucault.
Nietzsche and Foucault were interested, though, in complex narratives about concepts like morality or the notion of justice and how these can be used by various groups to get or maintain power. One of the greatest accomplishments of modern scholarship is the deconstruction of how political, religious and other cultural institutions use notions like good and evil or crime and punishment to their own ends. Let's not make the mistake of saying that efforts to understand how power is constructed have essentially made all facts or truth relative, when this is clearly not the case, and is not supported in the least in the writings of Nietzsche or Foucault.
Blaming the demise of "objectivity" for Trump is like blaming the chaos of the Enlightenment on the end of God. You are simply lamenting the loss of your own faith-based superstition. Long live poststructuralist criticism.
1
Oh good heavens, I actually think this is a very good article, but I still want to complain. I have often thought that Trump is deconstruction come back to haunt us. The worst of it, but even worse because it's out in the world walking around in the body of a man (who was in the construction business, of all things) who is now our president deconstructing us as if we were a test, not to mention the "administrative state" (though he's building up another just as fast).
Annoying as it was back in college some decades ago when texts would disintegrate before your eyes and if you could not make them do that you felt there was something lacking in yourself, it's worse in the White House. All we were were English and Philosophy majors destroying texts and not even really, not commanders-in-chief with nuclear weapons destroying the actual world in which those texts rested. Speaking of which, this whole debate might be settled tomorrow in favor of the ultimate deconstruction. Then it will be someone else's problem to worry about it, but I don't know who and I don't know when.
But the writer here is right. If we could pull our heads out of our behinds we might use all of this for good, if there's still time.
Annoying as it was back in college some decades ago when texts would disintegrate before your eyes and if you could not make them do that you felt there was something lacking in yourself, it's worse in the White House. All we were were English and Philosophy majors destroying texts and not even really, not commanders-in-chief with nuclear weapons destroying the actual world in which those texts rested. Speaking of which, this whole debate might be settled tomorrow in favor of the ultimate deconstruction. Then it will be someone else's problem to worry about it, but I don't know who and I don't know when.
But the writer here is right. If we could pull our heads out of our behinds we might use all of this for good, if there's still time.
The hypocrisy is just too delicious. Did they think that natural conservatives were just going to allow their ideas to be deconstructed forever? The Left is just as easy to dismantle. I sat through years of left wing propaganda during my schooling and now I'm very pleased to use the tools that my communist (a statement of fact) professors gave me against the vocal left.
As a Brown grad who concentrated in critical theory, I am very grateful to the Times for publishing this piece. It tackles an issue that I have been mulling privately since Trump's election.
And what is truth?, asked Pilate - and washed his hands
While I can appreciate the title question, I think it can only be approached if we liken it to a monkey's attempt to use a stolen barometer to open a clam.
This is in no way representative of philosophers or philosophy, or a representative interpretation of the significance of Kant and the tradition of thought he inaugurated. Perhaps the picture is representative of the author's own discipline - it is notable that Williams is Ph.D. student not in philosophy, but literature - but I do not recognize it in my own. Many philosophers believe in facts, in a difference between justified and unjustified assertions, and objectivity (at least within some domains). Much academic work is devoted to understanding these and related matters. Williams has taken a controversial position, given it a naive interpretation (even many who would deny objectivity do it at such a level of abstraction that it doesn't raise questions about the standards we employ in inquiry and everyday discourse), and presented it as a "result" of philosophy. Aside from being a highly misleading representation of what philosophers think, it is also a misleading account of what they do. Very many philosophers (including several Williams mentions) are not simply critiquing prevailing views (though, they do that too), but are engaged in positive programs to understand some aspect of our reality, or articulate some cogent vision of what we should be aiming at. Were the author misconstruing (and, though not Williams' intention, maligning) in some less prominent forum, I would feel less compelled to urge readers to not treat this as an account of what philosophers do.
1
Trump operates using only one "philosophy", Trump will always say what ever makes Trump feel good about himself. It's all far more puffery than Plato.
1
The present POTUS is both a window into the soul and a mirror image of what white America values.
Both a window and a mirror, a walking contradiction, a real-life masquerade.
Both a window and a mirror, a walking contradiction, a real-life masquerade.
1
Where many see relativism as pernicious, I wonder if it is not simply a reflection of the limits of human communication, and is something regarding which we must eventually develop some kind of post-Enlightenment ethics.
As Richard Rorty argued, the point of the mind is not to be a "mirror of nature" -- ie, a literal one-to-one correspondence, expressed in language -- but a medium for community, in the plural.
Individuals in various ways belong to various communities of discourse. One can, if one wishes, develop a means for evaluating one community against another -- something Rorty himself did by appealing to the pragmatic value these various discourses either do or do not bear -- but such a move is not essential.
One can simply understand, that global discourses are rare, if not in fact impossible, and that it would be more accurate to understand ourselves as each being members of this or that discursive community. This is simply how we work. What a tree means to a modern botanist is first of all simply different from what a tree means to an animist.
Trump -- or our era -- has not robbed philosophy of its tools. Rather, it is reminding us that our tools of rational discourse, never really obtain, except by force or wish, to global normativity. There is only us, speaking with each other about a world that is, sensu strictissimo, of secondary issue.
We are not mirrors of nature, maybe. We need a more healthy ethic about how to speak with each other in our differences.
As Richard Rorty argued, the point of the mind is not to be a "mirror of nature" -- ie, a literal one-to-one correspondence, expressed in language -- but a medium for community, in the plural.
Individuals in various ways belong to various communities of discourse. One can, if one wishes, develop a means for evaluating one community against another -- something Rorty himself did by appealing to the pragmatic value these various discourses either do or do not bear -- but such a move is not essential.
One can simply understand, that global discourses are rare, if not in fact impossible, and that it would be more accurate to understand ourselves as each being members of this or that discursive community. This is simply how we work. What a tree means to a modern botanist is first of all simply different from what a tree means to an animist.
Trump -- or our era -- has not robbed philosophy of its tools. Rather, it is reminding us that our tools of rational discourse, never really obtain, except by force or wish, to global normativity. There is only us, speaking with each other about a world that is, sensu strictissimo, of secondary issue.
We are not mirrors of nature, maybe. We need a more healthy ethic about how to speak with each other in our differences.
Thank you for an excellent essay
1
Let's be clear: this is a problem for YOUR school of philosophy and its denial of truth. You don't have a leg to stand on, save some psychological claim about
"...how and why [a statement] was made and what effects it produces when people feel it to be true." In short, all you can say about Trumpism is that you don't like it, but you cannot say Trumpism is false or wrong.
For those of us who do believe in truth-- with all its epistemological and metaphysical baggage-- people's feelings about the veracity of a statement are irrelevant. For some in the Anglo-American school of philosophy, we have plenty to say about Trumpism besides "We don't like how it makes us feel."
His beliefs about global warming are false. HIs treatment of women is immoral. There, I said it. If your "philosophy" cannot get behind these claims then I suggest you switch fields.
"...how and why [a statement] was made and what effects it produces when people feel it to be true." In short, all you can say about Trumpism is that you don't like it, but you cannot say Trumpism is false or wrong.
For those of us who do believe in truth-- with all its epistemological and metaphysical baggage-- people's feelings about the veracity of a statement are irrelevant. For some in the Anglo-American school of philosophy, we have plenty to say about Trumpism besides "We don't like how it makes us feel."
His beliefs about global warming are false. HIs treatment of women is immoral. There, I said it. If your "philosophy" cannot get behind these claims then I suggest you switch fields.
1
The author may be a PhD student in literature, but this doesn't mean that he understands much about philosophy. As someone who holds a doctorate specifically in philosophy, I can assure you that much of what he says about philosophy is quite mistaken. Contemporary philosophy has very little patience with the confused idea that truth is somehow manufactured. Skepticism about truth and knowledge are not widespread among philosophers. The very humble idea that we "cannot have certain knowledge about the world in its entirety"-- effectively the exceedingly banal claim that we are not omniscient beings-- doesn't warrant any deep skepticism about truth or knowledge, and very few contemporary philosophers would say otherwise.
2
I tell my students in Theory of Knowledge that the tools of critical thinking (often referred to as logical fallacies) can also function as a toolbox for those who want to subvert truth. Trump provides many examples for me to use in the classroom as illustrations of that very point. I also tell my students that two elements are necessary for critical thinking, time and effort. Truth is effectively neutralized for those who are unwilling to take time and give sufficient effort to think critically on Mr. Trump's many untrue statements.
I don't think Trump is learned enough to have read any of the authors mentioned here, and he has possibly never heard of them, either. The abstraction of relativism is possibly entirely unknown to him. Instead, he simply traffics in the crude methods of subversion that have been shown throughout history to be so dishearteningly effective. They are effective because people allow them to be so. Because of this, Trump is a perfect illustration of Friedrich Hayek's chapter titled, "Why the Worst Get on Top," found in that canon of the conservative intellectual movement, The Road to Serfdom.
I don't think Trump is learned enough to have read any of the authors mentioned here, and he has possibly never heard of them, either. The abstraction of relativism is possibly entirely unknown to him. Instead, he simply traffics in the crude methods of subversion that have been shown throughout history to be so dishearteningly effective. They are effective because people allow them to be so. Because of this, Trump is a perfect illustration of Friedrich Hayek's chapter titled, "Why the Worst Get on Top," found in that canon of the conservative intellectual movement, The Road to Serfdom.
1
To suggest that the philosopher's quest to understand whether and how truth becomes certain gives some intellectual cover to the ramblings of the
carnival-barking con-man occupying the White House, is preposterous. The difference between the two is glaring and gargantuan. Shame on Mr. Williams for tying himself in philosophical knots while pretending not to notice.
carnival-barking con-man occupying the White House, is preposterous. The difference between the two is glaring and gargantuan. Shame on Mr. Williams for tying himself in philosophical knots while pretending not to notice.
In other words, science is just white patriarchy!!
1
In 1998 Randy McNamara, my Landmark Advanced Course Leader, put it this way: Think reality is a myth? Try standing in the middle of Fifth Avenue as a bus is coming in your direction. You might change your mind. Then again, for the bus, life and death have no meaning at all. So, take your pick, do you want to be a person or a bus?
Isn't the real question how to get Trump voters, once they realize they were lied to, to care?
Philosophy, sociology and academia in general have offered up some whoppers in their day. Yet they generally do so in earnest search of the truth, even if they have twisted themselves into pretzel logic which leads them to believe that there is no truth to be found. Diabolical and devious distortion and outright denial of truth is a far more vicious thing altogether. Human culture is not, as some writers have maintained, based upon fiction but upon truth. Fiction is not even possible without prior shared truth. It is our shared vision of the world, based on truth, that allows for human cooperation. When such a foundation is fractured by the assassins of truth, then our very culture is threatened. When people deliberately lie about such critical issues as Global Warming, they are engaging in what can objectively be described as evil. "Common sense" may not be as common as we wish it were, but it is the glue that holds this entire human circus together. We cavalierly disparage and deny objective truth at our own great peril. And those who do it most egregiously should be scorned and shunned... not rewarded by being elected President of the United States.
Yes we I was in hi school and college debate I would see top debaters winning with these techniques. And yes the lawyers they have become would use these techniques at times to win in court.
Ted Cruz is a prime example of a winning college debater who never got over his word games.
Trump, may have learned a bit from lawyers in his technique. But, I think the problem with Trump is he never attended college classes (as opposed tobeing at a college). He really is that dumb. He has always had a team to clean up his junk. But you can not hide his mindless tweets.
Ted Cruz is a prime example of a winning college debater who never got over his word games.
Trump, may have learned a bit from lawyers in his technique. But, I think the problem with Trump is he never attended college classes (as opposed tobeing at a college). He really is that dumb. He has always had a team to clean up his junk. But you can not hide his mindless tweets.
Most truth is absolute. There is a sun in the sky. The sky is blue most days.
Some truth is relative, taking in the viewpoint of the self, for example. I feel someone is rude, he thinks he was brusque.
But when it comes to government administration, there are absolutes that are inviolable. Agencies have a function and the people who run them are supposed to understand and enable that function.
Not so in the Trump world. Most agency heads seem to have been selected to deconstruct those agencies, especially Education and the EPA. They do not hold the values that formerly made American education great. They deny climate change, which is a proven truth.
The result is already devastating. It is threatening to become catastrophic. Meanwhile, Mr. Trump continues to fiddle with the truth while a few Americans dance to his tune and the rest of us are appallingly sidelined.
Some truth is relative, taking in the viewpoint of the self, for example. I feel someone is rude, he thinks he was brusque.
But when it comes to government administration, there are absolutes that are inviolable. Agencies have a function and the people who run them are supposed to understand and enable that function.
Not so in the Trump world. Most agency heads seem to have been selected to deconstruct those agencies, especially Education and the EPA. They do not hold the values that formerly made American education great. They deny climate change, which is a proven truth.
The result is already devastating. It is threatening to become catastrophic. Meanwhile, Mr. Trump continues to fiddle with the truth while a few Americans dance to his tune and the rest of us are appallingly sidelined.
"We can never have certain knowledge about the world in its entirety."
Seems uncontroversial.
"From these premises, philosophers and theorists have derived a number of related insights. One is that facts are socially constructed."
Dubious extrapolation. To back it up, the author continues:
"People who produce facts — scientists, reporters, witnesses — [...] rely on non-neutral methods (microscopes, cameras, eyeballs) and use non-neutral symbols (words, numbers, images) to communicate facts to people who receive, interpret and deploy them from their own social positions."
The idea of "non-neutral" is not elaborated upon. In the case of using a scientific instrument "non-neutral" could mean that the instrument measures only an aspect of reality, not its entirety. No problem there: a measurement of light doesn't measure sound, for example. But the aim seems to be that whatever the filtering done by the instrument, the more serious filter is imposed by the preconceptions of the scientist.
Science is fully aware of such prejudice, and attempts to counter it by requiring multiple observers and consistency across a multitude of phenomena. So Maxwell's laws govern electromagnetic phenomena in a huge variety of circumstances, and errors made in some microcosm of their domain are detected by checking consistency with the general laws that describe a much wider encompassing experience. This approach is limited to phenomena amenable to such methods, but the facts are facts.
Seems uncontroversial.
"From these premises, philosophers and theorists have derived a number of related insights. One is that facts are socially constructed."
Dubious extrapolation. To back it up, the author continues:
"People who produce facts — scientists, reporters, witnesses — [...] rely on non-neutral methods (microscopes, cameras, eyeballs) and use non-neutral symbols (words, numbers, images) to communicate facts to people who receive, interpret and deploy them from their own social positions."
The idea of "non-neutral" is not elaborated upon. In the case of using a scientific instrument "non-neutral" could mean that the instrument measures only an aspect of reality, not its entirety. No problem there: a measurement of light doesn't measure sound, for example. But the aim seems to be that whatever the filtering done by the instrument, the more serious filter is imposed by the preconceptions of the scientist.
Science is fully aware of such prejudice, and attempts to counter it by requiring multiple observers and consistency across a multitude of phenomena. So Maxwell's laws govern electromagnetic phenomena in a huge variety of circumstances, and errors made in some microcosm of their domain are detected by checking consistency with the general laws that describe a much wider encompassing experience. This approach is limited to phenomena amenable to such methods, but the facts are facts.
15
St. Thomas Aquinas wrote extensively about truth in his Summa Theologiae. He basically believed that there is no real abosolute truth in this world but only in that portion of God's plan for the universe available to man. He cites that natural law serves the biggest and most powerful. Man made law is burdened with all the deficiencies of man, it does not provide a path to the truth; "a truth when a judgement conforms to the external reality"
Trump has not stolen truth, but abuses it.
At a simple level the issue seems to be 'how does one change the mind of another person to accept my point of view'. I don't want use 'accept the truth' as everyone seems to have problems with it, as in 'I had good intentions but my belief system / lack of knowledge / competence wouldn’t allow me to arrive at a different conclusion so I promulgated an untruth'. WMDs are in Iraq, Hillary is certain to win, globalization is good for everyone, etc. Good intentions don't make up for promulgating an untruth as the effect on opinion, policy, etc., is about the same as a lie, the main difference being that lies sometimes run afoul of the law.
Dealing with a perceived regular liar may require some judgement as they can be exhausting to attempt to counter, so one needs to pick their battles. Science doesn't really help as it doesn't deal in 'truth', Newton's laws of gravity are wrong as is Einstein's Theory of Relativity, instead they were/are the best explanation at the time on 'how things appear to work' and both are very good models within their boundaries. 'Truth' is expected to be universal, unchanging, and not open to interpretation. Instead the best that we can often do is to arrive at an approximation of it based upon the evidence at hand.
The more that values come into play the more flexible truth is to the point that it is not apparent. Values are subjective, and the more narrowly we view others the more our belief systems will not overlap.
Dealing with a perceived regular liar may require some judgement as they can be exhausting to attempt to counter, so one needs to pick their battles. Science doesn't really help as it doesn't deal in 'truth', Newton's laws of gravity are wrong as is Einstein's Theory of Relativity, instead they were/are the best explanation at the time on 'how things appear to work' and both are very good models within their boundaries. 'Truth' is expected to be universal, unchanging, and not open to interpretation. Instead the best that we can often do is to arrive at an approximation of it based upon the evidence at hand.
The more that values come into play the more flexible truth is to the point that it is not apparent. Values are subjective, and the more narrowly we view others the more our belief systems will not overlap.
Fight fire with fire. He with the biggest mouth wins? Then have the biggest mouth.
A lie is still a lie, no matter how clever the originator.
Wiretap evidence forthcoming, snowflake. Patience. Obama's fascination with spying on Donald Trump will be revealed. Why do you think he is living on a non-extradition island in the South Pacific?
1
This article seems like it's trying to accept partial blame, on behalf ot the social sciences, for creating the incredibly counter-productive and frustrating environment we now live in where those in power can assert obvious falsehood with seemingly no serious repercussions. But the end of the article seems to go back on the earlier premise and fantasizes about "new ways of thinking" that may come out of this.
In this brave new world where facts don't matter, if falsehoods and illogical arguments are going to give cover for policies that, say, kick millions off of healthcare or lead to serious environmental degradation, I doubt that this "new ways of thinking" will be worth the cost.
My daughter is a biology student taking an invasive species course. Some non-scientists claim that the concern about invasive species is nativist and xenophobic. These people cannot have seen kudzu. It is a provable fact that some species cause great damage in a new environment lacking native controls. This is one example of an actual, non-constructed fact.
Claiming that facts don't exist is common to social scientists, self-serving politicians and lobbyists, and anti-intellectuals - for different reasons. I believe that science should be questioned as there is a danger of bias in science as with any human activity. We do need a new way of determining truth/falsity. Throwing the concept of facts out the window is not it.
In this brave new world where facts don't matter, if falsehoods and illogical arguments are going to give cover for policies that, say, kick millions off of healthcare or lead to serious environmental degradation, I doubt that this "new ways of thinking" will be worth the cost.
My daughter is a biology student taking an invasive species course. Some non-scientists claim that the concern about invasive species is nativist and xenophobic. These people cannot have seen kudzu. It is a provable fact that some species cause great damage in a new environment lacking native controls. This is one example of an actual, non-constructed fact.
Claiming that facts don't exist is common to social scientists, self-serving politicians and lobbyists, and anti-intellectuals - for different reasons. I believe that science should be questioned as there is a danger of bias in science as with any human activity. We do need a new way of determining truth/falsity. Throwing the concept of facts out the window is not it.
There is an objective reality out there. No matter what Foucault and Derrida say.
1
Trump is a student of Joseph Goebbels who expertly used to Big Lie technique to promote the Nazi movement. Fake news was a major part of the strategy. Bannon is a past master of "Alternate Facts" coming from the most offensive of so-called news sources, Brietbart. Trump was also a fervent student of Roy Cohn, one of the most aggressive liars in legal history. Trump's narcissist personality disorder makes it absolutely essential for him to distort reality always making himself the winner or the victim of gross unfairness.
No, we do not need to review the history of philosophy to understand where Trump gets his disdain for real facts and his ability to dismiss "truth" out of hand. What is harder to understand is the Trump supporters who seem to suffer from "voter masochism". They continue to willfully harm themselves by backing a man who wants to take away their health care, their Social Security while openly lying to therm and taking money from their pockets in plain sight.
No, we do not need to review the history of philosophy to understand where Trump gets his disdain for real facts and his ability to dismiss "truth" out of hand. What is harder to understand is the Trump supporters who seem to suffer from "voter masochism". They continue to willfully harm themselves by backing a man who wants to take away their health care, their Social Security while openly lying to therm and taking money from their pockets in plain sight.
1
For anyone who has paid some attention to leaders of the evangelical Christian movement/cottage industry, the communications of Our Fake So Called President are all too familiar. How many times in the past 30 years did Jerry Falwell or Pat Robertson say some outrageous lie on his TV show that provoked howls of protest in the mainstream media, only to then appear on a Sunday morning talk show and walk back his statement? But, and its a bit but, his hardcore followers don't watch the mainstream Sunday morning talk shows very much and believe them even less, so, as far as they are concerned, his recantation is like the tree that falls in the deserted forest. The important thing for propagandists is to get the lies out there because someone will always believe them!
Yes, truth is a social construct. But Trump is not a society but a single individual. The lens best suited for understanding what he's doing is (aberrant) psychology, not the philosophy of knowledge.
I have taken down the American flag in front of my house that has flown there for forty years and will not hoist it again until Trump is no longer president. He and his cronies are the most lying unAmericans that I've seen in my lifetime, who have inhabited the White House.
2
As a student of analytic philosophy, in particular as one who is totally hostile to the goofy idealisms, relativisms and bad, distracting preoccupations of the mid-twentieth century, I invite the comparison between Trump and the philosophical forces of evil. Guys like Foucault and Baudrillard were always just kicking up dust. The fact that the Trumps of the world--i.e., the near-unamibguous fools--can do it too, well, that just shows you how easy it was all along.
But of course, whether it took great talent to notice that certainty is hard to come by and beliefs are influenced by desires (it didn't and does not), still it was an important stretch of intellectual work. Plus the stakes were a lot different when the challenge was authority, superstition and conservative cultural foot-dragging. Who could object to giving up truth when the only people who believe in it are Evangelicals and your mean old dad? But now we are in a position to appreciate the importance of reality.
Last century mankind was in a debunking mood. And guess what? We convinced ourselves that nothing is real. (My English teachers TAUGHT ME to put the truth in scare quotes: relativism was quite literally part of our curriculum, and I don't just mean at fancy liberal arts schools.) Debunking is great because its easy and fun. It is also liberating, and a powerful force for social change. But that makes it dangerous, because debunking is so much fun that people might just keep doing it forever.
But of course, whether it took great talent to notice that certainty is hard to come by and beliefs are influenced by desires (it didn't and does not), still it was an important stretch of intellectual work. Plus the stakes were a lot different when the challenge was authority, superstition and conservative cultural foot-dragging. Who could object to giving up truth when the only people who believe in it are Evangelicals and your mean old dad? But now we are in a position to appreciate the importance of reality.
Last century mankind was in a debunking mood. And guess what? We convinced ourselves that nothing is real. (My English teachers TAUGHT ME to put the truth in scare quotes: relativism was quite literally part of our curriculum, and I don't just mean at fancy liberal arts schools.) Debunking is great because its easy and fun. It is also liberating, and a powerful force for social change. But that makes it dangerous, because debunking is so much fun that people might just keep doing it forever.
Does it dawn on the now hand wringing philosopher that the medium itself was used to justify centuries of brutality by egotistical empire-minded men exactly like trump?
If you stand on a socially constructed train track long enough, you will be objectively killed by the non-neutral train constructed from a white, male, American social position, regardless of how you, from your social position, interpret the socially constructed facts.
This is a fun approach because it tells us consumers of popular media journalism that the book is still being written on this absurdity of a President. Listening to Trump, not on the stump but in one-on-one interviews, I personally find reminders of the syntax of Bush 41, whose clipped phrases and capacity to ricochet from one complex idea to another without ever really clearly communicating anything was the object of much derision when George H.W. was in the White House.
However, I don't think Donald is brilliant enough to master the sort of philosophical tools referenced in Mr. Williams' clever exercise in dialectical analysis. Clearly Mr. T. has a feel for the American Psyche, whatever the heck that is anymore. And God help him (and us all) that he is tapping that deeply felt undercurrent of national identity.
However, I don't think Donald is brilliant enough to master the sort of philosophical tools referenced in Mr. Williams' clever exercise in dialectical analysis. Clearly Mr. T. has a feel for the American Psyche, whatever the heck that is anymore. And God help him (and us all) that he is tapping that deeply felt undercurrent of national identity.
1
The problem is that the moment Trump proclaims an alternative fact cannot be immediately questioned to elaborate or give his "reasons" for his statement. If so, we would quickly find out he is a know nothing. If this line of questioning were to continue he would become irrelevant.
May I simply observe that the writer is not a philosopher? In mainstream academic philosophy, it is a decidedly minority view to think that truth is perspectivist in the way the writer supposes. Philosophers carefully study the primary texts (e.g. Kant) that literary theorists tend to read superficially, or in some cases not at all, in my experience.
Such theories of truth are quite useful for interpreting literature, but less useful anywhere else.
Such theories of truth are quite useful for interpreting literature, but less useful anywhere else.
1
Yes, most presidents lied occasionally. This president lies pathologically, almost all the time. Also, do you think he'd understand the thrust of this opinion piece?
Really.
Really.
1
What a painful read. It seem each paragraph leads to a last-sentence assertion. Some of the assertions are valid ("He propagates misinformation strategically, to excite his base and smear his opponent") and some way way less so: ("Truth is not found, but made, and making truth means exercising power" [huh?] ).
Save yourselves the from the esoteric musings and approach it that way.
Save yourselves the from the esoteric musings and approach it that way.
2
Truth is a very hard concept to prove. I idea of truth is that it regards actualities which are objectively and absolutely reliable, dependable, immutable. Until the early modern era began, truth was always accessible from authorities with great minds or sacred texts, and while men might struggle to remember these truths they were finite and always the same. Then Columbus found dry land thousands of miles west of the known world. This was a discovery, the first great one of the modern era, and it opened the door to men seeking what man had not known before, and ended the era of finite and unchanging truths, forever. By the early 18th century the mind of modern man was discovering that truth was very hard to know, and that many things which were thought true, were not. But there was a discipline which enabled men to discern what was most likely true from what was not, called science. Here is where the notions of truths being social arrangements of how reality is to be apprehended becomes silliness. Gravity, resolutions of forces, mathematical measurements and proofs, light, sound, quantum physics, the scope of the universe, the big bang theory, etc. all describe natural phenomena which have existed long before any man and will exist after the last one is gone. We understand them in terms of likelihood to be true rather than as absolute truths because we are mortal and cannot determine all possible outcomes but they the closest to certain truths as we can prove.
6
Fifty years ago the philosopher of science Paul Feyerabend attacked the standard philosophies of science inherited from the 1930s by first publishing an article titled “A Plea for Tolerance in Matters Epistemological.” In that article he embraced the insight that there are no pure observations. All observations are theory-laden. (Think about the commitments in the observation “The sun rises in the east.”) In short order Feyerabend went further. He claimed that all theories were equally valid, first calling his philosophy “epistemological anarchism” and then revising that title to “epistemological Dadaism.”
Mainstream philosophy of science did not follow. It accepted the insight that all observations are theory laden and then asked how to compare the validity of competing theories. While there may not have been agreement on how to do that there was certainly agreement that not all theories are equally valid.
In my opinion any “parallels between Trump’s attacks on accepted knowledge and critical philosophy’s insistence that we interrogate truth claims suggest that not all assaults on the authority of facts are revolutionary” are purely illusory. But never mid my opinion. Let’s put it to the test by asking the Trumpists to interrogate standard claims about sex and gender at the root of our day’s bathroom controversies.
Mainstream philosophy of science did not follow. It accepted the insight that all observations are theory laden and then asked how to compare the validity of competing theories. While there may not have been agreement on how to do that there was certainly agreement that not all theories are equally valid.
In my opinion any “parallels between Trump’s attacks on accepted knowledge and critical philosophy’s insistence that we interrogate truth claims suggest that not all assaults on the authority of facts are revolutionary” are purely illusory. But never mid my opinion. Let’s put it to the test by asking the Trumpists to interrogate standard claims about sex and gender at the root of our day’s bathroom controversies.
All I'm hearing Williams say here is that they're facts if he agrees with them, but not facts, if he doesn't..
Absent the recognition of a transcendent standard by which to judge truth, a war of wills prevails.
1
Well, I read a tweet from Mr. Twitter Brain (POTUS) recommending that we all should "read" that idiotic non-book by Knowles about "Reasons to Vote Democratic"...but contains no words. Sounds just like the sort of book this POTUS would enjoy, as it's clear he can't and won't actually READ. It's also why I imagine his "situation" rooms are filled with White Boards so his staff can draw him pictures in colored markers to educate him on various Presidential issues.
Even his Chief of Staff Reince Pribus was quoted as describing his 8 AM meetings as "...the care and feeding of the President..." I kinda picture it this as Trumpus in his Infant Bib seated in his Baby High(ness) Chair being spoon fed that goop of mixed domestic policy dreck they keep trotting out. Even unpalatable to the infant Child-In-Charge!
It's as exhausting a keeping an 18 month old from harming themselves by baby-proofing the world and the US for this POTUS.
Even his Chief of Staff Reince Pribus was quoted as describing his 8 AM meetings as "...the care and feeding of the President..." I kinda picture it this as Trumpus in his Infant Bib seated in his Baby High(ness) Chair being spoon fed that goop of mixed domestic policy dreck they keep trotting out. Even unpalatable to the infant Child-In-Charge!
It's as exhausting a keeping an 18 month old from harming themselves by baby-proofing the world and the US for this POTUS.
I think some of the tactics that work in real estate deals backfire in federal and international policy. Let's say I'm selling a building for $15M. Trump wants to pay $10M, and bargains very hard, bulldozes me, won't give up, not a penny over $10M. This is all over as soon the first moment that someone else is willing to pay me $15M, $14M, etc. Everybody moves on and probably never meets again, including the hardball buyer who goes on to his next hardball target and maybe better luck. Repeated games (engagements) in US and international policy are very different and there is more potential for irreversible damage with the same tactics.
"The bedrock claim of critical philosophy, going back to Kant, is simple: We can never have certain knowledge about the world in its entirety. Claiming to know the truth is therefore a kind of assertion of power."
1. Kant would roll over in his grave at this gross misrepresentation and oversimplification.
2. We've been reading different philosophers, apparently. Most philosophy departments do not take this Continental relativism very seriously.
3. This grounds/claim sentence pair is an unwarranted, reckless feaux-deduction. It does not follow from not being able to have certain knowledge that any claim to knowledge is an assertion of power. Perhaps it's just ignorance, for example.
4. What work does the phrase "in its entirety" do? Can we have certain knowledge about the world, just not omnipotence? Isn't that obvious?
5. Is relativism a tool? Does the idea that facts are in part socially constructed mean that we can just make up any ones we want at will?
Academics should laugh at the suggestion that Trump is using philosophy. Non-philosophers of all kinds will scoff at the idea of using philosophy to analyze Trump. Philosophers will balk at the notion that "making stuff up" is a philosophical tool.
Really unimpressed by this article.
1. Kant would roll over in his grave at this gross misrepresentation and oversimplification.
2. We've been reading different philosophers, apparently. Most philosophy departments do not take this Continental relativism very seriously.
3. This grounds/claim sentence pair is an unwarranted, reckless feaux-deduction. It does not follow from not being able to have certain knowledge that any claim to knowledge is an assertion of power. Perhaps it's just ignorance, for example.
4. What work does the phrase "in its entirety" do? Can we have certain knowledge about the world, just not omnipotence? Isn't that obvious?
5. Is relativism a tool? Does the idea that facts are in part socially constructed mean that we can just make up any ones we want at will?
Academics should laugh at the suggestion that Trump is using philosophy. Non-philosophers of all kinds will scoff at the idea of using philosophy to analyze Trump. Philosophers will balk at the notion that "making stuff up" is a philosophical tool.
Really unimpressed by this article.
2
Excellent comment and insights. Thank you. Yes, Kant would roll over in his grave. The author is not only misrepresenting his ideas but using him as a means.
1
The Universe is not at random. It operates according to laws. A primary purpose of Science is to determine what those laws are. A side advantage of this kind of exercise is learning how to use those laws to our advantage, or at the least, how not to run afoul of them.
There are such things as facts. The existence of Gravity is a fact. Global warming, the melting of glaciers, and sea level rise are facts. Nature operates according to its parameters. If someone denies that the human-caused injection of massive amounts of greenhouse gases into our planet's atmosphere has anything to do with global warming, Nature will continue to operate according to its parameters anyhow.
There are such things as facts. The existence of Gravity is a fact. Global warming, the melting of glaciers, and sea level rise are facts. Nature operates according to its parameters. If someone denies that the human-caused injection of massive amounts of greenhouse gases into our planet's atmosphere has anything to do with global warming, Nature will continue to operate according to its parameters anyhow.
Truth subjective...not really. Unless you want it that way.
Religious mind vs. a mind that reasons...the first will challenge all beliefs and evidence contrary to their religious rules. While the mind that reasons, may not like the path the evidence takes us, but we are willing to try to understand how we got there.
Religious mind vs. a mind that reasons...the first will challenge all beliefs and evidence contrary to their religious rules. While the mind that reasons, may not like the path the evidence takes us, but we are willing to try to understand how we got there.
One fundamental difficulty in applying this philosophy to Trump's lies is that eventually he has to perform in a way that has no subtlety. If you promise health care that is "better, cheaper, and more available" and people lose their health care, it is hard to philosophize your way around that. Or a wall with Mexico, $10B and Mexico will pay .. only its $30B and rising and we will pay. Get rid of the Latino immigrants and return American jobs, only no-one takes the jobs and produce rots in the fields because no one picks it. And so on.
Trump won that battle of constructing a confusing world during the election, but he'll lose in the long run. People will eventually recognize him for the con man and swindler that he is.
I'll concede that all issues are not as clear cut as those above. Arguments based on subtle statistics, usually. For example, if 5 children in the US get Autism (no evidence for it) as a result of immunizations and 1 million don't is that grounds for the argument that "immunizations cause autism"?
Trump won that battle of constructing a confusing world during the election, but he'll lose in the long run. People will eventually recognize him for the con man and swindler that he is.
I'll concede that all issues are not as clear cut as those above. Arguments based on subtle statistics, usually. For example, if 5 children in the US get Autism (no evidence for it) as a result of immunizations and 1 million don't is that grounds for the argument that "immunizations cause autism"?
7
"they’ve become axiomatic for many scholars in literary studies, cultural anthropology and sociology."
Scholars in literary studies, cultural anthropology and sociology, is a dog whistle for, not doing real philosophy or science but love shooting the bull. The shooters of the bull did not invent these tools, they stole them from carnival barkers and then gave them a false provenance: Nietzsche and Kant baby! Not Barnum.
Are the shooters of bull responsible for the utter degradation of American civic discourse? Duh. Is the pope Catholic--putting aside the Time's post truth Douthat and his buddies who say no the Pope is not Catholic and a coup is necessary. As but me example the Times prints daily.
Scholars in literary studies, cultural anthropology and sociology, is a dog whistle for, not doing real philosophy or science but love shooting the bull. The shooters of the bull did not invent these tools, they stole them from carnival barkers and then gave them a false provenance: Nietzsche and Kant baby! Not Barnum.
Are the shooters of bull responsible for the utter degradation of American civic discourse? Duh. Is the pope Catholic--putting aside the Time's post truth Douthat and his buddies who say no the Pope is not Catholic and a coup is necessary. As but me example the Times prints daily.
Sowing doubt? This was stolen from a Philosophy Department? Must be later than I thought.
As a scientist, I've always thought that this was a simple ploy by "social scientist and humanists" to take science down a peg. No objective truth? You take a spacecraft and guide it across the solar system to explore unknown worlds. Build a new airliner to safely hurl hundreds of people through the stratosphere. Or maybe don't argue with me when I say your house is on fire and you need to get out now! The truth is there and it is immensely powerful. Please treat it with respect, not disregard.
Well, if Trump represents the practical implications of the theories of those "great' philosophers, I am going to have to reject their theories entirely.
Bernays. Goebbels. The only defense is a well educated, informed and engaged public. Yet public education is focused ever more narrowly (stem, testing...), newspapers and magazines are ever thinner, our internet sources are diffuse, poorly curated, and aim to be click-bate rather than informative and the public is engaged with more serious matters, like sports and bling.
Maybe it will be better if silicon takes over. Better for the planet, anyway.
Maybe it will be better if silicon takes over. Better for the planet, anyway.
So, the validity of a statement is unknowable, but the intentions of the person making it, and how it will be interpreted by anyone hearing it, are? Give me a break. It seems that C.P. Snow's cultural gap is wider than ever.
1
The author is giving Trump too much credit. Trump is not a thinker. If building a wall will help get him elected, then he’ll make it a cornerstone of his campaign. The fact that there is no net migration across the US-Mexican border is of no consequence. It’s the outcome that matters. Forget about Baudrillard and Foucault. Trump’s thought processes are Pavlovian. Trump’s book should have been titled : “The Art of Acquiring Things That Make You Salivate”.
Uh, no. Trump is quite happy to assert "truths" when they suit him. When philosphers have interrogated The True to better see it's outlines, even when they have gone so far as to say that these interrogations have exposed it as permanently absent, they can only do so insofar as they submit their own statements to this doubt. But Trump never doubts his own statements, only the statements of others. It is a cynical, sociopathic attempt to gas-light the entire world, and it will fail. Trump WILL learn that you can fool some people some of the time - even a few people all of the time - but you can't fool all of the people all of the time. Truth as a property of statements may never come to full completion, but truth as events in the physical world have a way of asserting themselves far beyond a shadow of a doubt.
Can anyone please translate this article
into English? Philosophers have their own
language to "explain" things in a way that
we ordinary people find unintelligible.
Example: Use of a microscope is a
non-neutral method.
into English? Philosophers have their own
language to "explain" things in a way that
we ordinary people find unintelligible.
Example: Use of a microscope is a
non-neutral method.
I believe (and why shouldn't I?) that it was Rene Descartes who famously said, "The only reason you know who your daddy is is because your mama told you so."
"We can never have certain knowledge about the world in its entirety."
And I ask, is that a fact, is that the truth? This is a classic example of the stolen concept.
Using a fact to deny facts. You have to ask, where does the concept of fact arise from, why is there such a concept?
If facts are relative, hos can you even talk about them? And where does the idea of relative come from? If everything is relative, then how do you know there is such a thing, as he definition of relative depends on the concept of fixed fact.
And I ask, is that a fact, is that the truth? This is a classic example of the stolen concept.
Using a fact to deny facts. You have to ask, where does the concept of fact arise from, why is there such a concept?
If facts are relative, hos can you even talk about them? And where does the idea of relative come from? If everything is relative, then how do you know there is such a thing, as he definition of relative depends on the concept of fixed fact.
4
There's a difference between "absolute truth" and "the best testable conclusions we have at this time." A very big difference.
Two and two are four, no matter what Big Brother says.
Two and two are four, no matter what Big Brother says.
16
...or your thesis advisor.
Thank you for reminding me how happy I am that I majored in the pure sciences. Your head must surely ache at night.
30
In a college Philosophy class (Advanced Aesthetics), a graduate student attempted to answer the Professor's question. The Professor replied, "That may be true, but it's not interesting." And that's when I knew I was done with the liberal arts.
19
The crisis of truth has more to do with periodic waves of anti-intellectualism than the postmodernism featured by those such as Derrida. Derrida does not undermine truth nor accept that his philosophy is a brand of relativism. Derrida says justice is not deconstructable but law is. So also, truth is not deconstructable but knowledge is. In Truth and Power, Foucault confuses truth with knowledge. Knowledge is socially constructed and open to revision. Knowledge aims at truth but never arrives at it. For truth and knowledge to meet, humans must collectively assert they have had all the experiences there are to have. So long as there is a future, truth beckons and knowledge cannot rest. For knowledge to rest would constitute a major violation of scientific ethos and an absurd human narcissism. The current crisis in truth results from a failure to remain open to evidence and persuasion in preference for rigid dogmas that flatter the ego, confirm beliefs to which identity is attached, or align with special interests at the expense of the common good. But such crises in truth have been a standard part of human collective culture since the beginning of history. We have to want the truth before it can become a factor in collective decisions. And truth has taken a back seat to many things--Foucault's "power" but also many other desires. Solution: deflect anyone claiming to speak the truth; instead ask for the evidence. Then evaluate the evidence as if your life depended on it.
1
or you could have just dropped the class.
So every scientific or mathematical truth is also interesting? Just curious.
From the time of the Sophists, philosophers have honed their rhetorical tools for prostituting truth in the service of their abhorrent trade. In the modern era these tools have been employed in the service of these intellectual onanists to the extent that today no one knows which way is up. Figuratively speaking.
Mr. Trump would certainly be a brilliant philosopher, if only he could speak in coherent sentences. Unfortunately, his attention span encompasses only idea fragments that can be expressed in 140 characters or less, excluding spaces and punctuation if any.
Mr. Trump would certainly have pilfered the tools of philosopy, had he been aware that philosophy existed outside of a vague attitude towards life. For Mr. Trump, "What I say is...what I say" is about as deep as it gets.
Nevertheless, due to an innate sleaziness, Mr. Trump has assembled on his own a collection of rudimentary tools. His most valuable asset seems to be an inability to recollect anything that happened more than 24 hours ago, if it is in any way inconvenient to his self aggrandizement. The ability to spout utter twaddle on any topic---and to stick to it---is top of the list. God knows how he was able to proclaim to anyone who would listen that Mr. Obama was not a US citizen for years and then reverse himself in an instant and keep a straight face.
Like modern philosophers, Mr. Trump has discovered the philosophical equivalent of quantum physics, minus the useful technological results.
Mr. Trump would certainly be a brilliant philosopher, if only he could speak in coherent sentences. Unfortunately, his attention span encompasses only idea fragments that can be expressed in 140 characters or less, excluding spaces and punctuation if any.
Mr. Trump would certainly have pilfered the tools of philosopy, had he been aware that philosophy existed outside of a vague attitude towards life. For Mr. Trump, "What I say is...what I say" is about as deep as it gets.
Nevertheless, due to an innate sleaziness, Mr. Trump has assembled on his own a collection of rudimentary tools. His most valuable asset seems to be an inability to recollect anything that happened more than 24 hours ago, if it is in any way inconvenient to his self aggrandizement. The ability to spout utter twaddle on any topic---and to stick to it---is top of the list. God knows how he was able to proclaim to anyone who would listen that Mr. Obama was not a US citizen for years and then reverse himself in an instant and keep a straight face.
Like modern philosophers, Mr. Trump has discovered the philosophical equivalent of quantum physics, minus the useful technological results.
25
If truth is relative, then it's only relatively true (not definitely true) that truth is relative. Plato's Socrates took care of this relativism stuff in his comments on Protagoras, in the Theatetus 161-163.
25
Nietzsche posited - if the true is actually out there but all that we can do is have our own perspective of it then truth can be "true" and relative simultaneously.
Thank you! Hopefully the author reads your comment.
And yet, that relative relativity gets even more relative than the plain old relativity would - it's like, instead of just disappearing like you might expect, it starts chasing its tail all around the room... chase it out the door, it's jumping back in the window before you can turn around. Best just set out a saucer of milk and let it settle down - it's kind of cute, actually, when you get used to it...
Not a literature or philosophy scholar, I am a bit surprised by how so many here seem to be making both more and less of this argument than it requires. It is important to raise, there are apparent contradictions, paradoxes, but disentangling them is not, as the saying goes, rocket science. Whatever the critical theorists would say now, most educated societies have absorbed the hopefully-noncontroversial notion that one's perceptions of truths/facts/reality are distilled in some way through one's position or vantage point. That notion still does run up against a fundamentalist, literalist understanding of Truth, which was something created from supernatural power which remains constant through time. So, we do still have to stand up for relativism, if this is what it must be called; we must remember that what we see always goes through our personal lens. However, this does not and never did mean that there were thousands of Muslims cheering in NJ on 9/11 when there were not, it doesn't mean Trump won the popular vote, and it doesn't mean a lie is actually in some way true if you just look at it differently. What all this does mean, is that we must insist on verifiable facts in every possible instance, we must debate our differences while acknowledging contrary evidence, and nurture thoughtfully critical minds in our young. There are ways to teach how to question apparent reality in a fruitful way not driven by ego needs for certain outcomes. BTW, I'm a librarian.
42
There is a difference between a fact based upon events that can be documented as having happened or happening at the moment and opinions about his fact and it is the task of historians to present opinions which must be documented which can be done by date or measurement of objects. We have the exact date for the Mt. Vesuvius eruption because we have eye witnesses who reported and recorded the event. Same for the event that triggered the American Revolution... the Great Depression of 1929 as well as the storm market collapse in 2008 when I personally can report seeing the Dow Jones averages swiftly descend from 10.000, perhaps 12.000 to 3.000 points! People, and dare I say scientists, are documenting around the world increases in temperature, the melting of the ice in the poles as well as the glaciers on land and this is based on the tools, not opinions. Opinions may or may not be based on facts but if they conflict with the facts and are claimed as "facts" then the person presenting these facts is not different from those who three centuries ago burned women because they saw a cause and effect relationship between them and illness or accident.....or the myriads of people murdered in the 20th c., and now in the 21st c. because of "opinions and assumptions" not based on facts that can be documented...... opinions about them such as religions, race, subordination of women, and social class.....and isn't that fiction?
11
JK: "... in 2008 when I personally can report seeing the Dow Jones averages swiftly descend from 10.000, perhaps 12.000 to 3.000 points!"
As your use of the word "perhaps" shows, memories are not reliable. Did you make notes or record a video at the time?
As your use of the word "perhaps" shows, memories are not reliable. Did you make notes or record a video at the time?
1
Riddle me this: What happens when right-wingers who tend to think in black-and-white finally recognize the existence of ambiguity? Like any good soldier of the right, they find a way to weaponize it.
21
Yes, but none of the deconstructionists advised outright lies.
12
They did, however, facilitate downright lies by denying the possibility of truth. If there is no truth, there can be no lies. But the 'no lies' (in this case) does not equate to 'truth'. Own it, deconstructionists. Your pseudo-philosophy has led directly to 'alternative facts'. Trump is your child. You have a lot to answer for.
No, they didn't recommend lies at all - they just analyzed how when you dispute a version of something, you take into account where the story came from, who is claiming authority, who is deferring to whom, and so on -
Interesting. Here's a guy who insists that absolute truth doesn't exist. And he does so quite absolutely.
18
The Times is down to printing the musings of literature students?
There are major issues of honesty with all politicians (hello "you can keep your doctor, hello "Bengazi was the result of a video, hello sniper fire in Kosovo, etc.) it is fair to say that Trump has risen to new levels, but the useful analysis of how and why he does what he does is not found in philosophy or literature, and surely not in the analysis of a student.
It's fine and good that the Times keeps after Trump on these serious problems even if it does not with politicians it likes, but this is a really sorry way to approach a serious subject.
There are major issues of honesty with all politicians (hello "you can keep your doctor, hello "Bengazi was the result of a video, hello sniper fire in Kosovo, etc.) it is fair to say that Trump has risen to new levels, but the useful analysis of how and why he does what he does is not found in philosophy or literature, and surely not in the analysis of a student.
It's fine and good that the Times keeps after Trump on these serious problems even if it does not with politicians it likes, but this is a really sorry way to approach a serious subject.
12
guess your opinion piece got rejected, huh?
Who talked about Mr. Obama's preference for lying over dealing with difficult facts? Why, people no longer working at the Times or WaPo, or at the 3 major network news bureaus or CNN, that's who.
The real topper for me this week is the two-week lie assigned to Dr. Susan Rice by Barack & Hillary that it was a video. That was the equivalent of spitting in all Americans' faces, and the first time I recall any president abandoning men in battle that COULD have been saved.
And it was done to just sneak past the next election.
The real topper for me this week is the two-week lie assigned to Dr. Susan Rice by Barack & Hillary that it was a video. That was the equivalent of spitting in all Americans' faces, and the first time I recall any president abandoning men in battle that COULD have been saved.
And it was done to just sneak past the next election.
Allen, have you ever paid attention to a major event in real time, as it was taking place? Hearing all the various versions being announced by people on the scene, then finally hearing how the people and weapons and so on are finally all counted up - usually over a couple of days at least? How long did it take the US to realize, and announce, that the attack in Benghazi was different from the riot over that video, happening at that time elsewhere in the mid-east? Why does that very short time period that it took to get everything figured out seem so strangely significant to you? We're talking about days. Trump kept pretending to believe that Obama was born in Kenya for something like eight years. Four of them were after Obama released his birth certificate. Hello? Difference between a mistake quickly corrected, and a fantasy clung to for years? And he has never corrected himself about the millions of illegal voters, etc etc? Something really special going on with this guy. It's not unique, you can look back to LBJ, and Nixon, and Reagan - it's nothing like the ordinary mis-speaking that gets routinely corrected as soon as noticed.
I believe Trump has gotten good at using what is within his reach. Our 'laws' being one of his primary tools. But I strongly believe his election says more about his supporters than it does about him. Early in Trump's campaign to get elected, it became obvious to him lies and exaggerations were not a defining factor for those who supported him. He saw what his growing base liked-- his pandering, his flattering ways and once he seized on that notion, he knew he could adapt an 'anything goes' strategy, and did. That evidence, that they would not question his lying, his gross exaggerations as they cheered his boorish, bullying 'call-out' at rallies, they exhibited something defining-- their public surrender of a belief in a moral code, thus giving away their part in that ever-so-important-everyday-civil-contract we all have with one another. The result--Trump climbed from that social swamp of degenerates his types thrive in and dragged himself right into the White House. So ultimately, this is more about the intellectually lazy, the morally weak Trump supporters than the 'boor' they helped get elected by 39,000 votes.
12
His calling out the parents of the dead G.I. who was a Muslim was one of his worst, and stupidest. Then there was the beauty queen, and, and, etc. That told us he didn't grow up in the Midwest or South.
But if he employs tens of millions of people full time, his inscrutable ways will lie on the floor like last Christmas' tinsel and gift wrap.
But if he employs tens of millions of people full time, his inscrutable ways will lie on the floor like last Christmas' tinsel and gift wrap.
Even in this there is still the child's rejection of objective reality. Like the smart Alec kid who asks you to prove 2 2=4. Of course reality has a way of making itself known.
6
"... prove 2 2=4."
That's possible, but you have to do some work to understand the proof. See:
"Number Systems and the Foundations of Analysis" by Elliott Mendelson.
That's possible, but you have to do some work to understand the proof. See:
"Number Systems and the Foundations of Analysis" by Elliott Mendelson.
A river runs through Donald Trump's though processes. De Nile.
5
Postmodernism and the "philosophy" you are talking about has been kept alive mainly because it provides tenure for armies of lackluster academics. How easy is it to talk about the world once a person is unburdened from responsibility of truth? I wonder how many students who have had liberal arts degrees have left with the notion that things can't be known. Maybe that is why it isn't hard to find holocaust deniers or people who disputed the abomination of slavery? I can't believe anyone really believes this garbage. Do those people wake up in the morning and question if they really have a kid, or if they can pay the rent, or if they should eat food? Or do they accept those things as "facts" and act accordingly? Government is fundamentally about equally simple things.
9
Trump would not understand this article.
19
Mark, That is simply a brilliant -- and true -- observation.
But if you explained it to him nicely he might end up agreeing with it.
You actually should read Kant, the advocate of synthetic apriori knowledge and truth.
12
Since you have read Kant, if I say: You are a Mensch, is that a synthetic apriori knowledge or the truth?
Well, either anthropogenic global warming can be relativized out of existence by its "problematic white male methods" using critical theory and post-modernism, or else science, and perhaps truth-telling more broadly, isn't really about who is talking, or their skin color, or gender. Glad to see a left-leaning philosopher take note that others can play this relativizing game. Now if we could just get Mr. Williams to remember this when science says something that isn't politically appetizing to him, or appears to lend support to a Conservative (or Heaven forbid, Trump's) agenda...
Well, I find this argument kind of depressing.
There are a few things we KNOW as communities of people.
1) There is a sun, and if it fizzled, we would die. Foucault does not control the sun.
2) When parents lose a child to illness and death, that child cannot be resuscitated.
So.
Trump is a liar.
And never forget, Roland Barthes, the philosopher, was run over by a bus. The bus turned out to be real.
There are a few things we KNOW as communities of people.
1) There is a sun, and if it fizzled, we would die. Foucault does not control the sun.
2) When parents lose a child to illness and death, that child cannot be resuscitated.
So.
Trump is a liar.
And never forget, Roland Barthes, the philosopher, was run over by a bus. The bus turned out to be real.
15
The one thing I know for certain is that everything I say is a lie.
1
So, you are truthful?
It’s a stimulating column. We want to show that Trump is wrong but don’t quite know how to do it. Part of the problem has to do with the relation of logic to rhetoric in the history of philosophy in the twentieth century. At the beginning of the twentieth century logic was prior and more important to speech. By the end of the twentieth century, everyday speech had become more important. This was certainly the case with Wittgenstein, my current philosophical interest. Wittgenstein’s method in his latter phase was to clarify philosophical problems by examining how words are used in everyday discourse. He held that the meaning of the word was the way it was used. When he had grammatically clarified a word, truth, for instance, the philosophical problem of truth was dissolved into trivia and he could move on to something else. I would suggest that it would be useful to clarify how we use a concept like truth and see how it sounds when we speak of some of Trump’s statements. It would probably sound queer or fishy as Wittgenstein often said. Of course, we don’t possess Wittgenstein’s genius, but his last work, On Certainty, deals explicitly with questions of truth, knowledge, and certainty. We already know that Trump isn’t logical or scientific, but in what way isn’t he true? A study along the lines I’ve suggested might make us more articulate about that.
3
'Critical theory' isn't philosophy--at least not as understood by most in the profession. It's rubbish that literati, like the author of this article do. And Trump's promotion of 'alternative facts' is a reductio of this deplorable garbage. I'm an analytic philosopher: this in not what I do.
10
Dear NYT,
I love you, but if you don't stop leaving out the last comma in a series, I'm going to give you up. Please note how this sentence means two entirely different things depending on whether the comma is missing or not: "We’ve deconstructed facts, insisted that knowledge is situated and denied the existence of objectivity."
In a discussion about "truth" all should be clear. Please make it so.
I love you, but if you don't stop leaving out the last comma in a series, I'm going to give you up. Please note how this sentence means two entirely different things depending on whether the comma is missing or not: "We’ve deconstructed facts, insisted that knowledge is situated and denied the existence of objectivity."
In a discussion about "truth" all should be clear. Please make it so.
12
alternative punctuation = alternative facts = postmodern prose = Trump, bigly, niggly, piggly wiggly
The Ancient Greek sophists and modern propagandists (Goebbels, Madison Avenue hucksters, etc.) provide the pre-postmodern bases for the "flowering" of Trumpism. A certain Stink Blossom should also be credited for the rise of this movement. Postmodern thought is far too complex and obscure to have had any direct influence on Trump.
6
You're overthinking this.
Trump--or his "advisors"--understand that if you say a lie often enough, people will believe it is true.
While what is happening may mimic a philosophical line of thinking, this is a case of life imitating art, not the other way around.
Trump--or his "advisors"--understand that if you say a lie often enough, people will believe it is true.
While what is happening may mimic a philosophical line of thinking, this is a case of life imitating art, not the other way around.
14
My students over the years, unarmed with any Derrida or Foucault, still indulge in what I call "adolescent relativism," the product of half-learned, or passively absorbed, sociology. If I say 2+2=4, they are likely to say "That may be true for you, because you're a westerner with white privilege, but not for everyone." This is not critical theory, but just being sophomoric.
33
One shouldn't need a graduate degree to know what the view is. Your students reveal its intellectual bankruptcy.
All people lie as often and as seriously as they tell the truth. Some lies, however, cause much pain and destruction. This is where trump fits in.
5
Descartesian truth translated: I think, therefore I am.
Trumpian truth translated: I don't think, yet I am.
Trumpian truth translated: I don't think, yet I am.
5
I think, and often fear, that it's too late to not take Trump, Republicans, the alt.right, et al. seriously...
2
Please do not elevate Trump to an academic. He is an anti-intellectual, anti-culture creature. He is a person who rather than support a White House garden to promote healthier food, eats McDonalds.
Trump is our worst nightmare.
Trump is our worst nightmare.
2
It is amusing to see Casey Williams assume the power-neutral truth of her/his own argument about truth and power. Without such special pleading, relativism goes down the slope to solipsism.
4
The Chinese philosopher Confucius said it best:
No man is emptier than a man who is full of himself.
No man is emptier than a man who is full of himself.
8
Donald Trump and the Republican Party are employing the same techniques, with updated tools, that sociopathic authoritarian regimes have used in other times and other places; Just read Orwell.
9
NYT: Please - not another doctoral student getting a practice run in this paper. I will save Casey Williams a lot of time: Donald Trump has stolen nothing from Philosophy. In order to "Steal it and Weaponize" *it*- against anyone, one must first comprehend Philosophy. One must then have a capacity for DEEP THOUGHT; Donald Trump has neither. By your estimation Casey; any pathological liar, con man (woman) is really a master of Philosophy.
10
Quite a few of those con artists in humanities departments
"We can ask not whether a statement is true or false..."
"We" certainly do need to ask whether a statement is true or false--veridicality depends on it, as do our very lives if "we" are clearheaded about such matters.
"We" certainly do need to ask whether a statement is true or false--veridicality depends on it, as do our very lives if "we" are clearheaded about such matters.
3
The scientific method stole philosophy's critical tools about 400 years ago. Actually, Trump is doing what most philosophers do: throw a bunch of what-ifs around, and when those are questioned, thrown around a bunch more.
Seriously, come down off your high horse, Mr. Williams.
Seriously, come down off your high horse, Mr. Williams.
7
Reading this article and many accompanying comments, I felt like I was listening to a philosophical debate within the walls of an ivy-cloistered elite academic institution, with all of us enjoying the stimulating intellectual exercise but refusing to look out the lead-paned windows to the bare-teethed pandemonium, grenade-throwing, and fires consuming the surrounding countryside and encroaching on our comfortable ivory tower. The battered and bloodied people in the streets don't give a whit about critique or our latest academic labels. We best come down from the tower and start transforming the rebellion into a firefighting brigade. Wasting time and energy castigating them for believing crazy, authoritarian nut jobs gets us all burned; let's instead start communicating with them using basic "truths" and "facts" they understand and care about. Here's one example: Instead of joining many of us in the science march on Earth Day, one Texas A&M professor is in using her scientific knowledge and community relationships to join a local interfaith discussion on climate change action. Yes it's important to rally in the streets and in academia to uphold society's values of scientific reasoning and critical thinking, but if we expect to move beyond ideas to implementation and results, more of us need to be doing the hard work of connecting and transforming...Pragmatic Idealists. (e.g., NYT column recommending Dems put $$ into getting out vote rather than advertising)
all Pres and people lie but this is a whole different level
Empathy!
Goodbye to my Juan, goodbye Rosalita
Adios mys amigos Jesus and Maria
You won't have a name when you ride the big airplane
The only name you will be --- deportee
We died in your hills, we died in your deserts
We died in your valleys and died on your planes
We died 'neath your trees and we died in your bushes
Both sides of the river, we died just the same.
-Deportee (Plane Wreck at Los Gatos)
Woody Guthrie
1948
I read a few days ago that when Mexicans come over the border at Nogales from Mexico to Arizona seeking a new life in this country, some of them die - from exhaustion, injury, exposure. The bodies of those who die trying to get through are not recovered, they are left to rot where they fell. This is to punish and frighten others who come through - to let them know they are not wanted or respected. They are not considered to be human.
The more things change, the more they stay the same.
I have nothing to say about Trump anymore except any sense he might have had of human decency has failed him. And perhaps he never had any sense of humanity and decency at all.
We need to fight him. People are dying already. There will be more.
We must not let him convince us it is okay to take our humanity, our love and concern for one another.
He will fail.
Goodbye to my Juan, goodbye Rosalita
Adios mys amigos Jesus and Maria
You won't have a name when you ride the big airplane
The only name you will be --- deportee
We died in your hills, we died in your deserts
We died in your valleys and died on your planes
We died 'neath your trees and we died in your bushes
Both sides of the river, we died just the same.
-Deportee (Plane Wreck at Los Gatos)
Woody Guthrie
1948
I read a few days ago that when Mexicans come over the border at Nogales from Mexico to Arizona seeking a new life in this country, some of them die - from exhaustion, injury, exposure. The bodies of those who die trying to get through are not recovered, they are left to rot where they fell. This is to punish and frighten others who come through - to let them know they are not wanted or respected. They are not considered to be human.
The more things change, the more they stay the same.
I have nothing to say about Trump anymore except any sense he might have had of human decency has failed him. And perhaps he never had any sense of humanity and decency at all.
We need to fight him. People are dying already. There will be more.
We must not let him convince us it is okay to take our humanity, our love and concern for one another.
He will fail.
11
Pacê this column and most of the comments on it, the Trumpies are not relativists. They just define "Truth" sophistically--as what serves their individual and Party interests. That they are absolutely certain of this, both in general and in specific cases, is shown by the fact that they spout so much. True relativists speak with caution and even diffidence.
5
Relativism, Postmodernism, Deconstruction etc. have all essentially been monologues, not dialogues and they have since become foils of arrogance for anyone simply intent on "winning the argument." While these studies originally posited much needed wrecking balls for a hegemony of marble pillars, they have since become the lazy person's path to thoughtfulness (indeed, I was one of those for much of my 20s and 30s). Any valuable thought process, if it is to proceed as a constructive argument, must make concessions towards certain givens (i.e. truths). It's a lot of fun tearing things down, but if you don't rebuild (and do a little good-old-fashioned compromise and cooperation), you're left with nothing.
2
All donnie knows is "what works". All he cares about is his fame and his fortune. He is what I would call a "media savant". Some savants can multiply 20 digit numbers together in their heads in seconds and get the correct answer but not explain how they did it, and otherwise have no exceptional abilities. donnie is an banal person in every way except for his instinctive and exceptional use of the media, and his utter amorality. All of this philosophical hot air would mean less to him than the menu at Mar-a-lago.
5
Someday this column will go down in history as an example of the ironies that occur when French theory is uprooted and transplanted into America. No. Trump is not Foucault, and most young American Foucaultians have few if any idea of what the man was doing in French contexts. Neither does Williams. Had liberalism, in the sense of philosophy of the bourgeoisie, presented itself in the way that Trump does today, there would have been no need for a Foucault. Liberal philosophy and heavy handed Stalinists all claimed objective truth. They masked their brutality with a claim to science and an objective measure. Today's American Foucaultians see a transparent defender of the idea that might makes right (precisely that which French liberalism fought against that nation's ultras in the 19th Century) and ask, "Is he a Foucaultian?" Trump is the latent return of something older. Forget "critical thinking" and try a little history instead. One lesson that might deliver is that seeing power everywhere doesn't amount to a coherent defense of an affirmative politics (of liberty, equality, or much else). It has been the favorite snark fuel for people who take their political system for granted. The wake-up call that the Trump disaster may trigger, if we're lucky, is that the time for that kind of decadence is over.
6
I would rather go along with Trump than this tiring mix of philosophical jargons. At least, Trump knows what he would keep as he tries to hold on. That is, sex, money, and power, at any cost. He would not deny the reality of these virtues, or evils, if you may.
2
"Truth is not found, but made, and making truth means exercising power." Making this true means gaining power to defeat the idea that truth is revealed (by God or the Constitution or whatever). Reality itself exercises power and makes truth; Dubya's war in Iraq did not go well as soon as it made the inevitable turn from defeating the Iraqi army to occupying Iraq, and all the Rumsfeldian cuteness and Cheney darthness could not change this, although they did create enough appearances and illusions to get Dubya reelected. Even without the a-bomb, kamikazis could only delay the inevitable. Reality ultimately bursts through illusions, shakes off the bull with which we cover it, and appears.
Reality is what works. This is the American philosophy of pragmatism.
Reality is what works. This is the American philosophy of pragmatism.
1
Author is a student in literature. It shows.
The one humanities field that has consistently refused to fall for 'theory' and 'critique' and post-modernism and 'deconstruction' is philosophy. They learned their lesson from watching rhetoricians in Athens, and have held fast to the importance of logic (starting with the law of non-contradiction according to Aristotle) ever since.
They look like the only one of the humanities to have properly called it. And that is why there is always so much resentment of philosophy in the other humanities fields.
The one humanities field that has consistently refused to fall for 'theory' and 'critique' and post-modernism and 'deconstruction' is philosophy. They learned their lesson from watching rhetoricians in Athens, and have held fast to the importance of logic (starting with the law of non-contradiction according to Aristotle) ever since.
They look like the only one of the humanities to have properly called it. And that is why there is always so much resentment of philosophy in the other humanities fields.
9
As a mathematician (who admittedly has been a little influenced by Foucault and Kant) it has been painful to me to watch scientists assert passionately the truth of climate change, or any other scientific consensus, like evolution. There can be no such certainty except in the hermetically sealed world of pure mathematics, where the facts and proofs serve only as unreasonably good approximations to what we observe. But Pascal, a mathematician, had the perfect argument which many climate deniers are very familiar with: maybe the scientists are wrong on climate change, but what if they are right?
5
I remember when some grad student acquaintances in the social sciences and humanities discovered the left-wing conspiracy theorist Alex Jones during the early 2000s. They listened to his late-night radio show every night. They simply loved it, without irony. To them he was a marvel, and a master of what they themselves felt they were trying to do in their own theses and other work. Was this just a local phenomenon or was it more widespread?
2
There is a big difference between being cautious and questioning about any particular truth-claim and denying that it is possible to arrive at a valid determination of a general truth based on a broadly based assessment of empirical evidence.
Scientific knowledge is never Absolute Truth. It is always provisional and subject to revision as more evidence is gathered, as measurement techniques improve, as interpretations of causal effects are debated, and prevailing paradigms are refined or replaced.
Take climate science. There is an overwhelming consensus that has strengthened in the past decade that human activity has played a major part in global warming in recent decades. There is a legitimate debate about how much of global warming has been caused by human activity.
Precisely how to quantify the impact is not settled, and there are many human/natural interaction effects to consider.
When the tundra melts due to rising temperatures, massive quantities of methane gas are released that contribute to global warming. Is that a human effect? In proximate terms, no. In a cause and effect sequence with intervening variables, yes.
"Some liberals have argued that the best way to combat conservative mendacity is to insist on the existence of truth and the reliability of hard facts. But blind faith in objectivity and factual truth alone has not proven to be a promising way forward.
Scientific knowledge is never Absolute Truth. It is always provisional and subject to revision as more evidence is gathered, as measurement techniques improve, as interpretations of causal effects are debated, and prevailing paradigms are refined or replaced.
Take climate science. There is an overwhelming consensus that has strengthened in the past decade that human activity has played a major part in global warming in recent decades. There is a legitimate debate about how much of global warming has been caused by human activity.
Precisely how to quantify the impact is not settled, and there are many human/natural interaction effects to consider.
When the tundra melts due to rising temperatures, massive quantities of methane gas are released that contribute to global warming. Is that a human effect? In proximate terms, no. In a cause and effect sequence with intervening variables, yes.
"Some liberals have argued that the best way to combat conservative mendacity is to insist on the existence of truth and the reliability of hard facts. But blind faith in objectivity and factual truth alone has not proven to be a promising way forward.
1
The connection of trumpian idea of reality to ba d ideas, wherever they come from should be clear. But to include Kant in the progeny of pure constructivism reveals poor knowledge of his thought. We must recover the object, objectivity and the notion of a reality independent of our subjective constructions, indeed in part being their source. That was Kant's project too. Finally the dangers of pure constructivism should motivate us. The article takes one step, but does not understand the need for the next ones.
2
"Trump’s playbook should be familiar to any student of critical theory and philosophy. It often feels like Trump has stolen our ideas and weaponized them."
Indeed, those notions have been stolen and weaponized by regressives. This development was entirely predictable. The belief that "there are no facts, only interpretations" makes an emotive interpretation of a situation equal in value with an interpretation based on a rational assessment of evidence,
Nearly 30 years ago I tried to persuade post-modernist colleagues that their "skeptical attitude" would inevitably serve the interests of "the enemy"--of illiberal propagandists of every stripe. Unless we acknowledge the dialectical tension between belief systems and theories, on the one hand, and Peirce's surprising facts or Popper's falsifying facts, on the other, all claims are equally "subjective".
Each of us may be a perspectivally situated subject--an agent situated perceptually, linguistically, culturally, historically, etc.--but this subjectivity, as linguistic and cultural, is irreducibly inter-subjective and social.
Beliefs to a considerable extent may be inter-subjective constructs, but systems of belief are "objective" to the extent that they remain subject to reconstruction in the face of publicly accessible factual surprises and falsifications of antecedent beliefs.
Indeed, those notions have been stolen and weaponized by regressives. This development was entirely predictable. The belief that "there are no facts, only interpretations" makes an emotive interpretation of a situation equal in value with an interpretation based on a rational assessment of evidence,
Nearly 30 years ago I tried to persuade post-modernist colleagues that their "skeptical attitude" would inevitably serve the interests of "the enemy"--of illiberal propagandists of every stripe. Unless we acknowledge the dialectical tension between belief systems and theories, on the one hand, and Peirce's surprising facts or Popper's falsifying facts, on the other, all claims are equally "subjective".
Each of us may be a perspectivally situated subject--an agent situated perceptually, linguistically, culturally, historically, etc.--but this subjectivity, as linguistic and cultural, is irreducibly inter-subjective and social.
Beliefs to a considerable extent may be inter-subjective constructs, but systems of belief are "objective" to the extent that they remain subject to reconstruction in the face of publicly accessible factual surprises and falsifications of antecedent beliefs.
3
"But Trump’s relationship to the truth seems novel, if only because he doesn’t try to hide his relativism."
To use the term "relativism" suggests that Trump has a subjective, good-faith belief in what he is saying. He does not. Even a person who holds to their own subjective view of a given matter (climate change, religion, gun rights, immigration, etc.) has some kind of internal logic or rationality guiding them. Thus, even mortal enemies are capable of understanding each other on a basic level, even if they are committed to their conflict. Trump, on the other hand, is not even telling us his own subjective truth. That makes meaningful intellectual engagement with him, whether as friend or foe, virtually impossible.
Consider a hypothetical Trump ally in one example: Let's say that a Trump ally accepted Trump's subjective belief that the economic data for the last 8 years was a hoax and that the "real" unemployment rate was somewhere between 28% and 42% (Point A). Fine. Since he has taken office, nothing has changed in the calculation of those numbers, yet he now accepts it as closer to 5% (Point B). Even for a Trump ally, there is no logical progression between Points A and B. For Trump to have subjectively believed Point A he would have to abandon Point B (barring a disqualifying mental defect). If it were simply a matter of "relativism," we could piece the logic together.
If we accept he simply lies to suit his purposes, though, everything lines up.
To use the term "relativism" suggests that Trump has a subjective, good-faith belief in what he is saying. He does not. Even a person who holds to their own subjective view of a given matter (climate change, religion, gun rights, immigration, etc.) has some kind of internal logic or rationality guiding them. Thus, even mortal enemies are capable of understanding each other on a basic level, even if they are committed to their conflict. Trump, on the other hand, is not even telling us his own subjective truth. That makes meaningful intellectual engagement with him, whether as friend or foe, virtually impossible.
Consider a hypothetical Trump ally in one example: Let's say that a Trump ally accepted Trump's subjective belief that the economic data for the last 8 years was a hoax and that the "real" unemployment rate was somewhere between 28% and 42% (Point A). Fine. Since he has taken office, nothing has changed in the calculation of those numbers, yet he now accepts it as closer to 5% (Point B). Even for a Trump ally, there is no logical progression between Points A and B. For Trump to have subjectively believed Point A he would have to abandon Point B (barring a disqualifying mental defect). If it were simply a matter of "relativism," we could piece the logic together.
If we accept he simply lies to suit his purposes, though, everything lines up.
6
I think this is a very helpful essay. Where Trump and his supporters fail is not so much in challenging alleged facts and truths, but in replacing them with purely imagined facts and truths. What matters is the quality of our arguments, logic, and evidence, and the direction in which it points. It is generally not helpful to claim this or that is true, whereas it IS helpful to state that we BELIEVE this or that to be true for any number of reasons. And then we evaluate those reasons and arrive at our own conclusions. Trumpists fail to provide compelling, non-emotional reasons to believe their versions of reality, and that is the problem, as I see it.
2
It isn't just the facts are socially constructed but so is epistemology; indeed our very subjectivity is a product of social construction. I'll leave it the imagination of readers as to the status of our ontological ratiocinations, and rationality. Overlooked in the column's summary of post-structuralism is the facts at issue here are not absolute facts, but those inferences of necessary and probable actuality premised/based on prevailing standards of probative and material evidence. Trump's attempt to substitute alternative theories of fact is a conflation of meaning with facts.
I completely agree with those who argue for the rather tenuous nature of "facts", particularly those involving the actions of human beings. However over the years I have developed a useful heuristic to suss out where truth most probably lies by looking at statements about a subject and then looking at their logical extension from which I make a prediction of how events will play out. I am of course using a particular political framework to do this analysis. For politics and social outcomes I use both a leftist and rightist positions to do make the prediction. I then use the outcome which best matches the it to decide both where the truth most probably lay and which politics provided the most correct analytical framework.
Thanks for bringing this subject up. Recent events have demonstrated the vital importance of philosophical framing.
Today's frighteningly rapid rise of Authoritarianism and Fascism on a global scale raises again the vital importance of ideology. Firstly, in understanding how it is happening; secondly, in how to combat it. WW I and II led to a lot of rethinking in philosophy and to the prominence of Existentialism. The death and destruction from those global conflicts made the Existentialist arguments that Moral Authority, and Scientific Understanding of Human Nature are delusions seem to make a lot of sense. Thus, the attraction of seeing the individual will as sovereign, and truth and rightness created in the very moment of decision. It was fashionable to think this way in the immediate post-war years but it soon went out of fashion by the seventies.
I think we need to go back to Marx's analysis to understand what's going on. Authoritarianism is a response to economic instability. As Capital has taken a greater proportion of income for itself, it has led to stagnating wages and a series of Economic crisis. People are losing faith and trust in governments and social institutions and this has been exacerbated by sophisticated propaganda from both Fossil Fuel Corporations and Russia. The problem is that if we lose faith in our social institutions then we fall prey to Authoritarianism. Perhaps then, we need to rethink why our social institutions are important.
Today's frighteningly rapid rise of Authoritarianism and Fascism on a global scale raises again the vital importance of ideology. Firstly, in understanding how it is happening; secondly, in how to combat it. WW I and II led to a lot of rethinking in philosophy and to the prominence of Existentialism. The death and destruction from those global conflicts made the Existentialist arguments that Moral Authority, and Scientific Understanding of Human Nature are delusions seem to make a lot of sense. Thus, the attraction of seeing the individual will as sovereign, and truth and rightness created in the very moment of decision. It was fashionable to think this way in the immediate post-war years but it soon went out of fashion by the seventies.
I think we need to go back to Marx's analysis to understand what's going on. Authoritarianism is a response to economic instability. As Capital has taken a greater proportion of income for itself, it has led to stagnating wages and a series of Economic crisis. People are losing faith and trust in governments and social institutions and this has been exacerbated by sophisticated propaganda from both Fossil Fuel Corporations and Russia. The problem is that if we lose faith in our social institutions then we fall prey to Authoritarianism. Perhaps then, we need to rethink why our social institutions are important.
6
It is not 'blind' faith that scientists live by in their investigation of the phenomenon of climate change. It is, however, a willingness to share methods and conclusions, tentative though they remain for at least until the next evidence comes to light.
Derrida and his fellow deconstructionists have had a good run ...in the humanities, especially departments of languages and literature and perhaps also in philosophy. Their contribution to public debate about policy, as this article suggests, is problematic. But this much seems clear: the number of those participating in the debates has grown much larger, as had the information available to consider.
What we, any of us, voters or policy makers or wonks, decide to label as important, is still open to debate. This very proposition is what has been 'hijacked' by the Trump facilitator. It remains, however, open to each of us to pitch our claim of importance or significance or context at every turn. Not the least of these is what the press, especially TV talking heads, do when they, increasingly now, point out how conveniently the Tweeter-in-chief goes on line to change the subject from awkward events or statements associated with his administration.
Derrida and his fellow deconstructionists have had a good run ...in the humanities, especially departments of languages and literature and perhaps also in philosophy. Their contribution to public debate about policy, as this article suggests, is problematic. But this much seems clear: the number of those participating in the debates has grown much larger, as had the information available to consider.
What we, any of us, voters or policy makers or wonks, decide to label as important, is still open to debate. This very proposition is what has been 'hijacked' by the Trump facilitator. It remains, however, open to each of us to pitch our claim of importance or significance or context at every turn. Not the least of these is what the press, especially TV talking heads, do when they, increasingly now, point out how conveniently the Tweeter-in-chief goes on line to change the subject from awkward events or statements associated with his administration.
1
When I was in law school, "Critical Legal Studies" was considered cool. Stuffy old liberals warned that all that deconstruction and cultural relativity was nihilistic, and could undermine the understandings and institutions that make civilization possible. If empirical science doesn't reveal Truth sufficiently for post-modern philosophers, so much the worse for them. We are living with the fruit of their over-thought and over-wrought skepticism, which they weaponized for political advantage.
3
A presumptuous and one-dimensional article... ironic given its premise that all facts are subjective. At no point does the author ever acknowledge that deconstructivist theory - the idea that there are no objective facts and that all assertion of truth is a claim to power - is itself a subjective idea, one not held by the majority of philosophers across history. Deconstructivism is the backbone of far-left social theory in the modern university, but bears very little on reality. It is precisely this kind of academic nonsense and jargon that makes the left seem out of touch and only gets in the way of the center-left who is actually serious about making realistic political progress.
1
"Post-truth" indeed has a lot to do with post-modernism. Likewise the belief in objective truth was a defining characteristic of modernism; that through logic, science, and rationality, humans could move past the misery of their pre-modern predecessors. But the enlightenment was never complete. Billions still live an essentially pre-modern existence, defined by ignorance, superstition, and fear. Most of us in the west would consider ourselves "modern"; modernism has delivered immense benefits, but pre-modern thought has persisted for hundreds of years in America. Post-modernism is a recent development, and is the province mostly of artists, intellectuals, and the entertainment media. When they introduced "post-truth" into popular culture, they inadvertently attracted millions of pre-modern folks who mistakenly thought it validated their archaic beliefs. Many of the powerful, such as Trump, were quick to exploit this. They twisted "post-truth" into a grotesque weapon with which to manipulate the pre-modern masses.
3
I am sorry, but those who steep themselves in Derrida, Foucault, Baudrillard, Butler, et al., are generally responsible for ruining the humanities as a worthwhile, valuable field of study. Indeed anyone who claims to understand Derrida at all is intellectually problematic at best.
3
Five hundred years ago, truth was already known, and to learn it meant memorizing the words of the great minds from Aristotle to St. Thomas Aquinas. Truths were handed down from the great minds and there really was no more truth to be discovered. That was until Columbus discovered the previously unknown Western hemisphere where there were only supposed to be high seas. It took two hundred years for the modern perspective about truths having to be proved by reproducing them became the core of modern thinking. Gravity, the speed of light, quantum mechanics, the big bang, the ability to describe these with mathematics and so to both prove and measure them are not the socially determined realities of anything. They existed before man and will exist after man. This notion that truths are socially agreed upon concepts is simply wrong, absurd, in fact. Truth, absolute truth, is impossible for people to know because they are mortal and cannot see all outcomes from what they can understand. But we can understand truths in terms of such high probabilities as to amount to truths.
There is a fallacy underpinning the way relativism is perceived by the many. It moves from Everyone is entitled to an opinion as to what they think is true (True) to, Anyone's opinion is as good (true) as anyone else's (false). In a world where reality is information we need to return to caring about whether something is genuinely true of not. Truth matters. Opinions - especially from people who have no respect for truth - really don't matter other than they need to be managed.
1
If any professional philosopher or social scientist can tell me how "not all facts are created equal", as the author writes, yet "truth does not exist," it will make my day. I've read Kant, Hume, Schopenhauer, Nietzsche, Heidegger, etc., and I've never understood where this absurd interpretation comes from.
As a former philosophy student, it quickly became clear to me that no one can ever prove "truth doesn't exist," and even to say such a thing is a clear self-contradiction. How do these professional philosophers explain that? Contradiction is fine? No big deal? Well then in my view, you helped Trump win, period. (Of course the right wing appropriated critique, you really couldn't see this coming!?)
Let's review some simple facts.
1. Truth is merely word -- a very useful word -- not some direct manifestation of injustice or authority.
2. You are not fighting for justice by fighting against a word. In fact, you are clearly hurting the cause. A simple Wikipedia search reveals that the offending word "truth" has etymological ties to the word "trust":
Thus, 'truth' involves both the quality of "faithfulness, fidelity, loyalty, sincerity, veracity",[11] and that of "agreement with fact or reality", in Anglo-Saxon expressed by sōþ (Modern English sooth). [Wikipedia, "Truth"]
So, in other words, you philosophers and social scientists contend that the problem facing America right now is vastly too much trust of each other? Please.
As a former philosophy student, it quickly became clear to me that no one can ever prove "truth doesn't exist," and even to say such a thing is a clear self-contradiction. How do these professional philosophers explain that? Contradiction is fine? No big deal? Well then in my view, you helped Trump win, period. (Of course the right wing appropriated critique, you really couldn't see this coming!?)
Let's review some simple facts.
1. Truth is merely word -- a very useful word -- not some direct manifestation of injustice or authority.
2. You are not fighting for justice by fighting against a word. In fact, you are clearly hurting the cause. A simple Wikipedia search reveals that the offending word "truth" has etymological ties to the word "trust":
Thus, 'truth' involves both the quality of "faithfulness, fidelity, loyalty, sincerity, veracity",[11] and that of "agreement with fact or reality", in Anglo-Saxon expressed by sōþ (Modern English sooth). [Wikipedia, "Truth"]
So, in other words, you philosophers and social scientists contend that the problem facing America right now is vastly too much trust of each other? Please.
1
FDR was no intellectual either, but he was able to listen to good advice on the economy, on the war, and on politics. That's the wisdom of prudence. One big problem with DT is that he doesn't communicate that sense at all. It all seems like shooting from the tweet. But recently, he has reversed on so many issues, that one has to wonder whether he is after all. One can wonder also about the permanency and efficacy of the reversals themselves. How much and how broad a direction this is, is unknown, perhaps ever to himself.
The answer was given a century ago by William James, in his essays on Pragmatism and on The Meaning of Truth. A pity that melodramatic theorists turned away from James (and Peirce and Dewey and Quine) who are a whole lot deeper than those who followed.
1
"they’ve become axiomatic for many scholars in literary studies, cultural anthropology and sociology."
It's an okay approach for three impractical disciplines in which new realities are easily created. Not so useful in engineering or medicine, where denying the concept of knowledge can get someone killed.
It's an okay approach for three impractical disciplines in which new realities are easily created. Not so useful in engineering or medicine, where denying the concept of knowledge can get someone killed.
3
George Orwell, 1984, addressed Trump's line of thought: 2+2=5
1984 was a terrifying view of the future. 'Nuff said.
1984 was a terrifying view of the future. 'Nuff said.
1
American literature and sociology departments are partly to blame for the rise of Trump, and the alt-right, with their peddling of what the physicist Alan Sokal referred to as "fashionable nonsense". The theories and critiques that come from them are awash with gibberish that obfuscates any attempt to understand the world. Sadly, it further degrades the cause of the left and social and economic justice.
Editor’s note: This comment has been anonymized in accordance with applicable law(s).
I agree that "critical ways of thinking demand that we approach knowledge with attention and humility and recognize that, while facts might be created, not all facts are created equal." As I read about the events in the world around me, I find lots of criticism and asserted facts, but very little humility. "Microscopes, cameras, and eyeballs" may be non-neutral methods, but at least the (neo-) empiricists were making a sincere attempt to describe a reality as they found it. And it did bring you the iPhone after all ;-)
Is suspect that critical theory will do little to subdue President Trump. I encourage you to think critically about that and work toward making a decision on acting rather than ride the Mobius strip of cogitation.
Is suspect that critical theory will do little to subdue President Trump. I encourage you to think critically about that and work toward making a decision on acting rather than ride the Mobius strip of cogitation.
I worry that this article -- like many Stone articles -- is going to confuse the average citizen about what philosophy is and what philosophers do, and merely adds to an increasing PR problem which conflates sloppy, pseudo-continental styles of philosophizing with the more rigorous analytic style which the majority of U.S. and British colleges and universities teach. Critical theory is not a branch of philosophy, though it often helps itself to philosophical ideas which often can become marred in the process. The comments that I've read here seem to confirm my worry.
Casey Williams is identified as a Ph.D. student in literature, and is clearly deep into critical theory. Which is fine, whatever. But critical theory is not philosophy (at least, not as practiced by contemporary philosophy departments) and literature students are not the ones that should be speaking on behalf of the philosophical community as such. Calling something philosophy should have a higher bar that what I'm seeing here. The majority of philosophers are not generally obsessed with the legacy of Foucault and Derrida and Baudrillard; nor do we simplify everything into sweeping claims about the relativism of truth and hidden power structures, and decide to call that critical thinking.
This article no doubt has interesting and maybe even important things to say about our current political climate. But we should not confuse this with a quality piece of philosophy.
Casey Williams is identified as a Ph.D. student in literature, and is clearly deep into critical theory. Which is fine, whatever. But critical theory is not philosophy (at least, not as practiced by contemporary philosophy departments) and literature students are not the ones that should be speaking on behalf of the philosophical community as such. Calling something philosophy should have a higher bar that what I'm seeing here. The majority of philosophers are not generally obsessed with the legacy of Foucault and Derrida and Baudrillard; nor do we simplify everything into sweeping claims about the relativism of truth and hidden power structures, and decide to call that critical thinking.
This article no doubt has interesting and maybe even important things to say about our current political climate. But we should not confuse this with a quality piece of philosophy.
8
JP: "Critical theory is not a branch of philosophy, ..."
Actually, Williams distinguishes the two in some cases:
* "... any student of critical theory and philosophy."
* "From these premises, philosophers and theorists have derived ..."
* "... however carelessly some critical theorists and philosophers have deployed them."
However, he seems to conflate the two in other cases:
* "The bedrock claim of critical philosophy, going back to Kant, ..."
* "... critical philosophy’s insistence that we interrogate truth claims ..."
NB: I excluded the headline, because usually authors do not write the headline.
Methodology: Do a text search for "philo" in the essay.
Actually, Williams distinguishes the two in some cases:
* "... any student of critical theory and philosophy."
* "From these premises, philosophers and theorists have derived ..."
* "... however carelessly some critical theorists and philosophers have deployed them."
However, he seems to conflate the two in other cases:
* "The bedrock claim of critical philosophy, going back to Kant, ..."
* "... critical philosophy’s insistence that we interrogate truth claims ..."
NB: I excluded the headline, because usually authors do not write the headline.
Methodology: Do a text search for "philo" in the essay.
I think it's pretty clear that the spirit of the essay is that philosophers and critical theorists are on the same team and their forms of inquiry are on a par, neither of which seems right to me.
But he was wiretapped. He was being recorded and susan rice unmasked him as a private citizen. He never claimed that he was the target of the tapping but he made a general claim that his phones in Trump tower were tapped. This is a fact. How can you state that it is not?
1
Who could deny the fact that has no alternatives?
Objective v. Subjective, Science v. Religion, Faith v. Fact,... Most humans think thrive in a subjective, religious, faith based universe. The objective approach is difficult and boring while the subjective can be, and usually is, entertaining. Also the objective challenges your deeply held belief structure be it religious, economic or political and most of us prefer to have our beliefs affirmed rather than challenged.
On the political front we are dealing with a very subjective approach. The elected and appointed officials espouse a theory of what will or won't work but rarely has the implementation of any political plan actually achieved the desired results. Thus the problems that we have today.
Promises made and unfulfilled with that lack of results blamed on the other party are the stuff of elections. The human reality is that in most things that we attempt to do, we really don't know what will or won't work, while at the same time promising that it will work to your benefit.
Still, no political person is willing to say: "We're going to do our best but we're never going to be perfect and everything we do will be a compromise." Unfortunately, that statement is as close to "truth" as any political statement could ever be.
On the political front we are dealing with a very subjective approach. The elected and appointed officials espouse a theory of what will or won't work but rarely has the implementation of any political plan actually achieved the desired results. Thus the problems that we have today.
Promises made and unfulfilled with that lack of results blamed on the other party are the stuff of elections. The human reality is that in most things that we attempt to do, we really don't know what will or won't work, while at the same time promising that it will work to your benefit.
Still, no political person is willing to say: "We're going to do our best but we're never going to be perfect and everything we do will be a compromise." Unfortunately, that statement is as close to "truth" as any political statement could ever be.
1
I would hate for someone who has studied little-to-no philosophy to read this piece and come away with the view that all philosophy is relativistic, as the author suggests. Views like the one represented here are held by many, but far from all all philosophers.
The author offers no meaningful way for relativists to counter Trumpist "alternative fact" ideology. Anyone who takes the view that facts, as such, are created by perspective doesn't distinguish the meanings of "reality" and "perspective," and can offer no more than one's own ideology against that of an enemy, with all intellectual bridges between the two burned in advance.
The author offers no meaningful way for relativists to counter Trumpist "alternative fact" ideology. Anyone who takes the view that facts, as such, are created by perspective doesn't distinguish the meanings of "reality" and "perspective," and can offer no more than one's own ideology against that of an enemy, with all intellectual bridges between the two burned in advance.
2
The deconstruction fad appears to be an excuse for not bothering to learn probabilities and to generate and apply them. Things asserted as facts mostly include an unstated probabilistic modifier.
Most of us use probabilities far too seldom, reserving them for "there is an 80% chance of rain tomorrow afternoon" and other "safe" topics. Trump's claim that Obama ordered a wiretap was something like less than 1% likely of being true or partly true when first announced. Today, it has picked up a few zeros, and is far less than .001% likely to be true or partly true. Probabilities can be associated with most things, like the probability you will die in a car crash tomorrow (less than .0000001% chance of being true -- unless you wish to improve the odds by deliberately crashing your car).
The probability of significant sea level rise by 2050 (where significant is > 1 meter) is less than 50%. The probability of significant sea level rise by 2200 is higher than 99.999999%. The chances of a fire burning your house in a year is less than 0.1%, but you buy fire insurance anyway. But protecting from Global Warming impacts--?who knows? according to some. Well, nobody knows for certain--but the probabilities are pretty easy to establish, along with the uncertainties--and our planet will burn with a higher probability by 2050 than that your house will burn within a year--and Trump does nothing.
Most of us use probabilities far too seldom, reserving them for "there is an 80% chance of rain tomorrow afternoon" and other "safe" topics. Trump's claim that Obama ordered a wiretap was something like less than 1% likely of being true or partly true when first announced. Today, it has picked up a few zeros, and is far less than .001% likely to be true or partly true. Probabilities can be associated with most things, like the probability you will die in a car crash tomorrow (less than .0000001% chance of being true -- unless you wish to improve the odds by deliberately crashing your car).
The probability of significant sea level rise by 2050 (where significant is > 1 meter) is less than 50%. The probability of significant sea level rise by 2200 is higher than 99.999999%. The chances of a fire burning your house in a year is less than 0.1%, but you buy fire insurance anyway. But protecting from Global Warming impacts--?who knows? according to some. Well, nobody knows for certain--but the probabilities are pretty easy to establish, along with the uncertainties--and our planet will burn with a higher probability by 2050 than that your house will burn within a year--and Trump does nothing.
2
What a lame conclusion to an otherwise honest and thought-provoking essay! Note to Postmodernists: Critical Analysis did not begin with Critical Theory. You didn't invent critical thinking, or the idea that facts are often interpreted in such a way as to advance the ulterior motives of a given party. All you did was carry that idea to absurd lengths, and in the process, create a sterile academic "philosophy" so laden with technical jargon that not even its own practitioners have any idea what it means!
3
Since Kant's main aim was -- overtly and obviously -- to describe the conditions of possibility of objective knowledge, this is not a well-informed article.
4
The similarity of Trump's attitude to truth and postmodernist "philosophy" merely exposes the dangers and derangement of the latter.
If you make "truth" for any other purpose of fact based observations, you move away from it. There are two other rationales. One involves telling people what they like to hear and telling people what you want them to hear. These last two are distortions because the purpose is something else than factual reporting. This is nothing new and no great revelation either. You should know that. If you don't you are obviously and intentionally irrational. Thats when thinking people start treating you very, very carefully with any respect to the accuracy of information delivered by you and for good reason. Yeah, lets apply scientific reasoning to it. Why have you ever thought that any good could come about by any other method? Really? I find that surprising, to say the least.
The effects of all the Foucualt-Derrida stuff is almost uniformly pernicious. I cannot see any contribution within philosophy itself, let alone in the larger world of culture. Mostly it seems to have licensed the self indulgence of lazy-minded academics.
It shouldn't be that difficult to establish a hierarchy of responsibility concerning the truth expectations in various fields of discourse. I am not unduly exercised over Santa and the tooth fairy. Now by the rosy fingered dawn or the wine dark sea. I have very different expectations concerning courtroom testimony or science experiment reports. By and large I am very bothered when journalism strays very far from the standards of evidence called for in courtrooms. Might it help if the news community set up a 'Good Housekeeping Seal of approval, that one could apply for - or have it revoked - if one becomes irresponsible?
It shouldn't be that difficult to establish a hierarchy of responsibility concerning the truth expectations in various fields of discourse. I am not unduly exercised over Santa and the tooth fairy. Now by the rosy fingered dawn or the wine dark sea. I have very different expectations concerning courtroom testimony or science experiment reports. By and large I am very bothered when journalism strays very far from the standards of evidence called for in courtrooms. Might it help if the news community set up a 'Good Housekeeping Seal of approval, that one could apply for - or have it revoked - if one becomes irresponsible?
Obviously, most of these commenters have never read a theoretical or academic text in their life...
When will Trump agree to debate his version of truth with people who hold other views?
1
Why are we losing the battle for the minds and votes of good-thinking Americans? This column is unfortunately reflective. It takes us from "reductive version" to "conservative mendacity" to "non-neutral methods" to "non-neutral symbols." and then it cites Kant, Nietzsche, Foucault and Derrida as sources. Really? Who are we writing for? I need a scorecard . . .
I get it. I read the Times. But let's start thinking about others who probably don't. It's why the Democrats lost the election.
I get it. I read the Times. But let's start thinking about others who probably don't. It's why the Democrats lost the election.
1
I was confronted with this in graduate school - the idea that reality is some sort of construct. I was even instructed to remove the word "objective" from an article I was writing for an academic publication because I was told there was no such thing as objectivity. But if that were true, then science would be impossible; there would be no airplanes, televisions, or microwave ovens. However, I doubt Trump goes near academia. He gets his lessons closer to home.
Mainstream media fakes news so well most people reading this probably still think Bernie supporters were rioting and throwing chairs in Nevada. They probably have no idea that the 'reporter' who first published the story was eventually fired for it because it was fake. Then there's George W's WMDs lapped up by the media. What the author of this article says at the beginning - by now we are familiar with the pattern, an unsubstantiated charge followed by promises of proof that never materialize, sounds like the Russia-hacked-the-election story, for which no evidence was ever provided, including in two evidence-free government reports.
Trump has access to all the exercises in fabrication and people who mistake their wishes for the truth, all around him in the press and on TV. It's everywhere. Trump is just purifying it to a greater concentration.
Mainstream media fakes news so well most people reading this probably still think Bernie supporters were rioting and throwing chairs in Nevada. They probably have no idea that the 'reporter' who first published the story was eventually fired for it because it was fake. Then there's George W's WMDs lapped up by the media. What the author of this article says at the beginning - by now we are familiar with the pattern, an unsubstantiated charge followed by promises of proof that never materialize, sounds like the Russia-hacked-the-election story, for which no evidence was ever provided, including in two evidence-free government reports.
Trump has access to all the exercises in fabrication and people who mistake their wishes for the truth, all around him in the press and on TV. It's everywhere. Trump is just purifying it to a greater concentration.
Before starting down the road in search of the truth you have to have a good faith intent to discovery it. Trump mostly has the opposite intent. He seeks to exaggerate or cover up the truth.
What is the point of publishing such an article in a major newspaper? This belongs in some academic journal or blog for philosophers. It is an example of academic indulgence that treats Trump's tactics as seriously thought out strategy. It is not. It should be clear to anyone by now that he makes it up as he goes along with the singular objective of attracting attention to himself and trying to be popular with his base. Please use this valuable space for something of more real world application. If he hadn't won the election no one would read this article on its own merit. Please stop unwittingly normalizing his behavior.
4
Oh, brother. No defense of Trump meant - he has little credibility. But, to suggest he is doing anything other than what partisans on both sides of the aisle regularly do, as if he created something new, is preposterous. He's not even good at it. What happened in the election has nothing to do with skill in persuading people otherwise not inclined. It had to do with the Ds also nominating a candidate with little credibility, and many people being sick of political correctness and identity politics. The media is also at fault for frequent misstatements of fact, or overlooking the falsehoods of those they prefer or engaging in narrative attacks on some candidates and presidents. There are a number of times that Trump ended up looking better than the media. I do not trust them at all when it comes to him.
I love to debate. I will always be disappointed by how many people argue in an illogical fashion driven by a desire to "win" the argument, in their view, and engage in every kind of fallacy. Trump hardly invented it.
To both parties I'd say - look to clean your own house. It doesn't matter what you say about each other. Rs need to confront Trump and Ds whoever comes next and the DNC itself about the way they argue. Even at the point of the Obama/Romney election it seemed candidates knew that falsehoods didn't matter. Trump and Clinton took it a step further.
I love to debate. I will always be disappointed by how many people argue in an illogical fashion driven by a desire to "win" the argument, in their view, and engage in every kind of fallacy. Trump hardly invented it.
To both parties I'd say - look to clean your own house. It doesn't matter what you say about each other. Rs need to confront Trump and Ds whoever comes next and the DNC itself about the way they argue. Even at the point of the Obama/Romney election it seemed candidates knew that falsehoods didn't matter. Trump and Clinton took it a step further.
You make this harder than it has to be. The objective is not to be a missionary putting right all of the wrongs of the world. The objective is and should be disproving the irrational. Trump is a deductive reasoner and in any deductive reasoning proofs or facts flow from premises. False premises can not produce true facts. Therefore it's our job to critique and disqualify the premises, then Trump falls.
1
"We can ask not whether a statement is true or false..." Really? We can't ask whether a claim that social inequality is increasing, or decreasing? Or any other empirical statements? We can't answer that? The utter banality of such relativistic nonsense can be no more blatant than that. The fact that the right has now appropriated self-defined 'leftist' rhetoric is merely a case of the 'predicted cows coming home.' Please, we can certainly agree that paying attention to the sources of claims to knowledge, and to their interests, should always be part of our engagement with 'claims to truth,' but that doesn't mean that 'we can not ask whether a statement is true or false.' It's disappointing that graduate schools are apparently still putting out such tripe, instead of focusing on teaching graduate students how better to ascertain the truthfulness of such statements, or the lack thereof.
1
I believe one of the problems with 'Truth' is culture (or more broadly upbringing). As soon as you move away from the exact sciences, like physics and mathematics, facts become interpretative. The value system that one has, the language one uses determines at least to some degree the content of speech, of ideas or judgments.
Raised in some comfort one unwittingly assigns another weight to words or phrases, than when raised in affluence or poverty.
Constrained to use e.g. French, where new words cannot easily be constructed, one will express oneself differently than when using German or Dutch, where nouns can be strung together.
But is goes further, in Russian for instance, the color 'blue' does not exist as such. 'Blue' is either light- or dark-blue, and for a native the distinction is acquired with the mother's milk, whereas in translation it becomes a choice made by an individual translator. So how what is communicated or understood is, too, a matter of imbued culture.
Culture will also determine how 'facts' are assigned importance.
Is kicking a dog 'bad' or 'neutral'?
Is allowing one's child to select his or her own life partner 'evident' of 'utter madness'?
Is lightning striking a barn where next years seed-corn is stored a 'random catastrophe' or an act of a/the deity?
And if the latter, does that imply divine wrath, fickleness or sheer bad luck
Your culture decides!
Which isn't to say that Donald the Magnificent and his court are not redefining the boundaries ...
Raised in some comfort one unwittingly assigns another weight to words or phrases, than when raised in affluence or poverty.
Constrained to use e.g. French, where new words cannot easily be constructed, one will express oneself differently than when using German or Dutch, where nouns can be strung together.
But is goes further, in Russian for instance, the color 'blue' does not exist as such. 'Blue' is either light- or dark-blue, and for a native the distinction is acquired with the mother's milk, whereas in translation it becomes a choice made by an individual translator. So how what is communicated or understood is, too, a matter of imbued culture.
Culture will also determine how 'facts' are assigned importance.
Is kicking a dog 'bad' or 'neutral'?
Is allowing one's child to select his or her own life partner 'evident' of 'utter madness'?
Is lightning striking a barn where next years seed-corn is stored a 'random catastrophe' or an act of a/the deity?
And if the latter, does that imply divine wrath, fickleness or sheer bad luck
Your culture decides!
Which isn't to say that Donald the Magnificent and his court are not redefining the boundaries ...
Truth in relation to President Trump is thought by many to be a specious commodity. In fact, I suspect that many people consider him to be a pathological liar, which he may be. "The home where truth resides" is in "... the sending of history and its reception by man as fate", or so thought by Parmenides and Heidegger. Trump's audacity to think that the office of President could be successfully assumed by a business man, rather than a politician is the source of much speculation about this. The point is that Trump uses what he knows about the history of the actions of past Presidents as a basis for making judgments, which he may lack the ability to make, and so seems at times mendacious or shallow (All politicians are liars; most Presidents are politicians; ergo most Presidents are liars.) , when he is merely reflecting analogues of past situations upon what he thinks is important in the present. The substantial gulf between him and others makes what he thinks is important, and so people perceive him to be a liar; or his appeals to their emotions, their beliefs in myths, cause them to develop illusions and so attract them to government "business". (No question, government fosters illusions.) It is not a healthy situation; it could be dire.
Just a minute here: "But blind faith in objectivity and factual truth alone has not proven to be a promising way forward."
Faith in objectivity and factual truth is not "blind". That's reserved for religion. One of the main reasons that we are successful as a species is precisely because objectivity and factual truth has been a primary driver of our progress. Imagine where we'd be if we still burned witches and thought that the earth was flat.
Faith in objectivity and factual truth is not "blind". That's reserved for religion. One of the main reasons that we are successful as a species is precisely because objectivity and factual truth has been a primary driver of our progress. Imagine where we'd be if we still burned witches and thought that the earth was flat.
4
The short version of this piece is that truth is like pornography, you know it when you see it, with the addendum that those who like pornography like to see it. The same holds for those who enjoy Trump's lies, most can see he is lying but they like the lies nonetheless. It makes them feel good to do so. The problem for the rest of us is that despite the premise that truth can be made, reality exists independent of artificial truths and cannot be changed by denial of its existence. So here we are, stuck with a president who believes he can create his own truth, while simultaneously stuck with the reality that when his house of cards falls we will be under it.
3
Democrats decided that truth was not an important element of leadership when they elected Bill Clinton, because it was known on election day in 1992 that he lied to the draft board, he "didn't inhale", he was a serial womanizer. They confirmed this when the Democrats in the Senate declined to convict when he was impeached.
In contrast, George HW Bush ran on a platform of no new taxes, read my lips. When he did not live up to his campaign promises, he was not re-elected, because Republicans value truthfulness.
George W Bush never lied to the people; Republicans did not hold him accountable for erroneous information provided by the CIA and other intelligence services because there is a difference between knowingly repeating a lie and acting on facts provided by experts that are false. Democrats attempted to leverage Republican disapproval of liars by calling Bush a liar, but it didn't stick, particularly relative to John Kerry and Dan Rather.
Obama lied about there not being a health insurance mandate and about same sex marriages, but Democrats were OK with that because they knew he was lying. So they were not at all disappointed, with the refusal to defend the defense of marriage law, immigration law, or the fact that ObamaCare had
The trick that Trump picked up from Obama was to do what his followers wanted him to do even if it wasn't consistent with what he said. Regulations have been pared back, as promised, and illegal immigration has been throttled back.
In contrast, George HW Bush ran on a platform of no new taxes, read my lips. When he did not live up to his campaign promises, he was not re-elected, because Republicans value truthfulness.
George W Bush never lied to the people; Republicans did not hold him accountable for erroneous information provided by the CIA and other intelligence services because there is a difference between knowingly repeating a lie and acting on facts provided by experts that are false. Democrats attempted to leverage Republican disapproval of liars by calling Bush a liar, but it didn't stick, particularly relative to John Kerry and Dan Rather.
Obama lied about there not being a health insurance mandate and about same sex marriages, but Democrats were OK with that because they knew he was lying. So they were not at all disappointed, with the refusal to defend the defense of marriage law, immigration law, or the fact that ObamaCare had
The trick that Trump picked up from Obama was to do what his followers wanted him to do even if it wasn't consistent with what he said. Regulations have been pared back, as promised, and illegal immigration has been throttled back.
FISA authorized listening to people who were talking to trump's people.
close enough to what Trump said.
Th real fake (oops) is that the Russians elected Trump. Hillary Clinton elected Trump. and we have not even said thank you, perhaps her non-indictment is thanks enough, all she'll get though
I would have offered ambassadorship to Libya, she knows the terrain
close enough to what Trump said.
Th real fake (oops) is that the Russians elected Trump. Hillary Clinton elected Trump. and we have not even said thank you, perhaps her non-indictment is thanks enough, all she'll get though
I would have offered ambassadorship to Libya, she knows the terrain
Just because it's not what we thought it was, doesn't mean it's nothing at all. Religious conservatives use this argument all the time: if you don't get your morality from authority, than you just make up what you want. So do "original intent" scholars, ignoring or fudging many obvious questions. The problem is presenting it as you've got two choices "objective truth" or "nothing/anything."
The real issue to examine with Trump isn't so much how/why he gets away with lies. I think, rather, it's that lying itself is seen as an act of authenticity/truth telling. Regular politicians, so the theory seems to go, lie by misleading, but Trump lies flat out to our faces, so he's telling the truth! This doesn't strike me as a very logical position, but from an emotional standpoint (and after all, "I feel" now seems to be a synonym for "I think") it's understandable. Faced with a world where "reality TV" depicts fit young people getting voted off islands, movies are about super heroes and happy endings, and news events are centered around what the wealthy and celebrities do, Trump is an "honest liar" (sort of like being a "blue-collar billionaire.") If only it were just postmodern performance art, not the presidency.
The real issue to examine with Trump isn't so much how/why he gets away with lies. I think, rather, it's that lying itself is seen as an act of authenticity/truth telling. Regular politicians, so the theory seems to go, lie by misleading, but Trump lies flat out to our faces, so he's telling the truth! This doesn't strike me as a very logical position, but from an emotional standpoint (and after all, "I feel" now seems to be a synonym for "I think") it's understandable. Faced with a world where "reality TV" depicts fit young people getting voted off islands, movies are about super heroes and happy endings, and news events are centered around what the wealthy and celebrities do, Trump is an "honest liar" (sort of like being a "blue-collar billionaire.") If only it were just postmodern performance art, not the presidency.
No.
Philosophers think.
Philosophers think.
2
This Cliff Notes version of Philosophy is regrettable. Has Critchley farmed out editorial decisions about what to publish in this column to an assistant?
2
By this reasoning the Emperor may indeed be wearing a beautiful suit of clothing and we are all deluded when we think he is actually stark naked. The crowds at Trump's inauguration at the mall were larger than Obama's despite the photographic evidence and scientific theory is equal to religious doctrine, therefore the earth may be 4.5 billion years old or it may be 7000 years old. HOG WASH!
1
The Media has no one but itself to blame for the quagmire we find ourselves in. During the election, in an effort to appear non-biased, the media showed absolute cowardice in standing up to the lies being promulgated by the Trump campaign. In doing so it gave credibility to the constant wave of lies coming out of the mouths of Trump and his surrogates. The media would not even utter the word "lie." Trump didn't lie - he told untruths. I was happy to see the the New York Times was one of the first to stick its neck out and start calling out each lie for what it was.
But the pattern continues today. CNN is especially culpable in supporting Trump's "alternative facts." Unlike the NY Times, or MSNBC, CNN still gives a platform to Trump's surrogates to present their delusions as "opposing points of view." This is their standard format. In doing so they bring news to the level of Jerry Springer, and to the weak minded viewers (like Trump) who believe everything they see on television, cements these "alternate facts" as worthy of consideration.
We can argue about morality, cause and effects, philosophy. But to give voice to arguments about facts - that 2 equals 4 or that white is actually black, is an insult to our intelligence.
Everyone is entitled to an opinion. But regardless of whatever logical arguments you can come with, we know that the earth is not flat. Some points of view do not need to be heard.
But the pattern continues today. CNN is especially culpable in supporting Trump's "alternative facts." Unlike the NY Times, or MSNBC, CNN still gives a platform to Trump's surrogates to present their delusions as "opposing points of view." This is their standard format. In doing so they bring news to the level of Jerry Springer, and to the weak minded viewers (like Trump) who believe everything they see on television, cements these "alternate facts" as worthy of consideration.
We can argue about morality, cause and effects, philosophy. But to give voice to arguments about facts - that 2 equals 4 or that white is actually black, is an insult to our intelligence.
Everyone is entitled to an opinion. But regardless of whatever logical arguments you can come with, we know that the earth is not flat. Some points of view do not need to be heard.
2
The argument that President Trump is operating on some philosophical plane of relativism might make sense in an academic setting entirely cloistered from the real world. But we have some context here that cannot be ignored.
Donald Trump has said that his inauguration day crowd was larger than Barack Obama's 2008 gathering. He has said that his electoral college margin was historically large. No amount of philosophy can justify rewriting history and simple arithmetic.
So to ascribe Trump's alternative views of more complex subjects to some lofty philosophical basis is to ignore a reality on which we can all agree. This confusion emanating from the White House is not about how to define Truth. Rather it is entirely about having a relationship with the Truth that is casual or haphazard at best and expressly hostile at worst.
Philosophers can debate Truth. Blatant liars should not be afforded the same respect. To do so is intellectually dishonest and dangerous.
Donald Trump has said that his inauguration day crowd was larger than Barack Obama's 2008 gathering. He has said that his electoral college margin was historically large. No amount of philosophy can justify rewriting history and simple arithmetic.
So to ascribe Trump's alternative views of more complex subjects to some lofty philosophical basis is to ignore a reality on which we can all agree. This confusion emanating from the White House is not about how to define Truth. Rather it is entirely about having a relationship with the Truth that is casual or haphazard at best and expressly hostile at worst.
Philosophers can debate Truth. Blatant liars should not be afforded the same respect. To do so is intellectually dishonest and dangerous.
3
You know what they say about the Ph.D. 'You learn more and more about less and less until you know everything about nothing.'
2
Truth, facts, and reality are not identical things. The relationships between and among them are not the same for all people in all cases. But, the difficulty in ascertaining truth and reality does not mean there is no reality and does mean that there are no such things as lies.
Trump is not a critical thinker. He is not a philosopher and it is debatable if he has anything resembling a personal philosophy apart from narcissism and greed. He is a liar.
Trump is not a critical thinker. He is not a philosopher and it is debatable if he has anything resembling a personal philosophy apart from narcissism and greed. He is a liar.
4
Good grief, we have been using "truth" as a tool for years. What was the invading of Iraq about, for an especially unfortunate misuse of truth? America has been at war now since 2001, an impossibly long time to expect truth to be other than a shaping tool. The question is, how are we to get back to truthfulness?
7
Uh yep. He and the GOP have run with *postmodernism.*
Run amok!
Let's just hope he's not operating so fully in a parallel plane that he doesn't grasp the possible downsides and potentially catastrophic effects of nuclear war.
I for one am not convinced he does.
Run amok!
Let's just hope he's not operating so fully in a parallel plane that he doesn't grasp the possible downsides and potentially catastrophic effects of nuclear war.
I for one am not convinced he does.
8
I want to put a word in as someone with PhD in philosophy, but trained in a very different tradition to the one the author of this article alludes to (and, in fact, the one that many people in the United States regard as mainstream). I, and I suspect most academic philosophers in the United States, find it hard to even understand the idea that there isn't such a thing as truth (or "objective truth", if you prefer). In so far as I understand it, it seems dangerous for exactly the political reasons that the author of this article discusses in the first half.
I find it a little depressing that the author identifies those problems so well, but then suggests that the solution is just more critique. I don't see a path to anything helpful, if *all* we're doing is "questioning the Trumpian version of reality". Surely finding out what reality is actually like is going to be pretty important in part of achieving something worthwhile politically, isn't it?
I fully take the point that ideologies which serve the interests of the powerful have often masqueraded as neutral and objective when they were anything but (I think a good example is supply-side economics). But I think it is a fatal mistake to give up on the idea that there is, in fact, a way things are because of this. The solution, it seems to me, is rather to call out self-interest masquerading as objective theory when we see it, and demand good reasons to believe what we are asked to believe.
I find it a little depressing that the author identifies those problems so well, but then suggests that the solution is just more critique. I don't see a path to anything helpful, if *all* we're doing is "questioning the Trumpian version of reality". Surely finding out what reality is actually like is going to be pretty important in part of achieving something worthwhile politically, isn't it?
I fully take the point that ideologies which serve the interests of the powerful have often masqueraded as neutral and objective when they were anything but (I think a good example is supply-side economics). But I think it is a fatal mistake to give up on the idea that there is, in fact, a way things are because of this. The solution, it seems to me, is rather to call out self-interest masquerading as objective theory when we see it, and demand good reasons to believe what we are asked to believe.
27
"Truth is One and Eternal. Recognize this truth within."
A long time ago when I was in high school debate club we started our debates with a definition of terms. This ensured both sides would stick to debating the same issue within a framework of established facts.
To debate with a modern republican, t rump supporter is an exercise in futility.
It is common truth to them that Reagan shrank the size of government (he expanded it and the debt), that Hillary Clinton is a serial liar and works only for the good of the rich and powerful, and that Barack Obama was foreign.
Without the fear and hatred that stream out constantly from fox/limbaugh TV and radio republicans couldn't sell their governing philosophy to anyone outside of the koch bothers' compound.
A long time ago when I was in high school debate club we started our debates with a definition of terms. This ensured both sides would stick to debating the same issue within a framework of established facts.
To debate with a modern republican, t rump supporter is an exercise in futility.
It is common truth to them that Reagan shrank the size of government (he expanded it and the debt), that Hillary Clinton is a serial liar and works only for the good of the rich and powerful, and that Barack Obama was foreign.
Without the fear and hatred that stream out constantly from fox/limbaugh TV and radio republicans couldn't sell their governing philosophy to anyone outside of the koch bothers' compound.
15
Please, please, please do not accept this author's claim that the "tools of critique" here described are the "tools of philosophy". It is not a coincidence that the author is a student of literature rather than philosophy, and this sort of "critique" is not practiced at most of the highly regarded philosophy departments in the US and Britain. Just the opposite: philosophers have been in the forefront in rejecting this sort of methodology unreliable, subjective, and subject to preconceptions and biases.
Sometimes this split as it occurs within philosophy is referred to as the distinction between Analytic and Continental philosophy, although it would be unfair to ascribe these methods to everyone who self-identifies as a "Continental philosopher". Using terms in this way, most of philosophy done today in the US and Britain is Analytic. Those interested in this sort of "critique" are more comfortable in literature, English, or sociology.
Analytic philosophy is committed to truth and reason, not dismissive of them. Analytic philosophers are keenly aware of the fallibility of empirical evidence and of reasoning, and constantly on guard against overstating how securely a claim has been established. Analytic philosophers tend to be allied with scientists, and incorporate well-confirmed scientific results into their work. The tools of analytic philosophy cannot be used or adopted by the Trumps of the world. The fact that the tools of “critique” can be shows how useless they are.
Sometimes this split as it occurs within philosophy is referred to as the distinction between Analytic and Continental philosophy, although it would be unfair to ascribe these methods to everyone who self-identifies as a "Continental philosopher". Using terms in this way, most of philosophy done today in the US and Britain is Analytic. Those interested in this sort of "critique" are more comfortable in literature, English, or sociology.
Analytic philosophy is committed to truth and reason, not dismissive of them. Analytic philosophers are keenly aware of the fallibility of empirical evidence and of reasoning, and constantly on guard against overstating how securely a claim has been established. Analytic philosophers tend to be allied with scientists, and incorporate well-confirmed scientific results into their work. The tools of analytic philosophy cannot be used or adopted by the Trumps of the world. The fact that the tools of “critique” can be shows how useless they are.
52
"...there's no going back to the days when Americans agreed on matters of fact--when debates about policy were guided by a commitment to truth and reason."
Well that's depressing. The author's notion that we should accept the "post-truth" world we live in and regress to "critique" represents an intellectualization of stupidity that is dangerous and why we are in this mess in the first place.
This author seems to interpret Trump's presidency as a success and validation of critical theory when it should be interpreted as a marked FAILURE. A Trump presidency is exactly what happens when you abandon Truth, and it is baffling that the author of this article chooses to double down on critical theory rather than reject it.
Critical theory as this author portrays it irrelevant, miguided, armchair philosophy as its finest. When the author gets out of bed in the morning, does he/she question whether he is really awake? Whether he/she really needs to go into work that day because nothing is "real" or "true" anyway?
The validity of critical theory to the interpretation of literature is something I can't comment on, but when the author of this article wrongfully applies it to ontology and epistemology, it makes me shudder at the current state of academia in this country.
The world is real. Knowledge exists. Truth exists. Sometimes we don't know the truth and that's okay. To reject Truth because we sometimes don't know, however, is throwing the baby out with the bathwater.
Well that's depressing. The author's notion that we should accept the "post-truth" world we live in and regress to "critique" represents an intellectualization of stupidity that is dangerous and why we are in this mess in the first place.
This author seems to interpret Trump's presidency as a success and validation of critical theory when it should be interpreted as a marked FAILURE. A Trump presidency is exactly what happens when you abandon Truth, and it is baffling that the author of this article chooses to double down on critical theory rather than reject it.
Critical theory as this author portrays it irrelevant, miguided, armchair philosophy as its finest. When the author gets out of bed in the morning, does he/she question whether he is really awake? Whether he/she really needs to go into work that day because nothing is "real" or "true" anyway?
The validity of critical theory to the interpretation of literature is something I can't comment on, but when the author of this article wrongfully applies it to ontology and epistemology, it makes me shudder at the current state of academia in this country.
The world is real. Knowledge exists. Truth exists. Sometimes we don't know the truth and that's okay. To reject Truth because we sometimes don't know, however, is throwing the baby out with the bathwater.
18
As a literature professor, I can comment on the utter worthlessness of most critical theory in interpreting or finding meaning in literature. Applying Derrida and Foucault to literature is roughly equivalent to the 18th century practice of blood-letting to cure disease. If the works survive, it's not the fault of the doctors.
2
I'm sorry, but this is ridiculous.
It almost amounts to an accusation against relativism.
And blaming Trump's lies on it.
We may *only* have a *consensus* about climate change, but it's a consensus.
And that is *enough.*
We got to the moon on our *consensus* about gravity, already.
And yes, the moon shot *happened.*
It almost amounts to an accusation against relativism.
And blaming Trump's lies on it.
We may *only* have a *consensus* about climate change, but it's a consensus.
And that is *enough.*
We got to the moon on our *consensus* about gravity, already.
And yes, the moon shot *happened.*
9
Williams: "People who produce facts... rely on non-neutral methods (microscopes, cameras, eyeballs) and use non-neutral symbols (words, numbers, images) to communicate facts ..."
I searched Google books and cannot find any author making such a claim. Who, other than Williams, ever made such a claim?
Per Google searches for '"non-neutral methods" microscopes' and '"non-neutral symbols" words'
I searched Google books and cannot find any author making such a claim. Who, other than Williams, ever made such a claim?
Per Google searches for '"non-neutral methods" microscopes' and '"non-neutral symbols" words'
3
Microscopes, cameras, and eyes are not non-neutral methods, and words numbers, and images are not non-neutral symbols. They make up the critical tools of both science and philosophy.
The most important cultural contribution of the 20th century was the growth of science--quantum mechanics, relativity, molecular biology, organic chemistry, earth science. They have enabled scientists to explain and predict new subatomic particles, new elements, and new molecules.
Philosophical conceptions of truth are different from scientific, empirical, and practical ones. We should not let the ideas of thinkers, such as Nietzsche, Derrida, Foucault, or Thomas Kuhn confuse the idea of scientific philosophy and the advancement of science.
Nevertheless, these relativistic thinkers should not be blamed for the lies and deliberate falsehoods of President Trump. His inspiration was Josef Goebbels.
The most important cultural contribution of the 20th century was the growth of science--quantum mechanics, relativity, molecular biology, organic chemistry, earth science. They have enabled scientists to explain and predict new subatomic particles, new elements, and new molecules.
Philosophical conceptions of truth are different from scientific, empirical, and practical ones. We should not let the ideas of thinkers, such as Nietzsche, Derrida, Foucault, or Thomas Kuhn confuse the idea of scientific philosophy and the advancement of science.
Nevertheless, these relativistic thinkers should not be blamed for the lies and deliberate falsehoods of President Trump. His inspiration was Josef Goebbels.
28
"Science" also led to the holocaust: empirically categorizing people according to genre. The hijacking of all knowledge and understanding by the empirical sciences is still rampant, and we continue to suffer the consequences.
Science did not lead to the Holocaust. Science is a method of inquiry and a set of concepts, laws, and facts. It can be used for the benefit of mankind or its detriment--just like a can opener can be used to open a can or to gouge an eye.
The concept of race classifies people on the basis of gene frequencies for different characteristics. By classifying Jews as a race, the Nazis mischaracterized what is a religion. They also perverted other sciences so much that Germany, which was once the world's leader in physics, chemistry, and biology, still hasn't recovered.
Some philosophers and scientists claim that science can explain all objective phenomena, but that is false. Science cannot explain consciousness and many other important phenomena.
The concept of race classifies people on the basis of gene frequencies for different characteristics. By classifying Jews as a race, the Nazis mischaracterized what is a religion. They also perverted other sciences so much that Germany, which was once the world's leader in physics, chemistry, and biology, still hasn't recovered.
Some philosophers and scientists claim that science can explain all objective phenomena, but that is false. Science cannot explain consciousness and many other important phenomena.
Science led to theholocaust about as much as the gingerbread man did.
Stuff and nonsense.
Stuff and nonsense.
I don’t see the problem as one of unalloyed acceptance of a relativistic philosophy, but rather the failure of education to instill an appreciation of, and skill at, critical thinking.
Most of the tripe being blasted about, mainly from Trump and his brainless acolytes, would be seen as just that, tripe. However without a basis for applying critical thinking to any statement the under educated yahoos of American swallow tripe by the ton, every day.
Most of the tripe being blasted about, mainly from Trump and his brainless acolytes, would be seen as just that, tripe. However without a basis for applying critical thinking to any statement the under educated yahoos of American swallow tripe by the ton, every day.
21
I know many conservatives who think critical thinking is bunk (so no teaching that in their schools!) while accepting without question that gut feelings and so-called "common" sense are valid and all anyone needs for decision-making. Then their kids grow up and attend one of the many colleges requiring a course on the subject...makes for some lively family holidays afterward.
My philosophical credentials are virtually nonexistent, but I still feel entitled to say the philosophical approach is impractical and irrelevant. Of course no one can claim absolute certainty. We can still make our best guess, and operate on the basis of that guess. This is where the scientific method – hypothesize, test, repeat – differs from the Trump method: make up whatever is convenient, and when tested, repeat.
11
Your first sentence reveals why you erroneously employ the scientific method as a progenitor of truth.
This column was a waste of space.
It's time for Trump to be like Justinian and close down all these blowhard academies. They are a waste of societal resources. Time for these professors of hot air to earn a real living.
It's time for Trump to be like Justinian and close down all these blowhard academies. They are a waste of societal resources. Time for these professors of hot air to earn a real living.
2
Forget about Trump, who is a bad liar. I think every sociologist in this country should be focused on the best liar: Fox News, and what its campaign of disinformation has brought to this country.
9
This is Truth.
4
While there is a lot of interesting notions here, aside from the fact that any investigation of Trump's behavior must include his mental illness, let's not give him undeserved credit.
Tony Schwartz is the ghostwriter for Trump's book "Art of the Deal" and Mr. Schwartz is the originator of the phrase, "truthful hyperbole." Mr. Schwartz stated that Trump didn't read and possessed an extremely short attention span. More recently, Saturday Night Live players, Taran Killam and Pete Davidson said Trump struggled to read at the show's table reading when he appeared in 2016.
To give Trump credit for any sort of literacy or plan is folly. He is a mentally ill, illiterate bully and con artist.
Tony Schwartz is the ghostwriter for Trump's book "Art of the Deal" and Mr. Schwartz is the originator of the phrase, "truthful hyperbole." Mr. Schwartz stated that Trump didn't read and possessed an extremely short attention span. More recently, Saturday Night Live players, Taran Killam and Pete Davidson said Trump struggled to read at the show's table reading when he appeared in 2016.
To give Trump credit for any sort of literacy or plan is folly. He is a mentally ill, illiterate bully and con artist.
4
I'm not sure that there is much difference between the two versions of critique Williams describes: if making truth is an exercise in power, then "anything goes" — or anything "we" say goes — would seem to be an exercise in absolute power. It’s what I call postmodern with a vengeance.
Williams loses me when he argues not for an insistence on fact but for the continuing usefulness of critique. Notice how he frames the argument: an insistence on fact is turned into mere "blind faith in objectivity and factual truth alone." (With no appeal to values?) And that blind faith, Williams asserts, "has not proven to be a promising way forward." Not proven how? By whom? By what standards can we agree or disagree about that?
And if I doubt the reality of Donald Trump’s lost "great" America, it's not because of critique. It’s because I’m aware of too many elements in our history — call them facts — that contradict any simple claim to greatness.
Williams loses me when he argues not for an insistence on fact but for the continuing usefulness of critique. Notice how he frames the argument: an insistence on fact is turned into mere "blind faith in objectivity and factual truth alone." (With no appeal to values?) And that blind faith, Williams asserts, "has not proven to be a promising way forward." Not proven how? By whom? By what standards can we agree or disagree about that?
And if I doubt the reality of Donald Trump’s lost "great" America, it's not because of critique. It’s because I’m aware of too many elements in our history — call them facts — that contradict any simple claim to greatness.
5
Of course knowledge is socially constructed, and always tentative: we advance knowledge when new factual data is evaluated, and as such, all scientific 'laws" are open to improvements. However, it's silly to suggest that a statement can be presented as factual knowledge or contain "alternative facts" when there is NO empirical data to support it at all. There should be no confusion about this: ALL knowledge creation requires at least SOME empirical data to support a truth claim: when there is no data at all, there is no knowledge at all: there is only fantasy.
8
Science was corrupted by corporate financing and expectations. Same with medicine. Philosophy is a big competition between blowhards signifying mostly nothing. Wonder why there are so few female philosophers? That's because there's only one female philosophy, Life. For every man there's another philosophy, another religion, another god.
Time for a switch?
Time for a switch?
3
"Call it what you want: relativism, constructivism, deconstruction, postmodernism, critique. "
Alan Sokal demonstrated the fundamental problem 20 years ago in his mock deconstructionist physics article. I do think universities should have some room, among other things, for detailed abstractionism. It's good for civilizational memory for people to know that once upon a time there was a struggle between homoiousian and homoousian schools, or as Gibbon said, a battle over a dipthong. And it is good to have a few Latinists around who know their late Roman empire. And if that's so, why not a few homoousians and homoiousians of our own? For that's what postmodernists, deconstructionists, etc. are.
But can it go too far? Leftie critiques of euro-centric literature have, in an unlikely parallelism with right wing attacks on universities as a whole, succeeded beyond all expectations. Instruction in French, English, Russian, Italian, German literature, music, and theater has been gutted, and where it has not been gutted, it is in grave danger.
Alan Sokal demonstrated the fundamental problem 20 years ago in his mock deconstructionist physics article. I do think universities should have some room, among other things, for detailed abstractionism. It's good for civilizational memory for people to know that once upon a time there was a struggle between homoiousian and homoousian schools, or as Gibbon said, a battle over a dipthong. And it is good to have a few Latinists around who know their late Roman empire. And if that's so, why not a few homoousians and homoiousians of our own? For that's what postmodernists, deconstructionists, etc. are.
But can it go too far? Leftie critiques of euro-centric literature have, in an unlikely parallelism with right wing attacks on universities as a whole, succeeded beyond all expectations. Instruction in French, English, Russian, Italian, German literature, music, and theater has been gutted, and where it has not been gutted, it is in grave danger.
8
Trump is the modern philosopher king.
Marcus Aurelius' Meditations have been replaced by The Art of the Deal.
Marcus Aurelius' Meditations have been replaced by The Art of the Deal.
2
To me, at least, this is a problem similar in theory to what you see with the popularization of quantum physics.
Critical philosophy, like quantum physics is very useful for certain very specific academic situations. However, for the normal everyday person, it usually isn't relevant and very easy to get wrong.
With quantum physics you get "What the bleep do we know" and "we create our reality".
With critical philosophy you get "nothing is true".
In both cases these are taken out of context. For the normal person gravity works just fine and truth exists.
Critical philosophy, like quantum physics is very useful for certain very specific academic situations. However, for the normal everyday person, it usually isn't relevant and very easy to get wrong.
With quantum physics you get "What the bleep do we know" and "we create our reality".
With critical philosophy you get "nothing is true".
In both cases these are taken out of context. For the normal person gravity works just fine and truth exists.
7
What "popularization of quantum physics" says '"What the bleep do we know" and "we create our reality"'?
BTW, with quantum physics you get semiconductors and lasers.
BTW, with quantum physics you get semiconductors and lasers.
Now we are driven to intellectualzing absurdity. Now we are driven to rationalzing reality in our desperate attempt to make sense of Trump. I do it too. How else can we keep a modicum a sanity while he is in charge of our world. Sigh...
7
Not being a student of philosophy, I found the article intellectually fascinating, but an affront to basically honest people who reject Trump's lies. I understand that it may be impossible, or at least scientifically rigorous, to ascertain the absolute truth of a factual assertion. However, intellectual honesty necessitates debate, inquiry, scientific method, the offering and accepting of criticism. Asserting the truth of a fact should be the result of a procedure. Trump's lies are unrelated to a honest search for truth; they are an assertion of power. Even if accepted as "truth" by his faithful, Trump enforces his dictates by stifling disciplined inquiry. Global warming as a scientific subject is banned from EPA websites. Funding is cut for research and programs. Trump's substitute for fact is power. He understands that he won because his party controls the polling places, and thus the source of his power enables him to assert his goals as fact. This exercise of power does not make Trump's lies a mere version of the truth. He does not make his lies true by repeating them.
It will not take the facts or truth to defeat Trump and his lies. It will be retaliatory power: the power of resistance, protest, voter organizing, and staying in the liar's face.
It will not take the facts or truth to defeat Trump and his lies. It will be retaliatory power: the power of resistance, protest, voter organizing, and staying in the liar's face.
199
Amen, to that! Thanks!
1
"He understands that he won because his party controls the polling places,"
And his party, while controlling the polling places, gave three million more votes to Hillary than to Trump? Give me a break!
The main difference between lies BY Trump and lies ABOUT Trump is that the latter are socially acceptable.
And socially acceptable lies are far more dangerous because more people will believe them.
And his party, while controlling the polling places, gave three million more votes to Hillary than to Trump? Give me a break!
The main difference between lies BY Trump and lies ABOUT Trump is that the latter are socially acceptable.
And socially acceptable lies are far more dangerous because more people will believe them.
What I meant by " controlling the polling places", and poorly worded, was gerrymandered the districts, compounded the the reality that democratic voters are concentrated in urban areas.
"...there is no such thing as natural, unmediated, unbiased access to truth...
"...that we are always prisoners of language...
Only totalitarianistas could think like this - or link thoughts like these
Just look
> Up - at the stars
> Around - at nature's wonders
> Into - the eyes of a beautiful baby (for clarity, all babies are beautiful)
.............................................
The Indians (aka Native Americans) were free - until they were made "prisoners" by $24 and some beads
Except - They weren't prisoners of language
They were prisoners of superior firepower
Just look
At - the projectile staring back at you, from any gun ever pointed in your direction
If that isn't a moment of clarity and truth for you - I don't know what would be.
.............................................
Krugman and his cabal have made a handsome living from leveraging the "truth" in the epithet...;
"...Lies, Damned Lies, and Statistics...
Trump has riffed on - and superceded and surpassed - and upped the game...As in:
"Lies, Damend Lies, and Metaphors...
I always know when Trump is speaking metaphorically
It's when his lips are moving
For clarity - I like him now, even more than I did on Nov 8th
But, am assuming he revisits and does right by ObamaCaRepeal
For clarity - I don't care if he replaces it
I don't get any of the free stuff
I only get to pay for other people's free stuff
Never realized that the truth - and totalitarianism - could be so complicated
"...that we are always prisoners of language...
Only totalitarianistas could think like this - or link thoughts like these
Just look
> Up - at the stars
> Around - at nature's wonders
> Into - the eyes of a beautiful baby (for clarity, all babies are beautiful)
.............................................
The Indians (aka Native Americans) were free - until they were made "prisoners" by $24 and some beads
Except - They weren't prisoners of language
They were prisoners of superior firepower
Just look
At - the projectile staring back at you, from any gun ever pointed in your direction
If that isn't a moment of clarity and truth for you - I don't know what would be.
.............................................
Krugman and his cabal have made a handsome living from leveraging the "truth" in the epithet...;
"...Lies, Damned Lies, and Statistics...
Trump has riffed on - and superceded and surpassed - and upped the game...As in:
"Lies, Damend Lies, and Metaphors...
I always know when Trump is speaking metaphorically
It's when his lips are moving
For clarity - I like him now, even more than I did on Nov 8th
But, am assuming he revisits and does right by ObamaCaRepeal
For clarity - I don't care if he replaces it
I don't get any of the free stuff
I only get to pay for other people's free stuff
Never realized that the truth - and totalitarianism - could be so complicated
1
What do you expect from a reborn neocon? Now read Bill Kristol on Russia - no different than any run-of-the-mill liberal interventionist journalist.
1
So much gobblely gook!
Morality, scientific progress, and civilization itself are based on truth. Maybe not on Truth, but on truth which is verifiable and which conforms with observation, experience, and common sense.
Of course, America is a free country and anyone (including Trump and his cronies) may look outside through a window and declare that it is night---- but if the sun is shining, it IS daytime.
Morality, scientific progress, and civilization itself are based on truth. Maybe not on Truth, but on truth which is verifiable and which conforms with observation, experience, and common sense.
Of course, America is a free country and anyone (including Trump and his cronies) may look outside through a window and declare that it is night---- but if the sun is shining, it IS daytime.
3
All those big words! It is really quite simple. Truth is whatever the bully says it is and the rest of you little kids shut up. If he say it's red, it's red. Wanna get your face bashed in? He's bigger than you!
2
This is a profoundly irresponsible piece.
4
Please Larry publish your Trump poetry collection
1
The Greeks would call this "sophistry". It sounds meaningful, but it has no logical substance at all. Gravity provides weight. Light illuminates. CO2 absorbs heat. Apparently phd scholars never tire of debating angels on pins. The rest of us need to move on. We don't need epistomology to appreciate our peril: A lie is a lie. Call it out confidently and loudly.
380
Hey, don't overlook that the question of angels dancing on the head of pin leads to recognition of the primacy of definitions. If "dancing' is simply bouncing up and down rhythmically, then the answer is an infinity of these unextended presences, of course. But if "dancing" must include some swinging side to side...well then, you got me.
1
Sometime last year we were watching a mild sci-fi TV show - something to do with time travel and the Vietnam war era - when a character mentioned that president Johnson had shown his penis on national TV. I was no fan of Johnson but was shocked both at the slur and inaccuracy. I recalled that there was an incident where Johnson had distastefully displayed a recent surgical scar.
I am struck by the vast powers of the media to pass along misinformation so casually and carelessly. It seems we've entered a "post truth" era by populist notions that facts are intangible and in cyberspace no one can hear you scream.
I am struck by the vast powers of the media to pass along misinformation so casually and carelessly. It seems we've entered a "post truth" era by populist notions that facts are intangible and in cyberspace no one can hear you scream.
1
Discovering the social construction of reality is one of the great rites of passage any college student should have the pleasure of experiencing. It is somewhat akin to having your whole world turned upside down, shaken violently, and poured at your feet. Exactly what education should be about. College should never be a safe space for the minds of young thinkers.
But once you come face to face with the reality that we can never know “truth,” you have a choice. You can either slip into the kind of nihilism and relativism bemoaned by Mr. Williams, and throw the idea of truth out the window, or you can explore further and ask if minds greater than yours might have struggled with this apparent dilemma, and offered some kind of escape from its bleak prognosis.
I find it shocking that one can write an essay on this topic and get it published in the NYT without mentioning Karl Popper and the legacy of falsificationism. Although the complications and revisions go on and on, every undergraduate should understand the basic principle: science can never determine if a statement or theory is unequivocally true, but it can determine if it is false.
Republicans’ mortal sin is their rejection of science. By denying science they have tried to replace to search for truth with the quest for power. Trump is just a symptom of this intellectual failure. Once government is unhinged from reality, there is no check on the path toward authoritarianism -- other than the ballot box.
But once you come face to face with the reality that we can never know “truth,” you have a choice. You can either slip into the kind of nihilism and relativism bemoaned by Mr. Williams, and throw the idea of truth out the window, or you can explore further and ask if minds greater than yours might have struggled with this apparent dilemma, and offered some kind of escape from its bleak prognosis.
I find it shocking that one can write an essay on this topic and get it published in the NYT without mentioning Karl Popper and the legacy of falsificationism. Although the complications and revisions go on and on, every undergraduate should understand the basic principle: science can never determine if a statement or theory is unequivocally true, but it can determine if it is false.
Republicans’ mortal sin is their rejection of science. By denying science they have tried to replace to search for truth with the quest for power. Trump is just a symptom of this intellectual failure. Once government is unhinged from reality, there is no check on the path toward authoritarianism -- other than the ballot box.
7
Two words dispense with this op-ed: "Sokol Hoax."
A robust rebuttal to postmodern/"post-truth" drivel:
https://integrallife.com/trump-post-truth-world/
https://integrallife.com/trump-post-truth-world/
2
You say: "We can ask not whether a statement is true or false, but how and why it was made and what effects it produces when people feel it to be true."
Let's consider that. I'm all for paying attention to how knowledge is created and used. We should ask "Who profits?" as we have for millennia.
But are we not all us swimming together in the same uncertain stream of life regarding all these questions? How is it that none of us can achieve certainty as to the truth of what we normally consider matters of fact but some of us can make sure pronouncements regarding purpose, effect, and accompanying moral judgments?
We can try to do our best. The assault by Trump and others on a matter such as climate science is more brazen and broad-based than the norm, but it's not directed towards convincing scientists to doubt scientific methods. Speaking as to its purpose, it seems pretty clear that the idea is to create doubt in the minds of voters and policy makers about the fruits of some scientific inquiry.
I myself doubt what some scientists at some times have had to say about matters such as diet or genetics as applied to policy or common practice. I don't see that as a reason to stop the scientific inquiry but I'll agree we should keep purpose and effect in mind.
And I think we must address climate change.
Let's consider that. I'm all for paying attention to how knowledge is created and used. We should ask "Who profits?" as we have for millennia.
But are we not all us swimming together in the same uncertain stream of life regarding all these questions? How is it that none of us can achieve certainty as to the truth of what we normally consider matters of fact but some of us can make sure pronouncements regarding purpose, effect, and accompanying moral judgments?
We can try to do our best. The assault by Trump and others on a matter such as climate science is more brazen and broad-based than the norm, but it's not directed towards convincing scientists to doubt scientific methods. Speaking as to its purpose, it seems pretty clear that the idea is to create doubt in the minds of voters and policy makers about the fruits of some scientific inquiry.
I myself doubt what some scientists at some times have had to say about matters such as diet or genetics as applied to policy or common practice. I don't see that as a reason to stop the scientific inquiry but I'll agree we should keep purpose and effect in mind.
And I think we must address climate change.
Ain't that the troot.
1
The context of this is America’s anti-intellectualism. And the root of America’s anti-intellectualism is America’s foundational Puritanism. And the seed of that Puritanism is Christianity’s insistence on innocence over knowledge, worship over discovery, and faith over fact, starting right off with the forbidden apple. From the very start America has been a divided nation, shifting back and forth between the secular Enlightenment of its Founding Fathers and the theocratic fundamentalism of its Mayflower Puritans. That conflict of church and state has never been resolved, and we see it playing out again today in the war against facts that is really a war against existence itself. When the universe itself is nothing more than a battleground between “Go to heaven” and “Go to hell” there is no value in it, and so every fact in the universe has no value either. The result is that critical thinking erodes and medieval thinking rises.
And all of this occurs against the backdrop of catastrophic climate change.
Extra! Extra! Right around the next turn or two of history is a new Dark Ages.
Unless we start thinking critically now.
And all of this occurs against the backdrop of catastrophic climate change.
Extra! Extra! Right around the next turn or two of history is a new Dark Ages.
Unless we start thinking critically now.
5
I should apologize for this cheap shot ad hominem, though probably nearly sincere.
Our semi beloved POTUS decimates if not arbitrarily redefines "applicable clichés." "facts," "truths," "normalcy," "sanity," "adaption," "absurdity,"
"goodness," and "progress."
Arrogant "naked king," big time.
Convicted admirers luv the redundant repetitious rhetoric nevertheless.
Breaker of customs, taboos, traditions.
Demagogue's demagogue.
Meaning if not concept of "verity" is POTUS' most dizzy victim.
Our leader is shrewd dunce, as Tip O'Neil doesn't imply.
Perfectionist of disingenuousness.
Sicko comedian.
Semi-slick con artist.
Action comic hero self-debunks.
Our semi beloved POTUS decimates if not arbitrarily redefines "applicable clichés." "facts," "truths," "normalcy," "sanity," "adaption," "absurdity,"
"goodness," and "progress."
Arrogant "naked king," big time.
Convicted admirers luv the redundant repetitious rhetoric nevertheless.
Breaker of customs, taboos, traditions.
Demagogue's demagogue.
Meaning if not concept of "verity" is POTUS' most dizzy victim.
Our leader is shrewd dunce, as Tip O'Neil doesn't imply.
Perfectionist of disingenuousness.
Sicko comedian.
Semi-slick con artist.
Action comic hero self-debunks.
1
As an alternative to this intellectual mush, read Richard Friedman's column in today's Times about the beauty of mathematics.
1
As Carl Schmitt put, this is Truth's revenge
1
Oh, please. You give Trump WAY too much credit. He is not some evil genius manipulating reality. Let's call him what he is--a thug, a hustler, a con-man pulling off "the long con." He has some low-level instincts for deception and survival, but he is certainly not an intelligent man. Not only is he ignorant, he is AGGRESSIVELY ignorant. He knows nothing, and he doesn't WANT to know anything. Forget his tax returns. I want to see his transcript from The Wharton School. It astonishes me how someone so blindingly STUPID ever made it through college. And it terrifies me that 60 million Americans fell for his lies. #NotMyPresident #RESIST #ImpeachTrumpNOW
5
Once upon a time, when I was young, a million years ago it seems, we would point a finger into the chest of a liar, and say "you my friend are a liar", walk away, and everyone would ignore him. His lies evaporated harmlessly. We weren't educated, upper class, refined, or of a particular political inclination.
Folks were just sensible, and civil. Perhaps there were sufficient numbers of us. Of course that was before mindless TV.
Folks were just sensible, and civil. Perhaps there were sufficient numbers of us. Of course that was before mindless TV.
140
Not to mention mindless ersatz emperors with IQs lower than their age.
2
This discussion goes off the rails when we accept the binary premise that assertions about our shared world are either true or false. The base question is whether there is an objective reality. If there is not, we are lost in the swamp. If there is, we should keep striving to understand it, while recognizing that we have imperfect tools for doing so and that different perspectives will yield different observations.
3
A disappointment of an Op-Ed, to be sure - because it lacks the ACTIONABLE. The real question for everyone who already knew this information relates to the motivation for distorting reality into alternative facts.
We do not live in a vacuum, so it does not really follow that people just make up alternative facts and realities. They do so BECAUSE THEY NEED TO.
So, the real question is not "how" people distort reality, or that they are doing it with regards to Trump, the real question is "why".
When we focus on the why, we get nearer to a solution.
We do not live in a vacuum, so it does not really follow that people just make up alternative facts and realities. They do so BECAUSE THEY NEED TO.
So, the real question is not "how" people distort reality, or that they are doing it with regards to Trump, the real question is "why".
When we focus on the why, we get nearer to a solution.
1
Better to reframe the things Trump comes out with as negotiating positions rather than attempts to get at the truth. He doesn't want to reason his way through to the best policy. He wants to manipulate the conversation towards whatever advantage he hopes to take. The ideas of "true" or "false" just don't apply. It won't end well, because the truth has teeth!
1
"We can never have certain knowledge about the world in its entirety. These ideas (have) become axiomatic for many scholars in literary studies, cultural anthropology and sociology."
So Heisenberg's Uncertainty about absolute knowledge in particle physics has this corollary in philosophy? But Werner also understood that a provable limit to absolute knowledge did not mean that no truth is knowable, that no science is true. He saw the underlying oxymoron: Any 'expert' who claims there is no truth, that facts do not matter, that there are only situations, not certainties, must be wrong in order to be right. It cannot be true that there is no truth. T does not equal Not T.
Our knowledge is not perfect. Yet we live in a world of science and technology, proof that our limited facts and truth are valid. The old joke has the mathematician explaining that his friend can get ever closer to the girl, but never actually touch, to which the young engineer replies, "Don't worry, I'll get plenty close enough!"
And that's the truth.
So Heisenberg's Uncertainty about absolute knowledge in particle physics has this corollary in philosophy? But Werner also understood that a provable limit to absolute knowledge did not mean that no truth is knowable, that no science is true. He saw the underlying oxymoron: Any 'expert' who claims there is no truth, that facts do not matter, that there are only situations, not certainties, must be wrong in order to be right. It cannot be true that there is no truth. T does not equal Not T.
Our knowledge is not perfect. Yet we live in a world of science and technology, proof that our limited facts and truth are valid. The old joke has the mathematician explaining that his friend can get ever closer to the girl, but never actually touch, to which the young engineer replies, "Don't worry, I'll get plenty close enough!"
And that's the truth.
2
The views presented in this piece are pretty trendy in some parts of academia. But they sure are not useful. There is plenty of knowledge of our world out there, and it is not really that hard to obtain. And it is very useful for running our world and improving it. This is niche thinking which, thank God, few people ascribe to.
The article tries to have it both ways. Which can work for purely academic rhetoric. Check the quote from the darling of recent postmodernists, Bruno Latour: he says there is no such thing as truth, then mentions "hard-won evidence that could saver our lives." Rather than postmodern academic philosophies, there are some critiques that actually do a lot of good, like: 1. Good science, which is about the most rigorous critiquing of any new claims. 2. Good ventures in profit or nonprofit businesses, which is about going out to try ideas, being critiqued by failing.
I would not go to politicians or academic rhetoricians for truth. I'd go to those who put skin in the game and test their claims in the world.
I would not go to politicians or academic rhetoricians for truth. I'd go to those who put skin in the game and test their claims in the world.
Provocative and well-intended, the argument that relativism paved the way to Trump's fabrications is nevertheless itself only a half truth. The other part or parts are related to or derived from what Kenneth Burke called "the bureaucratization of the imagination." Trump is a different matter altogether.
Sure, truth is a creation and, while probabilistic, should be authoritative. That it retains "uncertainty" is simply a way of saying it's open to revision. Those in quest of certainty are not doing science, nor philosophy. But in the hands (heads) of at least some, who call themselves intellectuals, the imagination is a weapon and hence power. Note that power is decidedly not synonymous with authority. In the bureaucracies we call universities those who latched onto Pomo, deconstruction, etc., were not particularly philosophical, some even declared they didn't need to be philosophical and declared philosophy dead. They were (are) seeking or attempting to exercise power.
In short, critical theory, Pomo, deconstruction can all be seen as bureaucratic infighting. It has amounted to mostly a way of getting tenure by being clever and, it being mostly an affliction of the humanities, getting tenure early, like they do in the sciences, thus showing that C P Snow's distinction between "two cultures" in academia is alive and well. Don't get caught up in it.
Note: I'm stereotyping--to convey my own half-truth.
Sure, truth is a creation and, while probabilistic, should be authoritative. That it retains "uncertainty" is simply a way of saying it's open to revision. Those in quest of certainty are not doing science, nor philosophy. But in the hands (heads) of at least some, who call themselves intellectuals, the imagination is a weapon and hence power. Note that power is decidedly not synonymous with authority. In the bureaucracies we call universities those who latched onto Pomo, deconstruction, etc., were not particularly philosophical, some even declared they didn't need to be philosophical and declared philosophy dead. They were (are) seeking or attempting to exercise power.
In short, critical theory, Pomo, deconstruction can all be seen as bureaucratic infighting. It has amounted to mostly a way of getting tenure by being clever and, it being mostly an affliction of the humanities, getting tenure early, like they do in the sciences, thus showing that C P Snow's distinction between "two cultures" in academia is alive and well. Don't get caught up in it.
Note: I'm stereotyping--to convey my own half-truth.
1
Thank you, Casey, for finally addressing something that has been bothering me as the Trump "alternative facts" phenomenon began: how is it possible to fully fight back as long as some aspects of post-modernism seem valid? No one has wanted to go there. A strict duality between liars versus fact and data-based truth-tellers seemed so much a better and easier way to frame this.
Discounting the easier parts that get caricatured, post-modernism has value. Some certain, "objective" "facts," like only two genders, take centuries to get corrected (remember Kuhn?), some scientists do inject their own views into interpretation and policy (I'm wrestling with when this actually can be appropriate), we've seen scandals of supposedly standard-setting scientific journals falling for gibberish submissions. I've discovered confirmation bias is so powerful that it's hard for anyone to resist.
Post-modernism can be uncomfortable, but if scientists are to be true to their espoused values (while updating a few subject to a good debate), they should be open to discerning the good parts. If so, we would have no better weapon to actual understanding.
Come the "Scientists' Climate March," and those to come, it would be nice to be armed both with the facts, which they already have, as well as post-modernism-influenced "facts."
We need to build on what Casey offers. Sounds like we need a critical theory of critical theory.
Discounting the easier parts that get caricatured, post-modernism has value. Some certain, "objective" "facts," like only two genders, take centuries to get corrected (remember Kuhn?), some scientists do inject their own views into interpretation and policy (I'm wrestling with when this actually can be appropriate), we've seen scandals of supposedly standard-setting scientific journals falling for gibberish submissions. I've discovered confirmation bias is so powerful that it's hard for anyone to resist.
Post-modernism can be uncomfortable, but if scientists are to be true to their espoused values (while updating a few subject to a good debate), they should be open to discerning the good parts. If so, we would have no better weapon to actual understanding.
Come the "Scientists' Climate March," and those to come, it would be nice to be armed both with the facts, which they already have, as well as post-modernism-influenced "facts."
We need to build on what Casey offers. Sounds like we need a critical theory of critical theory.
2
The supposed harm a purely relativistic conception of truth has on politics and science in society? The relativistic view that there is no absolute truth, that all is narrative, interpretation and which is the view which is typically associated with philosophers such as Derrida and Foucault (whether rightly or wrongly) not to mention is summed up by the term "postmodernism"?
Let me state flat out I think it is entirely nonsense such a view could be harmful to society. It is precisely such a strategy which calls into question truth in society and drives the pursuit of further truth. It is a deliberate destabilizing strategy to create a stronger foundation of truth and goes hand in hand with scientific methodology. Any dunce should be able to observe that if a person puts a coin under one of three cups and rapidly mixes them the result is uncertainty on part of spectator (confusion, relativism sets in). So what does that force in the spectator? Increased method of clarity.
I very rarely hear scientists, logicians, those steeped in the intellectual life objecting to relativistic views of truth. People such as that agree, according to science, logic, truth is provisional. The objections I do hear to relativistic views of truth come, from, no surprise, the political, religious quarter of life where whether out of benevolence or far more likely typical human evil, power grasp it is essential to prop up a particular reality in the masses so they can be manipulated, controlled.
Let me state flat out I think it is entirely nonsense such a view could be harmful to society. It is precisely such a strategy which calls into question truth in society and drives the pursuit of further truth. It is a deliberate destabilizing strategy to create a stronger foundation of truth and goes hand in hand with scientific methodology. Any dunce should be able to observe that if a person puts a coin under one of three cups and rapidly mixes them the result is uncertainty on part of spectator (confusion, relativism sets in). So what does that force in the spectator? Increased method of clarity.
I very rarely hear scientists, logicians, those steeped in the intellectual life objecting to relativistic views of truth. People such as that agree, according to science, logic, truth is provisional. The objections I do hear to relativistic views of truth come, from, no surprise, the political, religious quarter of life where whether out of benevolence or far more likely typical human evil, power grasp it is essential to prop up a particular reality in the masses so they can be manipulated, controlled.
3
Critical theory has value as a tool for developing critical thinking and questioning of "common sense". It has no value when its epistemological claims are taken as ontological statements. In other words, there is a difference between saying we don't (yet) know what the truth is and saying that the truth does not exist. I admire Foucault but I part ways with his followers where science is concerned. Science has - or should have - absolute authority in a modern society. The fact that science constantly adjusts or questions its own findings is precisely the guarantee of its truthfulness. As opposed to ideology or religion, science has in-built self-correcting mechanisms. And Its involvement with Eurocentrism, imperialism or capitalism does not invalidate its theories. Evolution is true, regardless of Darwin's putative racism. Quantum theory is the best approximation of what the universe actually is, even if it was developed by white males. Critical theory should divest itself of its association with social justice; only then will it become philosophically respectable.
In his own bumbling way, Trump, has turned attention to that difficult understanding that the truth is made, not discovered. Richard Rorty, I think does it best, with his distinction between metaphysicians and ironists---with metaphysicians--the Kantians amongst us---always attempting to rationalize their final vocabularies while ironists are always skeptical of the final vocabularies they have inherited. But these academic arguments really miss the point---again, referencing Rorty and Nietzsche, what draws people to Trump is the story, the narrative, he developed during the campaign which resonated with the dispossessed in our country. Sec. Clinton's weak response was to go academic--question the evidence within Trump's story of the forgotten man and women in our country. Yes, evidence is crucial when sending a rocket to the moon, but becomes irrelevant when authoring a bestselling novel.
1
I think the problem here is more the distain for experts, knowledge and even people who read.
I am now 63. I worked as a laborer with bricklayers the summer before my freshman year in college (I know years ago, but...) Far from being supportive or happy for me and my future, the bricklayers were amazingly derisive and had nothing but scorn for me, my future and college or anything about higher education or even learning in general. This was an eyeopener for me and that underlying sentiment has not changed.
I am now 63. I worked as a laborer with bricklayers the summer before my freshman year in college (I know years ago, but...) Far from being supportive or happy for me and my future, the bricklayers were amazingly derisive and had nothing but scorn for me, my future and college or anything about higher education or even learning in general. This was an eyeopener for me and that underlying sentiment has not changed.
3
Nice try--but no serious student or practitioner of philosophy has ever condoned lying, particularly when it is used routinely and often for personal gain. And "truth," while in some respects difficult to pin down, is often plain to see. That Mr. Trump has failed to divulge his financial status through tax returns, for example. That Mr. Trump failed to gain a majority of votes cast in the November election. That Mr. Trump has, in fact, made statements that are quite far from demonstrable truth to attack others, to evade responsibility, and to becloud issues as though truth were the elusive, squirrelly thing you describe.
The "fact" that the facts constituting truth may sometimes be hard to pin down does not in the slightest condone lying, evasiveness, and false dealing in human affairs. That our novice president, and many members of his cabinet and close advisors, twist and distort fairly simple truths does not mean that they are practising or exploiting a type of philosophic inquiry. They are lying, pure and simple, and no backward look at modern philosophic trends can change that.
The "fact" that the facts constituting truth may sometimes be hard to pin down does not in the slightest condone lying, evasiveness, and false dealing in human affairs. That our novice president, and many members of his cabinet and close advisors, twist and distort fairly simple truths does not mean that they are practising or exploiting a type of philosophic inquiry. They are lying, pure and simple, and no backward look at modern philosophic trends can change that.
4
There are school districts that prohibit the teaching of critical thinking. Absent critical thinking it is not possible to distinguish fact from fiction. Not everyone is comfortable with a method of determining truth on a provisional basis by formulating falsifiable hypotheses and having them tested by experiments and measurable observations.
Are some voters too gullible, substituting their wishes for reality? Absent critical thinking, probably, and in frighteningly large numbers. This does not bode well for our country.
Are some voters too gullible, substituting their wishes for reality? Absent critical thinking, probably, and in frighteningly large numbers. This does not bode well for our country.
2
It is fine to argue about the modern equivalent of how many angels can dance on the head of a pin, but in the real world, things have to get done. That can be accomplished in one of two ways: If you have sufficient power you can force your ideas upon others. Lacking that, you must reason with others and compromise. In order to reason with others you must agree on the problem to be solved, which in turn requires a common understanding of these inconvenient "Facts."
As Trump is finding out, if everyone sticks to their version of the "Truth" and labels the other's as "Fake News," nothing gets done. Important things like Heath Care Reform blow up in your face, or as the Democrats found out, living in your own bubble leads to losing the election. In the real world, facts matter. The Truth will out.
As Trump is finding out, if everyone sticks to their version of the "Truth" and labels the other's as "Fake News," nothing gets done. Important things like Heath Care Reform blow up in your face, or as the Democrats found out, living in your own bubble leads to losing the election. In the real world, facts matter. The Truth will out.
1
"This is because critical ways of thinking demand that we approach knowledge with attention and humility and recognize that, while facts might be created, not all facts are created equal."
That truth is relative is a dangerous concept exploited primarily by the GOP and their minions in order to marshal power in their favor. Is it not interesting that major supporters of the GOP are fundamental and evangelical christians who rely on their supposedly absolute rendering of Biblical verses to justify, well, any belief they may have.
I would suggest that their is another way to consider 'truth' and that is that Truth evolves as we evolve and if our innate 'feeling for the Truth' has been compromised or not nurtured, we live in fear and are thus easily manipulated by miscreants such as the 45th POTUS.
The media in all its postmodern permutations has a lot to do with this devaluing of our feeling for the Truth. Unless or until we regenerate this feeling and learn for the first time or again how to discriminate the essential from the non-essential, we're descent into illiberalism will continue.
That truth is relative is a dangerous concept exploited primarily by the GOP and their minions in order to marshal power in their favor. Is it not interesting that major supporters of the GOP are fundamental and evangelical christians who rely on their supposedly absolute rendering of Biblical verses to justify, well, any belief they may have.
I would suggest that their is another way to consider 'truth' and that is that Truth evolves as we evolve and if our innate 'feeling for the Truth' has been compromised or not nurtured, we live in fear and are thus easily manipulated by miscreants such as the 45th POTUS.
The media in all its postmodern permutations has a lot to do with this devaluing of our feeling for the Truth. Unless or until we regenerate this feeling and learn for the first time or again how to discriminate the essential from the non-essential, we're descent into illiberalism will continue.
1
If one is honest truth is not a mystery.
Trump has been a known liar and prevaricator for decades.
The attack on reason being decried this year began during the Nixon Admin and as it worked using the same tactics we decried our enemies for using on their people. You can see it working in the shifting downward of the cultural and moral standards for behavior we used to apply for ourselves and our public servants. It went full court [press with the election of reagan in November 1979 and has been going downward ever faster like the swirling of water circling a drain.
There is no mystery only deception and wilful lies which honesty can easily pierce.
Trump has been a known liar and prevaricator for decades.
The attack on reason being decried this year began during the Nixon Admin and as it worked using the same tactics we decried our enemies for using on their people. You can see it working in the shifting downward of the cultural and moral standards for behavior we used to apply for ourselves and our public servants. It went full court [press with the election of reagan in November 1979 and has been going downward ever faster like the swirling of water circling a drain.
There is no mystery only deception and wilful lies which honesty can easily pierce.
Granted, successfully proclaiming truth confers power on those who proclaim it. So, what? Anyone can proclaim a truth, and fail then to be socially validated. We rely on informed communities for evaluation of truth claims, honest reporting of them, and pragmatism to validate truth claims which are, after all, always provisional. That is, truth claims endure so long as no one has overturned them. When truth claims are overturned, the power that they conferred on those who proclaimed them is also overturned.
1
Wow, I had to read it twice to understand the points being made. Who exactly is the audience you are trying to reach?
I'm not the expert on the subject but I would argue your points are better pointed at Justice or fairness than facts.
Not all facts are narratives. A fact such as the Earth is round is truth. If we did not exist the fact that Earth is round would remain. It's not based on any bias, societal pressures or personal narratives. A demonstrable outcome done repeatedly is a fact.
Justice or fairness is much more subjected to bias and narratives. Take the practice of cutting off of the hand of a thief practiced in some countries, at least was just recently. In those country's its fair and just to do so. In other countries, not so much.
I'm not the expert on the subject but I would argue your points are better pointed at Justice or fairness than facts.
Not all facts are narratives. A fact such as the Earth is round is truth. If we did not exist the fact that Earth is round would remain. It's not based on any bias, societal pressures or personal narratives. A demonstrable outcome done repeatedly is a fact.
Justice or fairness is much more subjected to bias and narratives. Take the practice of cutting off of the hand of a thief practiced in some countries, at least was just recently. In those country's its fair and just to do so. In other countries, not so much.
1
Philosophy is becoming more pragmatic and specialized, charged with making technology, life and humanity compatible by how humans think about it. Now it's about figuring out how to deal with specific applications of technology to life. Before it was more sweeping and generalized, more rarefied, academically and culturally.
So, the "stealing" from philosophy is through the defunding of the sciences more so than Trump's use of emotional manipulation. He, himself, is conditioned to do just that in life -- and, couldn't help himself over it, even if he tried. This is why he is so open about it, he doesn't get the greater societal import, he just knows it works for him -- he's a quintessential salesman. But, not even a run-of-the-mill deep thinker. His thinking on what he does goes to the mechanics of how to manipulate people for the moment's purpose, not the underlying questions in relation to society. No true introspection exists there.
And, also: There is the reality of society -- dreamed into being, collectively, by individuals and groups. You can't say the same about nature -- hurricanes, tsunamis, earthquakes, disease or cosmic cataclysm. So, we can collectively dream up the belief that we can manipulate our environment, bend it to our will. But we can't deny the reactions by nature to our actions based on our erroneous beliefs.
Our explanations as to why it happens are relative -- but, not the actual events, (regardless of how we individually experience those events).
So, the "stealing" from philosophy is through the defunding of the sciences more so than Trump's use of emotional manipulation. He, himself, is conditioned to do just that in life -- and, couldn't help himself over it, even if he tried. This is why he is so open about it, he doesn't get the greater societal import, he just knows it works for him -- he's a quintessential salesman. But, not even a run-of-the-mill deep thinker. His thinking on what he does goes to the mechanics of how to manipulate people for the moment's purpose, not the underlying questions in relation to society. No true introspection exists there.
And, also: There is the reality of society -- dreamed into being, collectively, by individuals and groups. You can't say the same about nature -- hurricanes, tsunamis, earthquakes, disease or cosmic cataclysm. So, we can collectively dream up the belief that we can manipulate our environment, bend it to our will. But we can't deny the reactions by nature to our actions based on our erroneous beliefs.
Our explanations as to why it happens are relative -- but, not the actual events, (regardless of how we individually experience those events).
Good analysis. I'm sure most Trump supporters voted for him after careful study of postmodern non-analytic philosophy and quantum mechanics.
This essay demonstrates that liberal academics who’ve spent the last couple of decades merrily deconstructing Western thought are now being hoisted on their own petard. Or, put another way, right-wingers have learned to play with the deconstruction toys of liberals.
Mr. Williams strategy in fighting Trump is to double down on deconstruction’s evasiveness. He’s so tethered to “critical thinking” that he won't even call Trump's lies “lies,” and instead calls them, “Trump’s alternative version of reality.”
He proposes that we ask not “whether a [Trump] statement is true or false,” but instead ask “how and why it was made and what effects it produces when people feel it to be true."
Please. I get it that this plays well in a junior seminar in philosophy, where the only ones who can suffer are guileless students, but in the real world, where Trump's presidency threatens the Republic itself, and where Trump is making a presidential career out of calling facts “fake news,” to not clearly come down on the side of truth or falsity is cowardice.
We need a lot less of Mr. Williams's critical thinking, and a lot more of David Hume’s acknowledgement that for all our uncertainty, for most experiences, empiricism offers a powerful and firm ground for drawing conclusions about such things as lies and truths. While no intelligent person stops examining how we know what we know, if epistemology takes over, the result is inaction.
Trump tells lies. Period.
Mr. Williams strategy in fighting Trump is to double down on deconstruction’s evasiveness. He’s so tethered to “critical thinking” that he won't even call Trump's lies “lies,” and instead calls them, “Trump’s alternative version of reality.”
He proposes that we ask not “whether a [Trump] statement is true or false,” but instead ask “how and why it was made and what effects it produces when people feel it to be true."
Please. I get it that this plays well in a junior seminar in philosophy, where the only ones who can suffer are guileless students, but in the real world, where Trump's presidency threatens the Republic itself, and where Trump is making a presidential career out of calling facts “fake news,” to not clearly come down on the side of truth or falsity is cowardice.
We need a lot less of Mr. Williams's critical thinking, and a lot more of David Hume’s acknowledgement that for all our uncertainty, for most experiences, empiricism offers a powerful and firm ground for drawing conclusions about such things as lies and truths. While no intelligent person stops examining how we know what we know, if epistemology takes over, the result is inaction.
Trump tells lies. Period.
3
"And if we question all ideas — not just the ones we dislike — perhaps our critiques can also reveal new ways of thinking and suggest political possibilities undreamed of by either Trump or his centrist opponents." This is easy to utter for someone in the midst of a post-modern literature degree. However, America has for the last several decades destroyed K-12 to the point where a high school diploma gives no one an ability to think critically. I taught science in archaeology for 23 years at Berkeley, and even California students had no clue how to question an utterance, or even diagram a sentence for pity sake. This is why Republicans win. The electorate cannot critically evaluate anyone's utterances. That is the main reason that 2/3 of the states are controlled by Republicans and their alternative reality, that and Democrats not interested in voting.
1
Modern critical thought unleashed moral and cultural relativism on the world with great success, at least in academia. The relativism of truth could only follow.
As Dostoyevski famously said, without God everything is permitted. And indeed, despite, the well-intentioned cogitations of such as Mr Williams, that's where we are and where critical thinking will have to remain.
Meaning and truth are dependent on a transcendent source, outside the human brain, call it what you will. It is that or despair and nihilism, whatever the hope of the critical thinker to avoid that conclusion may be. Let him face facts.
As Dostoyevski famously said, without God everything is permitted. And indeed, despite, the well-intentioned cogitations of such as Mr Williams, that's where we are and where critical thinking will have to remain.
Meaning and truth are dependent on a transcendent source, outside the human brain, call it what you will. It is that or despair and nihilism, whatever the hope of the critical thinker to avoid that conclusion may be. Let him face facts.
1
Suggesting that a god must exist because without one "everything is permitted" is a claim without any validated evidence.
All of science and social science and history shows us that meaning and truth is created by human imagination, just like all language, culture, values, technologies and gods are human made.
Human rights and humanist values are man made, as are ALL our laws, and just because they are all 'relative" and not absolute does not mean anything goes: if you break the law, there are punishments here on Earth. If you go against social mores you find life difficult in a community.
All of science and social science and history shows us that meaning and truth is created by human imagination, just like all language, culture, values, technologies and gods are human made.
Human rights and humanist values are man made, as are ALL our laws, and just because they are all 'relative" and not absolute does not mean anything goes: if you break the law, there are punishments here on Earth. If you go against social mores you find life difficult in a community.
The overarching philo-politcal wisdom condoning the 'non-objectivation' of fact is "...the ends justify the means". Attributed to Machiavelli in the 18th century, it defines away the very need for facts which can be conveniently altered in the service of greater truths. But then the paragraphs in Machiavelli's "Prince" don't exactly say "the ends justify the means". Maybe it was Trotsky? Or perhaps Ovid in a 10th century BC tract --and everyone in between? What was the question?...
My own favorite anti-fact fact wisdom is African, "The history of lion hunting will only be told when lion's have their own historians..."
So what to make of all of this relativism, constructivism, deconstruction, postmodernism, critique philo-babble? If there's a bottom line here it is never to take Trump at face value--orange hair and all. If Trump says it is raining outside (contrary to his Inauguration Day weather fact) one should go to the window and check. But then, as Chief Justice John Marshall once famously said to justify the justices belting down a whiskey or two over a difficult point of law, "Somewhere in this country it is raining..."
What was the question?
My own favorite anti-fact fact wisdom is African, "The history of lion hunting will only be told when lion's have their own historians..."
So what to make of all of this relativism, constructivism, deconstruction, postmodernism, critique philo-babble? If there's a bottom line here it is never to take Trump at face value--orange hair and all. If Trump says it is raining outside (contrary to his Inauguration Day weather fact) one should go to the window and check. But then, as Chief Justice John Marshall once famously said to justify the justices belting down a whiskey or two over a difficult point of law, "Somewhere in this country it is raining..."
What was the question?
1
Science killed philosophy a long time ago, as did the impenetrable prose of philosophers, whose primary requirement is the inability to communicate.
1
My Dad used to make fun of relativism by saying 'there are Absolutely no absolutes'. I have also heard the 'only absolute is there are no absolutes. Trump has weaponized relativism. Maybe the Traditionalists had a point after all...
1
We have a dual situation of a nation's short attention span + immediate gratification fed rapid falsehoods from this administration.
Add on a right wing faction manufacturing fake news, videos and documentaries. TV organizations fully dedicated to supporting the man and sacrificing truth, such as Fox. And a wild and free internet.
Movies + TV shows saturate us with quick-fixes and tidy little endings. People are used to that. No one has to do much thinking.
From a language perspective, Trump mastered propaganda techniques, knowingly or not, using a Neuro-Linguistic-Programming model, where he convinced the public he has their interests at heart.
Their minds are set and he set them.
"Crooked Hillary...lock her up...there's a problem...only I can fix it."
These short sound bites repeated relentlessly over 2 years programmed people likely not concerned about critical thinking. He made it fun.
They elected a television showman well versed in manipulating reality. Something they're used to. All of the major television cable stations saturated the nation with him, and mostly him.
All hours of the day and night, they reinforced what he was selling them.
Add on a right wing faction manufacturing fake news, videos and documentaries. TV organizations fully dedicated to supporting the man and sacrificing truth, such as Fox. And a wild and free internet.
Movies + TV shows saturate us with quick-fixes and tidy little endings. People are used to that. No one has to do much thinking.
From a language perspective, Trump mastered propaganda techniques, knowingly or not, using a Neuro-Linguistic-Programming model, where he convinced the public he has their interests at heart.
Their minds are set and he set them.
"Crooked Hillary...lock her up...there's a problem...only I can fix it."
These short sound bites repeated relentlessly over 2 years programmed people likely not concerned about critical thinking. He made it fun.
They elected a television showman well versed in manipulating reality. Something they're used to. All of the major television cable stations saturated the nation with him, and mostly him.
All hours of the day and night, they reinforced what he was selling them.
2
This is an an uncecessary and inaccurate obfuscation of the nature of truth, or Truth, otherwise glorified as Philosophy.
Truth is Sustainable and Consistent, Lies are Not Sustainable over the long run.
You can keep repeating that the Earth is the Center of Universe and it is flat, but sooner or later the facts and the majority perception of them, are forced to the only Sustainable view, that seems consistent with them
- that is not flat, and that it is the Sun at the Center.
sure the long run may be too long, and the battles to sustain Truth may overrun many human lives, but in the end whatever facts remain, remain, and that becomes the Truth. the Lies are simply lost to history.
Truth is Sustainable and Consistent, Lies are Not Sustainable over the long run.
You can keep repeating that the Earth is the Center of Universe and it is flat, but sooner or later the facts and the majority perception of them, are forced to the only Sustainable view, that seems consistent with them
- that is not flat, and that it is the Sun at the Center.
sure the long run may be too long, and the battles to sustain Truth may overrun many human lives, but in the end whatever facts remain, remain, and that becomes the Truth. the Lies are simply lost to history.
Of course, the difference is that Trump has never shown any sign that he would understand what you are talking about or, really, of critical thinking. His assertions are based on narcissism rather than a philosophy.
I wish that the last 2 paragraphs of this piece had been expanded and were the main point of the article rather than an after thought. What do you mean "critique can help those who oppose...the Trumpian version of reality"?
I wish that the last 2 paragraphs of this piece had been expanded and were the main point of the article rather than an after thought. What do you mean "critique can help those who oppose...the Trumpian version of reality"?
1
Tweet: Why would I call China a currency manipulator when they are working with us on the North Korean problem? We will see what happens!
So if China fails to help us, we go back to claiming currency manipulation.
He's taking me back to grade school here, where the bully will be my friend if I give him my lunch money. Sad.
So if China fails to help us, we go back to claiming currency manipulation.
He's taking me back to grade school here, where the bully will be my friend if I give him my lunch money. Sad.
3
Trump is an unwitting day trader in philosophy. If he is not near the idea he loves, he loves the idea he's near. Whoever has his ear at the moment wins.
1
Trump has stolen philosophical tools only from those gullible or timid enough to let him get away with it.
Instead of blaming him, we should be blaming our own careless indifference.
Instead of blaming him, we should be blaming our own careless indifference.
Yes, but of course, the question is why I should take your critique of truth to be accurate, verifiable, i.e. truthful.
The late American philosopher M.C. Dillon warned of the implications of "semiological reductionism" in Continental philosophy in his 1995 book of the same name (and in papers and lectures in the two decades preceding its publication). He argued that the way out of the mess created by the post-modern turn cannot be backward, towards claims of eternal Truths, but must be forward through the embodied phenomenology of Merleau-Ponty and its recognition that it was the Cartesian splitting of mind from body, subject from object, that made reaching this point inevitable. And he recognized, acutely and presciently, how dangerous this wrong turn would turn out to be: that once all knowledge was reduced to the play of power, there would be no basis on which to adjudicate between competing perspectives except power. And thus the "liberatory" claims of critique would turn into the foundation (!) of a new fascism--whose terrifying face we now see emerging throughout the West.
Popkin demonstrated in his work on early modern skepticism how extreme doubt leads to absolutism.
So we witness today
So we witness today
1
Oh, for Pete's sake. These philosophical arguments are pointless.
Why?
Because anyone who understands the basics of personality disorders knows that for those afflicted, FEELINGS ARE FACTS. Trump obviously is suffering (which makes the rest of us impacted by him suffer) from Narcissistic Personality Disorder, and possibly Borderline Personality Disorder and more.
Most persons, once understanding this PD 101 basic, will realize they likely know at least one individual who as a rule, is angry and guided strictly by their feelings, not their eyes, brains, experience, or common sense.
Why?
Because anyone who understands the basics of personality disorders knows that for those afflicted, FEELINGS ARE FACTS. Trump obviously is suffering (which makes the rest of us impacted by him suffer) from Narcissistic Personality Disorder, and possibly Borderline Personality Disorder and more.
Most persons, once understanding this PD 101 basic, will realize they likely know at least one individual who as a rule, is angry and guided strictly by their feelings, not their eyes, brains, experience, or common sense.
3
"We can never have certain knowledge about the world in its entirety. Claiming to know the truth is therefore a kind of assertion of power."
Who ever claimed with certainty to have knowledge about the world in its entirety.
Second sentence is a non-sequitur even if you accept the first.
Who ever claimed with certainty to have knowledge about the world in its entirety.
Second sentence is a non-sequitur even if you accept the first.
Mr. Williams asks the right questions. Critical literary studies and postmodernism (the arguments put forth by other commenters that Derrida and Foucault are not postmodern is a red herring) allow us to examine the social context and intellectual genealogy of facts, knowledge and truths. It allows us to understand how truths are derived, organized, and implemented into policies. For the latter see Foucault's governmentality studies.
Trump lies strategically, as dictators have always done. Some dictators lie to further ideologies and goals. Stalin (an extreme example) lied -and murdered -in the service of a collective vision. Trump (thus far a run-of-the-mill authoritarian personality a bit befuddled by the institutional workings of the US democratic system) lies strategically to avoid damaging information and to further his own self-aggrandizement.
As Mr. Williams noted: "Not all facts are created equal." Facts can be rooted in processes of social construction, based on history, science and politics, or they can be made up out of whole cloth. Trump seems to practice the latter, i.e. Obama wiretapped Trump tower; his inauguration broke all attendance records.
We cannot go back to the non-existent, fact-based past. We can understand how lies, 'facts' and truths are used as a part of governance. That should be enough to mount a credible resistance to the Liar-in-Chief and preserve whatever institutional integrity is left in the US's battered but resilient democracy.
Trump lies strategically, as dictators have always done. Some dictators lie to further ideologies and goals. Stalin (an extreme example) lied -and murdered -in the service of a collective vision. Trump (thus far a run-of-the-mill authoritarian personality a bit befuddled by the institutional workings of the US democratic system) lies strategically to avoid damaging information and to further his own self-aggrandizement.
As Mr. Williams noted: "Not all facts are created equal." Facts can be rooted in processes of social construction, based on history, science and politics, or they can be made up out of whole cloth. Trump seems to practice the latter, i.e. Obama wiretapped Trump tower; his inauguration broke all attendance records.
We cannot go back to the non-existent, fact-based past. We can understand how lies, 'facts' and truths are used as a part of governance. That should be enough to mount a credible resistance to the Liar-in-Chief and preserve whatever institutional integrity is left in the US's battered but resilient democracy.
4
"People who produce facts — scientists, reporters, witnesses — do so from a particular social position (maybe they’re white, male and live in America) that influences how they perceive, interpret and judge the world. They rely on non-neutral methods (microscopes, cameras, eyeballs) and use non-neutral symbols (words, numbers, images) to communicate facts to people who receive, interpret and deploy them from their own social positions."
Yeah this whole idea is a real problem, and is really at the root of all the authors troubles.
See, microscopes are most certainly neutral. So are cameras. And eyeballs. They show us what is really there. And to suggest that somehow people in the hard sciences are interpreting facts based on their culture is frankly absurd.
Once you accept this idea you have ruined science. People will begin to consider data and analysis as interpretation. Once you add in the current perception that Universities are all liberal you have made those on the right ignore anything coming out of academia, including climate change and vaccines.
In the social sciences, interpretation reigns supreme, because social sciences rely on someone finding patterns in data (which usually end up confirming what they already thought, quelle suprise). Hard sciences dont. And if you conflate them you have yielded the initiative to the right. And as military history tells us, that's the first step to defeat.
Yeah this whole idea is a real problem, and is really at the root of all the authors troubles.
See, microscopes are most certainly neutral. So are cameras. And eyeballs. They show us what is really there. And to suggest that somehow people in the hard sciences are interpreting facts based on their culture is frankly absurd.
Once you accept this idea you have ruined science. People will begin to consider data and analysis as interpretation. Once you add in the current perception that Universities are all liberal you have made those on the right ignore anything coming out of academia, including climate change and vaccines.
In the social sciences, interpretation reigns supreme, because social sciences rely on someone finding patterns in data (which usually end up confirming what they already thought, quelle suprise). Hard sciences dont. And if you conflate them you have yielded the initiative to the right. And as military history tells us, that's the first step to defeat.
Ah, yes, but a microscope without an observer looking through it is just an inert hunk of technology of no use to anyone. Different observers will see different things through the microscope. Hard sciences also rely on finding patterns in data, and doing so is a consensus process. As Williams aptly concludes, we must pay attention to how knowledge is created. Critiquing how a fact is created doesn't necessarily invalidate it; indeed, it may make it stronger, and more useful!
2
Jesse: "See, microscopes are most certainly neutral. So are cameras. And eyeballs. They show us what is really there."
Microscopes, cameras, and eyeballs have limited resolving power, so they can never "show us what is really there".
Microscopes, cameras, and eyeballs have limited resolving power, so they can never "show us what is really there".
2
Social sciences don't do hard data?
Clearly someone who hasn't completed the first year of a cognitive psychology grad program.
Clearly someone who hasn't completed the first year of a cognitive psychology grad program.
Optical illusions converted to verbal illusions.
Slow down, a moment, on the George Washington cherry tree story. There's no evidence that Washington himself ever circulated that story. As far as we can tell, it was a posthumous fabrication by an early Washington biographer, Mason Weems, who concocted the tale out of nothing in an effort to make his biography do a better job of instilling good values in young people.
Pick a fight with Weems, please! Legend-burnishers have been doing all sorts of mischief throughout American history. But blaming the cherry tree story on Washington seems unfair. Our first president was dead and buried before the fable came to life.
Pick a fight with Weems, please! Legend-burnishers have been doing all sorts of mischief throughout American history. But blaming the cherry tree story on Washington seems unfair. Our first president was dead and buried before the fable came to life.
98
One of the several criteria upon which we should judge a philosophical assertion is: Can, or is the asserter willing, to live by the assertion? You child is in serious need of have her fractured leg reset? There's Orthopedist Dr. Derrida Foucault, "Reality is a narrative constructed by and for the powerful." There's Orthopedist Dr. Carnap Russell, "Reality is independent of human thought to which good reasoning brings us closer and closer." Who ya gonna choose?
1
Any approach that requires nuanced thinking is doomed to fail.
Yes Donald Trump does emulate Humpty Dumpty though he may not be aware of it. However Science does not. The fundamental position is to proceed from observation and experiment not from authority. "Nullius in verba".
1
Casey Williams says in the article that “…critical ways of thinking demand that we approach knowledge with attention and humility and recognize that, while facts might be created, not all facts are created equal.”
Appealing to one’s emotions than to confirmed facts, or "even to common sense” is the bent of an abounding number of Americans, who do not question the version of reality that is perpetrated by utterly selfish driven politicians through the various media is the exact reason why such fanatically grotesque governance is what we have today! It is only through personal critique that can confront what is copiously delivered to us and which we can affect the kind of healthy life that is possible. It is called critical thinking where people, you, me, ordinary people, practice genuinely unbiased verification of facts to make clear to ourselves truly self-beneficial judgments. It is, essentially, to a very great degree, our responsibility what we get.
Also as author, Williams, says, “…if we question all ideas — not just the ones we dislike…” our evaluations without doubt will reveal fresh ways of thinking and actually self-suggest advantageously political possibilities not imagined before.
Appealing to one’s emotions than to confirmed facts, or "even to common sense” is the bent of an abounding number of Americans, who do not question the version of reality that is perpetrated by utterly selfish driven politicians through the various media is the exact reason why such fanatically grotesque governance is what we have today! It is only through personal critique that can confront what is copiously delivered to us and which we can affect the kind of healthy life that is possible. It is called critical thinking where people, you, me, ordinary people, practice genuinely unbiased verification of facts to make clear to ourselves truly self-beneficial judgments. It is, essentially, to a very great degree, our responsibility what we get.
Also as author, Williams, says, “…if we question all ideas — not just the ones we dislike…” our evaluations without doubt will reveal fresh ways of thinking and actually self-suggest advantageously political possibilities not imagined before.
1
Essentially, critical theory addresses how to fit objective science with effective (moral) society. This is a problem that arose during the age of enlightenment (i.e. age of reason). Science is morally neutral in that it can deliver an atomic bomb and a cure for cancer. That science has delivered benefits and banes to society cannot be argued. How to reap the benefits without the banes is addressed by critical theory.
Critical theory uses several techniques to address its inspection of the problem: e.g., Marxian, psychoanalytic, economic, and social theories. Note that they are using different viewpoints to address the juncture of society and science, not science itself.
Science asymptotically approaches “truth” but never quite gets to truth. At bottom, there is always an implied “it’s as if” in scientific facts. Why is this? Simply because science is language based and reality is reality-based (two different things, admitted that language has its own reality).
Some literary critical theorists and others fail to understand that while science can closely approach reality and therefore be very useful in human manipulation of nature, the “it’s as if” at the bottom of science is misused to claim that science is ambiguous and therefore socially constructed.
Critical theory uses several techniques to address its inspection of the problem: e.g., Marxian, psychoanalytic, economic, and social theories. Note that they are using different viewpoints to address the juncture of society and science, not science itself.
Science asymptotically approaches “truth” but never quite gets to truth. At bottom, there is always an implied “it’s as if” in scientific facts. Why is this? Simply because science is language based and reality is reality-based (two different things, admitted that language has its own reality).
Some literary critical theorists and others fail to understand that while science can closely approach reality and therefore be very useful in human manipulation of nature, the “it’s as if” at the bottom of science is misused to claim that science is ambiguous and therefore socially constructed.
1
This way of thinking hardly originated with Trump and his supporters. See Nicholas Kristsoff's e-mail interview with Jimmy Carter published on Saturday. Carter: "My belief in the resurrection of Jesus comes from my Christian faith, and not from any need for scientific proof [or evidence, apparently]. I derive a great personal benefit from the totality of this belief, which comes naturally to me." If believing something makes you feel good, it must be true.
Consider Zeno's paradoxes and the reductio ad absurdum. Did Zeno actually think Achilles would never pass the tortoise, or that arrows do not move? If so, he could stand confidently before a released arrow knowing he would not be hit. Oops.
What he was doing was showing by paradox that his opponents' arguments were deficient. That is the essence of reductio ad absurdum. It is a tool of disproof, that is of showing another line of reasoning to be false. So it is with the premise that 'facts' are made, that 'truth' is merely an exercise in power. It presumes that only through such power do we have facts, which is absurd. Somewhere right now a poor woman is fetching water for her family. That is not true because I write it, but because she is. While I wrote this reply at least one weak person died. It may be true that you believe there is no truth, not even local mini- or micro-truth, but if so, your logic is absurd.
I wrote this sentence and finished it with this period. That is not a critique, but it is paradoxical to claim it is a "made fact".
What he was doing was showing by paradox that his opponents' arguments were deficient. That is the essence of reductio ad absurdum. It is a tool of disproof, that is of showing another line of reasoning to be false. So it is with the premise that 'facts' are made, that 'truth' is merely an exercise in power. It presumes that only through such power do we have facts, which is absurd. Somewhere right now a poor woman is fetching water for her family. That is not true because I write it, but because she is. While I wrote this reply at least one weak person died. It may be true that you believe there is no truth, not even local mini- or micro-truth, but if so, your logic is absurd.
I wrote this sentence and finished it with this period. That is not a critique, but it is paradoxical to claim it is a "made fact".
2
"Even George Washington’s great claim to honesty — that he ’fessed up to felling a cherry tree — was a deception. " Really? Did Washington himself ever make that claim? I do not believe HE did. So why impugn his honesty by repeating a lie made by Weems? Or maybe telling the truth is not convenient for making your point?
2
You can try to fight Trump with reason. You can try to fight Trump followers by reasoning away the emotional arguments they give for believing his statements of falsehoods. You cannot use reason to fight the feeling these followers have that their way of life and by extension, they themselves are disappearing. Incessantly referring to them as stupid, uneducated deplorable, rural red neck evangelicals or attacking every identifier they held sacred convinced them they were in a battle for existence. Now you want to discuss Trump and philosophical theft?
Trump also does not understand that with each denial of reality, or worse, manipulation of it, hecreates another mile of distance between himself and sanity.
By the rambling, obsessive, desultory nature of Trump's recent interviews, if held in a psychiatrist's office, would suggest an urgent need for anti-psychotic and OCD medications. He seems to be functioning with about 20% of his former functioning self. As the truth becomes more and more of any enemy to him, his grasp on reality has become elusive at best and forsaken at worst.
By the rambling, obsessive, desultory nature of Trump's recent interviews, if held in a psychiatrist's office, would suggest an urgent need for anti-psychotic and OCD medications. He seems to be functioning with about 20% of his former functioning self. As the truth becomes more and more of any enemy to him, his grasp on reality has become elusive at best and forsaken at worst.
2
Trump will not accept the truth even when it is backed up by visual evidence---as example, the number of people at his inauguration vs the number of people at Obama's inauguration. Confusing comments in this article supposedly backed up by philosophers and teachers will not change the basic statement that Donald Trump does not tell the truth---he lies. A truth, as well as a lie, is obvious.
Having studied medicine instead of social theory, I think that influenza is caused by the influenza virus. Of course maybe that's just the white male in me saying that.
Trump hasn't stolen the ideas of these theorists. He doesn't pay any attention to them. He's just a con man supercharged with narcissism and sadism. The prisons and the C Suites are full of guys like this. Very few of them read Foucault.
Trump hasn't stolen the ideas of these theorists. He doesn't pay any attention to them. He's just a con man supercharged with narcissism and sadism. The prisons and the C Suites are full of guys like this. Very few of them read Foucault.
3
And this comment is . . . what? Fact? Fiction? Story-telling? Are you describing what actually happened or what you would like to have happened? The kind of philosophical baloney sold by some of these "idea leaders" undermines itself. And it doesn't have a liberal bias. Christian doctrine, among other teachings, is also based on some shaky notions and extrapolated into "absolute certainty" that isn't all that certain.
Can you imagine anyone from Trump's circle managing to get through this article, let alone understand it? OK for the philosophically inclined, but useless as a guide to resolving the policy quagmire.
Trump has nothing to fear from philosophers, who have been nitpicking grammar, invariably devoid of ideas - operating in their own fantasyland since Wittgenstein.
Academic and political racketeers share a need to feign knowledge.Ask your local philosopher if neurology is right for you.
Academic and political racketeers share a need to feign knowledge.Ask your local philosopher if neurology is right for you.
I can't understand why some writers use their intellect and knowledge
to try to explain trump as if their theories have anything at all to do with
trumps off the cuff, day in day out behavior?...
How do you go intellectually deep on a mentally disturbed person as if he has a master plan or that his behavior is as rational as your theoretical interpretation?
This is nothing more than trying to make a silk purse out of a sow's ear.....
to try to explain trump as if their theories have anything at all to do with
trumps off the cuff, day in day out behavior?...
How do you go intellectually deep on a mentally disturbed person as if he has a master plan or that his behavior is as rational as your theoretical interpretation?
This is nothing more than trying to make a silk purse out of a sow's ear.....
Te author suggests we accept the abandonment of objective truth and instead search for ways to reverse-deconstruct the false claims of demagogues. We are supposed get down in the sand-box with them and to say the not all would-be truths are created equal; to refine their own game and beat them at it. Fat chance of that. I say rather it is a fact that Trump supported the Iraq War early on, and he can deny it a thousand times and still lies. Relativism doesn't apply to a simple fact that is recorded on tape. The author gives us a recipe for philosophic surrender and despair.
132
I expect the author would insist that relativism does apply to a simple fact recorded on tape, but I'm with you on not surrendering.
Anti-intellectualism has a long tradition in America. You don't need to know what epistemology means to understand Trump and his followers. Trump is the 'we don't need your fancy book-learnin'' candidate. His open contempt for reporters i.e., people who work with their minds and words for a living, feeds his bases' hatred and suspicion of the educated. He walked straight out of the right-wing media conspiracy and paranoia echo chamber and into the oval office. The right wing media has long said that something is true if it comes from one of their approved mouthpieces and to be suspicious of everyone else.
250
President Trump is using the most advanced tools of science and philosophy to battle the left-wing elites. Isn't it cool?
1
Call it what you want: relativism, constructivism, deconstrution, postmodernism, critique.......
This is a nonsensical theories because if you apply them to themselves they lose all their validity.
This is a nonsensical theories because if you apply them to themselves they lose all their validity.
16
Poe said, "All that we see or seem, is but a dream within a dream." Truth? Hah! We're all just masses of infinite energy, interacting with and continually interchanging with other fluid masses of infinite energy. We dream of creating order out of chaos so that we'll feel a bit better about the fact that we have no clue.
Breathe, smile, stand up straight, go for a walk in this Miracle of Illusion in which we find ourselves. Ah, enlightenment!
Breathe, smile, stand up straight, go for a walk in this Miracle of Illusion in which we find ourselves. Ah, enlightenment!
5
"We're all just masses of infinite energy, interacting with and continually interchanging with other fluid masses of infinite energy." Is that true?
Here's a quote from Derrida: "One has the right to ask all questions. But when one responds to questions with falsifications or counter-truths, gestures that have nothing to do with honest research or critical thought, then that's something else. It's either incompetence or unjustified instrumentalism, and it has to be reprimanded, just as a bad student has to be reprimanded." Hint. (and that goes for you, too, "John T." who clearly got a bad grade in Critical Theory. Sorry about that...)
49
Rhetoric rather than Philosophy is the relevant classical teaching. There was the story of a Greek rhetoric teacher, looking for business in Rome, who made a convincing speech one day, and argued the opposite position convincingly the next day, after which he was lynched... Modern media and advertising simplify Rhetoric. Only the results matter, and logic is unnecessary to reach the gut. Proof: we're seeing it. [I'm a mathematician. I know logic, and this is not about logic of any sort.]
195
Alexander the Great was the prized pupil of the rhetorical philosopher mathematician teacher Aristotle. With his elite Companion Calvary Alexander the Great was the master of rhetoric, philosophy and math. The force of war has it's own logic in the real world.
Kurt Godel was a mathematician who took his own life. Isaac Newton was a mathematician who believed in alchemy. In mathematics some things are true even when there is and can be no proof. Faith is the basis of religion. Math is neither sentimental nor humane nor moral.
Kurt Godel was a mathematician who took his own life. Isaac Newton was a mathematician who believed in alchemy. In mathematics some things are true even when there is and can be no proof. Faith is the basis of religion. Math is neither sentimental nor humane nor moral.
1
Rhetoric has a great many different branches. Although many of the Sophists were radical relativists, others argued that most of the claims made regarding human affairs were probably rather than absolute. This, of course, was Aristotle's position, as well. This meant that Rhetoric was necessary to build a case for the most probable claims. Rhetorical training was also necessary to help prevent people from fooled by the con man. It seems clear that we have too little rhetorical training going on in America.
I suspect the number of people who have studied or even understand logic is pretty small. I hear it abused all the time, with the final argument-winning move composed of volume and obstinacy
2
'Stolen'? Since when has Pyrrhonism (from Pyrrho of Elis, 360-270 BC) been the 'Intellectual Property' of the postmodern Left (and who can claim 'IP' anyway if you agree with Trump that there are no stable and manifest truths?)
The philosophy student who wrote this wretched piece needs a refresher in the history of Philosophy. Bigly.
The philosophy student who wrote this wretched piece needs a refresher in the history of Philosophy. Bigly.
12
An entire opinion piece to point out that people tend to believe in things that make them feel good about themselves & their tribe & not believe things that don't?
12
There are few with little dust in their eyes.
Most people hate the truth. Accepting it requires humility. Humility means accepting embarrassment, setting aside defensiveness, risking defeat, having feelings, caring for others.
Our selfish and self centered culture numbs us to the feeling and truth seeking side of our humanity. We are so afraid of loosing our identity that suffering becomes normal. Good luck with that!
Most people hate the truth. Accepting it requires humility. Humility means accepting embarrassment, setting aside defensiveness, risking defeat, having feelings, caring for others.
Our selfish and self centered culture numbs us to the feeling and truth seeking side of our humanity. We are so afraid of loosing our identity that suffering becomes normal. Good luck with that!
4
Losing, not loosing. Back to basics.
What is "truth"? What are "facts"?
There are no critical tools aka science in philosophy, faith, politics, sociology, anthropology, economics, finance, accounting, psychology, law, history etc.
There are way too many unknowns and variables to craft double-blind repeatable controlled predictive tests.
The truth is that there is only one biological DNA genetic evolutionary fit human race species. And we are driven to crave fat, salt, sugar, water, habitat, sex and kin by any means necessary including conflict and cooperation.
The fact is that 70% of physical reality is a force known as dark energy and a mass known as dark matter that is 25% of our universe. What we "know" makes up 5% of reality. Yet there are some things that are uncertain and incomplete. While we have no theory that joins the relative and the quantum universe. We know the speed of light.
There are no critical tools aka science in philosophy, faith, politics, sociology, anthropology, economics, finance, accounting, psychology, law, history etc.
There are way too many unknowns and variables to craft double-blind repeatable controlled predictive tests.
The truth is that there is only one biological DNA genetic evolutionary fit human race species. And we are driven to crave fat, salt, sugar, water, habitat, sex and kin by any means necessary including conflict and cooperation.
The fact is that 70% of physical reality is a force known as dark energy and a mass known as dark matter that is 25% of our universe. What we "know" makes up 5% of reality. Yet there are some things that are uncertain and incomplete. While we have no theory that joins the relative and the quantum universe. We know the speed of light.
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Yet we are the masters of the local universe composed of the 5% of the total mass of the universe. We build buildings that do not fall down, planes that fly and know how to extract energy from matter. What the other 95% consists of, we do not know. Yet scientists admit this and work to find out whatthe 95% really is. So science is very different from philosophy, business and most of all, Trump.
2
. . . sort of.
1
Words have meaning, they are defined b genus and differentia. If not then they are ambiguous. Fats are those that are real, gravity is a fact, and the truth is if you jump from a height you will fall.Facts exist, they are real and observable, to say otherwise is to say they are not real, a contradiction in terms. Contradictions can not exist.
1
Deconstruction theory is vulnerable to being self-deconstructed. If all is just narrative, then isn't the theory itself just another narrative? The Cretan says "All Cretans are liars". Is this true or not true? (This little gem is about 2500 years old.)
8
Wow. The one thing in this article that corresponds to my personal experience is that you don't have to be Trump to lie like crazy, and academics, literary scholars, and philosophers are as likely to lie, and to fall for or put up with lies, as anyone else. Some folks are just too lazy to do their homework, many don't care, few want to speak out on behalf of the interests of a group they don't belong to or think they need. Some folks see their own advantage in other people's losing out. This is not news. The Bolsheviks did it. The Nazis did it. I believe in academic circles it is thought of as sophisticated thinking. In the corporate world it's How to Get Ahead. And of course Getting Ahead is not known only in Corporatia. The intellectual "cutting edge" cuts in more ways than one.
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Obama campaigned opposed to same sex marriage and with a promise that there would not be a mandate associated with his universal health insurance.
@Mary Penry
Your tour de force trumps Williams' tour de farce.
Your tour de force trumps Williams' tour de farce.
Some academic circles. Not all. Not mine.
A liar is a liar is a liar.
Walks like, lies like, IS like.
Walks like, lies like, IS like.
6
Indeed, the useful idiots of the academic left - along with the Republican party and its fellow travelers - have been preparing the ground for Trump for decades. The great clamor against "objectivity" - based on a confusion of the rational principle that all assertions are subject to revision (a truth quite compatible with a belief in the objectivity of knowledge, as every scientist knows) with the titillating idea that there is no such thing as truth, no rationally decidable difference between one claim and another - has spread insidiously, and those who have no compunction about lying to further their political and economic ends are quite happy to take advantage.
13
I don't know what they teach at Duke these days, but Derrida was vehemently opposed to "social constructionism," and both he and Foucault explicitly denied any affinity for postmodernism. So it's misleading to say that we are grappling with "simplified" or "misused" versions of their work; we are not dealing with any semblance of their work at all. It is true, however, that many graduate programs have *encouraged the conflation* of social constructionism with deconstruction, Foucauldian archaeology & genealogy, and Baudrillardian simulation. I've had to battle grad students in seminars who insisted, against explicit and overwhelming textual evidence, that Judith Butler supported restrictions on hate speech, or that Habermas's theory of communicative action is imperialist and hostile to "other ways of knowing." This style of thought has been imported into intellectual spaces that should by all rights be allergic to it. And now those very spaces are being blamed for fostering it.
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Welcome to the new and revised PhD. Everyone has one, because every Institution is selling them by the dozens upon dozens to folks who neither want to teach or do research, but sure like the idea of coming into work 2 or 3 days a week, fat bennies, and job protection only bettered by CEOs, barely.
We should all demand PhDs!
We should all demand PhDs!
1
mk: "... Judith Butler supported restrictions on hate speech ..."
Presumably that is your paraphrase, so it would help to see the "explicit and overwhelming textual evidence". Butler uses the phrase "hate speech" and the word "restrictions" throughout this book, but I can't find any "explicit" evidence:
"Excitable Speech: A Politics of the Performative", Routledge, 1997.
Disclaimer: All I did was text searches in the Amazon preview.
Presumably that is your paraphrase, so it would help to see the "explicit and overwhelming textual evidence". Butler uses the phrase "hate speech" and the word "restrictions" throughout this book, but I can't find any "explicit" evidence:
"Excitable Speech: A Politics of the Performative", Routledge, 1997.
Disclaimer: All I did was text searches in the Amazon preview.
1
Thank you Michael K!!! You are absolutely correct. Deconstruction is about careful, thoughtful reading, reading that takes its time with a text despite the anxiety and discomfort this might result in. Deconstructionism does have a nose for the hidden tensions in a text, but it is precisely such tensions that point towards the Real. I suppose that today's confusion is only to be expected. Resistance to theory might be an essential part of theory. And yet, it is still distressing to me. Thank you for drawing our attention to the problem. I'm grateful.
There may be a good philosophical argument about the denial that facts exist. But there are many where there is such general agreement that there is little argument.
For example:
1. 2+2=4
2. Today, in the US, is April 17, 2017
3. In Newtonian mechanics, F=ma
Any of these might, under some circumstances lead to an assertion of power. But they remain facts.
For example:
1. 2+2=4
2. Today, in the US, is April 17, 2017
3. In Newtonian mechanics, F=ma
Any of these might, under some circumstances lead to an assertion of power. But they remain facts.
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Scientific facts are true until they are not. Newton was no Einstein nor Bohr. Scientific paradigms can begin to resemble faith.
See "The Structure of Scientific Revolutions" by Thomas J. Kuhn.
See "The Structure of Scientific Revolutions" by Thomas J. Kuhn.
1
No, nothing was stolen.
The corporate barbarian inside the gates has grabbed for all the power and has done what it can to negate the power of the Constitution, by buying off politicians and courts, but that is the way of Empires.
Athens, Rome, Berlin, Moscow, London, Washington...
The truth is irrelevant to Putin or Trump or, for that matter, many of the far right preachers. It is all about money and power.
Hugh Massengill, Eugene Oregon
The corporate barbarian inside the gates has grabbed for all the power and has done what it can to negate the power of the Constitution, by buying off politicians and courts, but that is the way of Empires.
Athens, Rome, Berlin, Moscow, London, Washington...
The truth is irrelevant to Putin or Trump or, for that matter, many of the far right preachers. It is all about money and power.
Hugh Massengill, Eugene Oregon
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What "truth" did Hillary and Bill Clinton ever utter or practice?
The scientific method has given us the advanced society we live in with all of its built technological environments, tools, computers, medical advances, etc. "Relativism" is irrelevant, though philosophically trendy. Over-ruling empiricism by relying on ideology, political needs, or emotions (Donald Trump and his zealous followers) is called "motivated cognition" and should be criticized and avoided. Critical thinkers do not have "blind faith" in scientific objectivism. Although willing to revise theories with new evidence, they see the real results of real science. The author waves the relativism flag too hard while stepping off the "cliff that really isn't there."
5
Casey, with all due respect, human beings have repeatedly proven that collective lessons shall not be learned! We repeat foolish mistakes. Continue wars. Fight over land, territory, borders, ethnicity, tribes, religion. When the truth is these divisions are entirely man made. So in as much as they are manufactured and formulated, they are not true and thus prone to dismantling and break down.
The fact is that we human beings are one race totally interdependent and intertwined, with Nature that surrounds us. Each one of us depends on the grace and kindness of fellow sentient beings which include grasslands, cattle, trees and bees. If we do not recognize the fundamental truth that unites us, no number of philosophers can help human kind. Messiahs and messengers have come and gone. New messengers emerge with need of time yet we remain Fools. You can show off your literally knowledge of philosophy but it's useless if it does not translate to the fundamental truths.
The fact is that we human beings are one race totally interdependent and intertwined, with Nature that surrounds us. Each one of us depends on the grace and kindness of fellow sentient beings which include grasslands, cattle, trees and bees. If we do not recognize the fundamental truth that unites us, no number of philosophers can help human kind. Messiahs and messengers have come and gone. New messengers emerge with need of time yet we remain Fools. You can show off your literally knowledge of philosophy but it's useless if it does not translate to the fundamental truths.
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To deny any objective reality is a path to the flat earth society or worse. What is being argued is human, cultural and political not natural. While I would be willing to concede that the scientific method is a human institution what we have learned using it is not. One of the reasons that results of the method such as Chaos Theory and Quantum Mechanics violate the common sense feeling of truth. Denial of a fact does not make the fact less real, whether it is climate change or shape of the earth. Too often, those who use use words to persuade others and work in areas of entirely artificial human construction such as law, literature or politics can easily convince themselves that they live in a fact free universe.
4
"Critical" approaches tend to be more parlor game than serious intellectual exercise, with the common outcome of offering no new way of using information beyond some very watered down version of political economy. In some ways, the appropriation of these tools by the Right might finally kill them off in much the same way that shoddy characters killed off the woolly remains of humanistic psychology or perhaps help social constructivism rise above the unreadable but rigorous work of people like Rorty.
Just wondering: Does the post-modern discovery that there are no "Absolute Truths" also apply to the argument that there are no "Absolute Truths"?
It is true that 2 + 3 = 6 for LARGE values of 2.
4
This article seems to be saying that with Trump there is a method to his madness! I find it so hard to believe that there is any conscious thinking going on in his brain. Its like he says something and then waits for a reaction to which he can think of something else to say, ad infinitum. Maybe he is living in some kind of unconscious 'stream of consciousness'.
Of course I don't know what Trump really thinks because I have never had the chance to talk with him personally. Beyond what I read in the media there seems to be no 'real' Trump out there in reality land. I just take it for granted that Trump exists in the same way that I do, minus the money, high office etc.
The last two years I have been thinking about what is 'thought' and it still baffles me. Thought is obviously some kind of physical process that goes on in the brain and nervous system but I have not been able to detect it (thought) as a physical process.
I stumbled onto an area of thought research called Quantum Brain Dynamics which was intriguing because it was able to hypothesize the energy coming into the brain through the senses and how that energy physically transformed parts of the brain. Sadly the information from that type of research is twenty years old and I can't find any traces of it as an ongoing area of interest at the present time. Just another dead end.
Of course I don't know what Trump really thinks because I have never had the chance to talk with him personally. Beyond what I read in the media there seems to be no 'real' Trump out there in reality land. I just take it for granted that Trump exists in the same way that I do, minus the money, high office etc.
The last two years I have been thinking about what is 'thought' and it still baffles me. Thought is obviously some kind of physical process that goes on in the brain and nervous system but I have not been able to detect it (thought) as a physical process.
I stumbled onto an area of thought research called Quantum Brain Dynamics which was intriguing because it was able to hypothesize the energy coming into the brain through the senses and how that energy physically transformed parts of the brain. Sadly the information from that type of research is twenty years old and I can't find any traces of it as an ongoing area of interest at the present time. Just another dead end.
This is an important piece. While fact-checking enterprises like Politifact provide valuable services for journalists and responsible readers, they have proven largely impotent at halting the avalanche of misinformation on the internet and in political discourse. As this column argues, the focus needs to be enlarged to discern not just what is "true" or "false" or "mostly true" or "mostly false," but also the motive, the intention, behind the assertion, whom it is aimed at persuading, and what its consequences may be. In other words, the responsible media, concerned citizens and member of academia must examine not just the veracity of individual statements, but the larger arguments at work.
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One does not find these manipulations of truth only on the right. The contortions and gyrations by the left on the relation between scientific understandings of fetal development and philosophical and legal assessments of human personhood match anything you see produced by conservatives on other issues. The stance by the president on abortion is the most scientifically creditable position he has. It is the trump card, so to speak, that won for him the election. Until the Democrats take a more nuanced and scientifically accurate position on abortion, they will always suffer from a lack of credibility, even though on many other issues they are far more in line with and attendant to observable scientific fact than the Republicans are.
1
Feelings are the Generals in our head. They run the show. This is a Human universal. Ask Spock. He will tell you about our frailties and vulnerability to the irrational. Any therapists out there? For all the stock they like to talk about beliefs, feelings are the true executives.
This is all "true" but there are no real solutions given here. Trump supporters prefer shortcuts that avoid nuance, conspiracies and lies that reinforce what they want to believe.
On a certain level, this is all just nonsense: why should anyone bother to invest any scarce mental time and energy debating the merits of a known snake-oil salesman? After all, we should all know what truth means, and yes, there is a distinction between one who lies, and one who simply does not care whether or not something happens to be true - the liar has to be aware of the veracity of a statement in order to maintain consistency, while the person who will say anything regardless of whether or not it happens to be true is free of any need to care about consistency.
Clearly, egocentric Trump has no regard for truth in any sense of the word.
So why all this commotion about philosophical ideas?
Clearly, egocentric Trump has no regard for truth in any sense of the word.
So why all this commotion about philosophical ideas?
3
The only way to properly evaluate any truth claim is to examine the evidence. If Trump's core strategy is to question contradictory or merely inconvenient evidence regardless of the source, he's not so much postmodern as post-Enlightenment.
Great column. About 99 percent of what we embrace with certainty is based on information that we don't observe first hand. And once we accept something as gospel, we find it almost impossible to admit we we're wrong about it, even in the face some times of overwhelming evidence. How many believers of end-of-days predictions over the past couple of centuries continued to cling to their positions despite experiencing another sunrise on the day after? But the author is wrong in suggesting that Trump has hijacked the philosophical practice of questioning the validity of all facts. What he is doing instead is exploiting the stubbornness within humans to cling to long-held beliefs and prejudices despite an abundance of empirical evidence. That Trump supporters will selectively apply skepticism to information supported by science and empirical evidence but fail to apply the same process of doubt to the nonsense Trump spouts daily suggest that there isn't a whole lot of high-minded philosophical calculation going on here. It's more psychological -- simple denial. Trump, and what he says and does, represents their worldview, which they will cling to regardless of fact or truth, no matter how it is presented.
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While we cannot necessarily know what is true, that does not mean that truth is therefore subjective or can be created by our wishful thinking or limited capacity for understanding. While one can deny the existence of gravity or the danger of fire, there is an objective truth beyond that mistaken belief with which we all must ultimately contend.
2
Don't let the perfect be the enemy of the good. The logical extension of modern thought on the relativity of truth, is to do nothing because we can know nothing. The many material and social changes in life wrought by the enlightenment suggests that our methods of perceiving reality, however imperfect, are tools worth using.
2
There has been a lot of dialoge about the impossibility of certainty. But, we should not confuse ideology and ethos.
Trump and conservatives posit a very specific truth. That they are never wrong.
We have politicians who switch policy positions on a daily basis. And, we have voters voicing support for the politicians who are failing to keep their promises.
Underlying the actions of both of these groups is a simple thought: "It is impossible for me to be wrong."
Trump and conservatives posit a very specific truth. That they are never wrong.
We have politicians who switch policy positions on a daily basis. And, we have voters voicing support for the politicians who are failing to keep their promises.
Underlying the actions of both of these groups is a simple thought: "It is impossible for me to be wrong."
2
"There’s no question that past presidents have lied."
How can there be "no question" they've lied if there is no such thing as truth? You are assuming the existence of the very notion you supposedly reject.
Look, there may be ways to present a more nuanced version of critical theory, ways to save it from the obvious foolishness of claiming that all statements are equally "made up." (Or the inevitable criticism that statements like "Truth means exercising power" are themselves truth claims.) But notwithstanding a few references to the "reductive version" of critical theory or the idea that "not all facts are created equal," this essay does not attempt to make that case. And that's a big problem. For if at the end of the day Trump's approach is a legitimate extension of critical theory, then critical theory really is as nonsensical as he is.
How can there be "no question" they've lied if there is no such thing as truth? You are assuming the existence of the very notion you supposedly reject.
Look, there may be ways to present a more nuanced version of critical theory, ways to save it from the obvious foolishness of claiming that all statements are equally "made up." (Or the inevitable criticism that statements like "Truth means exercising power" are themselves truth claims.) But notwithstanding a few references to the "reductive version" of critical theory or the idea that "not all facts are created equal," this essay does not attempt to make that case. And that's a big problem. For if at the end of the day Trump's approach is a legitimate extension of critical theory, then critical theory really is as nonsensical as he is.
2
Question all ideas? Putting aside the practical issue that few of us have the time to actually do that in a meaningful way, there is the urgency of crises like climate change where the failure to act is likely to have devastating consequences. Sure, critical thinking is a necessary practice in modern life. But putting some trust in experts who have dedicated their lives to studies in their fields is also quite reasonable.
2
For me the question comes down to the purpose words are used for. For politicians, and for demagogues the purpose is to sway and deceive for personal power.
For a scientist, in the common accepted parlance of that person, the purpose is to approximate some further verifiable findings.
To conflate these two approaches to the use of words I think is a mistake.
For a scientist, in the common accepted parlance of that person, the purpose is to approximate some further verifiable findings.
To conflate these two approaches to the use of words I think is a mistake.
1
It's a mistake to believe that all of academia, or even philosophers had bought into critical theory. It may have hit a high water mark at one point, but events from the Sokal Hoax onwards pretty much "deconstructed" critical theory.
Sloppy phrasing suggests that Washington himself perpetrated the falsehood about the cherry tree, rather than his 'biographer', Parson Weems, whose life of Washington bore only the most tenuous connexion with the actual man, as Weems himself admitted.
As for relativism, the engineer has been hoist with his own petard. It isn't only Trump and the alt-right who have relied on emotion rather than reason and adopted the assumption that 'truth' is whatever you want to believe, that saying something *really loud* makes it true, that every time you repeat it constitutes an element of evidence, and that winning an argument by shouting down and shutting up your opponent is effectively equivalent to winning by force of logic. I lived through the Sixties, friend Williams.
As for relativism, the engineer has been hoist with his own petard. It isn't only Trump and the alt-right who have relied on emotion rather than reason and adopted the assumption that 'truth' is whatever you want to believe, that saying something *really loud* makes it true, that every time you repeat it constitutes an element of evidence, and that winning an argument by shouting down and shutting up your opponent is effectively equivalent to winning by force of logic. I lived through the Sixties, friend Williams.
1
Arriving at truth political in America today?
1) All truth, whether scientific, philosophic or artistic or political or economic is provisional. This is not to say absolute truth, like God, does not exist, but the relationship of humans to truth is like a person taking an immensely difficult test with a seemingly infinite number of questions; obviously, in such a case, one will be fortunate to get a few answers right.
2) Because truth is provisional the best political order must operate like a ladder, facilitating path to truth (method in math or art or music or writing, not to mention in science--all our "how to"). The citizens in such an order must be facilitators toward increased clarity all the while knowing all the truth they know to be provisional.
3) Such political order as stated in #2 is difficult to establish. Humans are fallible, crowds get unruly, individuals seek power. We find attempts to impose "universal truth" on the masses by leaders whether out of wicked deceit or benevolence or simply unknowing ignorance; we find attempts to lie to the masses out of wicked deceit and out of benevolence and out of ignorance as well.
4) It appears in America technology (computer, etc.) has advanced ahead of society being formed politically as a ladder as stated in #2--a system of truth facilitation--which means problems as stated in #3 only threaten to increase. Particularly does the computer/internet threaten to have us encased in a fake reality created by power.
1) All truth, whether scientific, philosophic or artistic or political or economic is provisional. This is not to say absolute truth, like God, does not exist, but the relationship of humans to truth is like a person taking an immensely difficult test with a seemingly infinite number of questions; obviously, in such a case, one will be fortunate to get a few answers right.
2) Because truth is provisional the best political order must operate like a ladder, facilitating path to truth (method in math or art or music or writing, not to mention in science--all our "how to"). The citizens in such an order must be facilitators toward increased clarity all the while knowing all the truth they know to be provisional.
3) Such political order as stated in #2 is difficult to establish. Humans are fallible, crowds get unruly, individuals seek power. We find attempts to impose "universal truth" on the masses by leaders whether out of wicked deceit or benevolence or simply unknowing ignorance; we find attempts to lie to the masses out of wicked deceit and out of benevolence and out of ignorance as well.
4) It appears in America technology (computer, etc.) has advanced ahead of society being formed politically as a ladder as stated in #2--a system of truth facilitation--which means problems as stated in #3 only threaten to increase. Particularly does the computer/internet threaten to have us encased in a fake reality created by power.
Factual analysis has always been the mortal enemy of demagogues. Trump's extreme animus toward the media indicates an awareness in the reptilian complex of his brain, that institutions that deal in empirical fact are an existential threat to his proclivity for hyperbole, distortion, and outright fabrication. His primary ally his been the revolutionary development of social media where the volume of information makes timely verification of its accuracy an impossibility and every new day brings more data.The sheer volume of material is of existential benefit to pathological liars like Donald Trump. Eventually "facts" are reduced to the neutrality of "data"and objective truth disappears. It would have take a Machiavellian genius to have figured all this out in advance. The success of Donald Trump's demagoguery of falsehood would have been impossible without its synchronicity with social media.
2
Everyday Americans have to continue to fight for truth and hold Trump and others accountable when they deny verifiable claims of fact, and when they make claims without any evidence to support them.
In totalitarian states they change facts on a whim depending on who is in power. If we want to avoid this in America, people in positions of authority need to know they have to answer to the people.
In totalitarian states they change facts on a whim depending on who is in power. If we want to avoid this in America, people in positions of authority need to know they have to answer to the people.
"From these premises, philosophers and theorists have derived a number of related insights. One is that facts are socially constructed."
Hence proof that the premises are false.
Time dilation happens whether society believes it or not.
Global warming is happening whether society believes it or not.
Evolution has happened and continues to happen whether society believes it or not.
For more details, see "The Flight from Science and Reason (Annals of the New York Academy of Sciences)" by Gross, Levitt, and Lewis, and
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sokal_affair
It's sad that Mr. Williams is trapped back in the year 1995. And that fact is not socially constructed.
Hence proof that the premises are false.
Time dilation happens whether society believes it or not.
Global warming is happening whether society believes it or not.
Evolution has happened and continues to happen whether society believes it or not.
For more details, see "The Flight from Science and Reason (Annals of the New York Academy of Sciences)" by Gross, Levitt, and Lewis, and
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sokal_affair
It's sad that Mr. Williams is trapped back in the year 1995. And that fact is not socially constructed.
"Paying attention to how knowledge is created and used can help us hold leaders like Trump accountable for what they say."
should read:
"Paying attention to how *lies and misinformation are* created and used can help us hold leaders like Trump accountable for what they say."
Trump is not creating knowledge with his lying, even when people believe him. Such believers are not possessed of new knowledge; erroneous impressions are not knowledge.
should read:
"Paying attention to how *lies and misinformation are* created and used can help us hold leaders like Trump accountable for what they say."
Trump is not creating knowledge with his lying, even when people believe him. Such believers are not possessed of new knowledge; erroneous impressions are not knowledge.
2
Yes, absolute facts are elusive, colored as they are by our imperfect individual mentality. But as individuals, and as society, we have tools to make good decisions even when uncertain . One is to ask critical questions. And if something quacks like a duck it is probably a duck. We can also adopt the scientific approach and ask the two critical questions: what is the evidence? ie, show me! And can the result (fact?) be replicated.
It is not likely that the Crazy Man will go looking for truth since he is 70 years old and not likely to have an "awakening" of any kind. What I see happening in our society is that we are questioning his ideas of "truth" and calling him out as a result. Especially in the mainstream news media I have seen reporters come almost to the point of saying "those are lies." Each person must find their own personal truth for their life but when it comes to public policy I want the truth called "facts."
1
The stretching of truth and the facts has become ridiculous, as we feel 'free' to question even empiric evidence. And given that Reason alone cannot reach the truth, especially when driven with the emotion liar- Trump is able to instill in his misinformed and prejudiced folks, and that emotions already formed persevere in spite of contrary evidence, you find them impervious to new evidence, hence, not persuadable. Trump, an ignoramus unable to tell truth from lie, to him they sound interchangeable, is no match for philosophy's aims. If government's aims are supposed to resolve conflicts, and provide as best it can to the needs of all its citizens, crooked lying Trump is failing miserably. Reality is what it is, and we must demand objective reasons to believe in, however imperfect, and accepting change as new evidence becomes available. Just do not expect our current liar-in-chief to abide.
"But the parallels between Trump’s attacks on accepted knowledge and critical philosophy’s insistence that we interrogate truth claims suggest that not all assaults on the authority of facts are revolutionary."
Any parallels between dt's attacks on accepted knowledge and philosophy of any kind are completely accidental. He isn't thinking when he lies - they just pop out. It's his nature, not any thoughtful philosophy. He knows no more about that than one of those frog emojis of which his fans are so fond.
Any parallels between dt's attacks on accepted knowledge and philosophy of any kind are completely accidental. He isn't thinking when he lies - they just pop out. It's his nature, not any thoughtful philosophy. He knows no more about that than one of those frog emojis of which his fans are so fond.
If the "effect" of "feeling the truth" of climate denial is that I'm happy to see my flowers bloom earlier, does that bring back the coral reefs off Australia or stop street flooding in Florida?
This is just whackadoodle thinking. Greenhouse gases warm the earth, melt the ice pack, acidify the oceans and cause flooding. But, wait, it warms the heart of the right wing politicians and their deep-pocketed sponsors.
The "effect" of believing in the science of climate change is that we might save our lives and our planet.
The same reasoning applies to vaccine deniers where the "effect" of denial is to put lives at risk.
We are ignoring the Enlightenment and it is putting us, and the earth, in danger. But it makes the GOP happy so if that's the "effect" you want, congratulations, you've won.
This is just whackadoodle thinking. Greenhouse gases warm the earth, melt the ice pack, acidify the oceans and cause flooding. But, wait, it warms the heart of the right wing politicians and their deep-pocketed sponsors.
The "effect" of believing in the science of climate change is that we might save our lives and our planet.
The same reasoning applies to vaccine deniers where the "effect" of denial is to put lives at risk.
We are ignoring the Enlightenment and it is putting us, and the earth, in danger. But it makes the GOP happy so if that's the "effect" you want, congratulations, you've won.
2
Yes, Critical Thinking is an important tool in our Post-Truth era, but what is most important is action.
As long as we treat Trump and the Republican Party as a Reality Show ("...can you believe what he just said/Tweeted?!?") the easier it is for them to act in their interest by ignoring the gasps from the audience.
As soon as we stop analyzing and start acting based on our own (however tenuous) understanding of our reality, the harder it will be for the current Party in Power to make changes that we believe are harmful to us and our communities (based on our individual analysis of "facts" and "theories" and "opinions").
Yes, consider all the imperfect information available, but then ACT, otherwise we continue to be only witnesses to the harmful actions of others.
As long as we treat Trump and the Republican Party as a Reality Show ("...can you believe what he just said/Tweeted?!?") the easier it is for them to act in their interest by ignoring the gasps from the audience.
As soon as we stop analyzing and start acting based on our own (however tenuous) understanding of our reality, the harder it will be for the current Party in Power to make changes that we believe are harmful to us and our communities (based on our individual analysis of "facts" and "theories" and "opinions").
Yes, consider all the imperfect information available, but then ACT, otherwise we continue to be only witnesses to the harmful actions of others.
1
If an absolute dedication to self-aggrandizement can be called philosophy, then Trump* is a philosopher extraordinaire.
1
"There are no facts, only interpretations." -- Thus spaketh Nietzsche.
Yet as he also observed: "The liar is a person who uses the valid designations, the words, in order to make something which is unreal appear to be real. He says, for example, "I am rich," when the proper designation for his condition would be "poor." He misuses fixed conventions by means of arbitrary substitutions or even reversals of names. If he does this in a selfish and moreover harmful manner, society will cease to trust him and will thereby exclude him. What men avoid by excluding the liar is not so much being defrauded as it is being harmed by means of fraud. Thus, even at this stage, what they hate is basically not deception itself, but rather the unpleasant, hated consequences of certain sorts of deception. It is in a similarly restricted sense that man now wants nothing but truth: he desires the pleasant, life-preserving consequences of truth. He is indifferent toward pure knowledge which has no consequences; toward those truths which are possibly harmful and destructive he is even hostilely inclined."
-- On Truth and Lies in a Non-moral Sense.
Yet as he also observed: "The liar is a person who uses the valid designations, the words, in order to make something which is unreal appear to be real. He says, for example, "I am rich," when the proper designation for his condition would be "poor." He misuses fixed conventions by means of arbitrary substitutions or even reversals of names. If he does this in a selfish and moreover harmful manner, society will cease to trust him and will thereby exclude him. What men avoid by excluding the liar is not so much being defrauded as it is being harmed by means of fraud. Thus, even at this stage, what they hate is basically not deception itself, but rather the unpleasant, hated consequences of certain sorts of deception. It is in a similarly restricted sense that man now wants nothing but truth: he desires the pleasant, life-preserving consequences of truth. He is indifferent toward pure knowledge which has no consequences; toward those truths which are possibly harmful and destructive he is even hostilely inclined."
-- On Truth and Lies in a Non-moral Sense.
This piece makes the fundamental error of attributing too much thought to Trump's incoherent brain and mind, to the point of giving him philosophical significance. One has to be too clouded in one's own thinking to attribute coherence to someone who is nothing more than an incoherent, impulsive, overgrown and incorrigible school yard bully, a developmentally disabled man-child who lacks the brain function and the mental capacity to look at himself, let alone recognize himself. This piece tries but fails to impress. Trump is a real global threat, which is something that matters, not merely a topic for pseudo-intellectual discussion by the academically bored but ambitious, which is something that too often does not.
So, it turns out that reductio ad absurdum in the form of Trumpism is the best argument against "critique." Wouldn't it have been better for all of us if common sense had prevailed at a much earlier stage, and the absurdity of the enterprise had been recognized before it could exert its toxic influence? And by the way, the cherry tree story was never "George Washington's great claim to honesty"--it was made up by a biographer, Mason Locke Weems, after Washington's death. Not that there is any way to "know" the "truth" of that statement, since it depends upon "facts" (there was no mention of the cherry tree story during Washington's life, or in the first four editions of Weems' biography) that must have been "socially constructed." A reference (for what it's worth): http://www.mountvernon.org/digital-encyclopedia/article/cherry-tree-myth/
It seems that Latour and other constructivists fail to distinguish between facts and conclusions.
To say that the crowd at Donald Trump's inauguration was smaller than the one at another president's is to state a conclusion reached by the evaluation of evidence using one's powers of judgement. Of course there is an underlying fact, whatever it may be, but the intervening evidence and judgement are arguably suspect. The statement of a conclusion is a bid to represent a fact. The notion that conclusions are made and not found is sound enough.
But to say that Donald Trump was inaugurated on January 20, 2017, is to state a fact. It can be forgotten or ignored (at one's peril), but it cannot be deconstructed or relegated to the realm of competing narratives. Neither can, say, the fact that the institution of slavery once existed in the United States of America. One can become a denier of some fact, and yet the fact remains. One can play word games, perhaps making "slavery" out to be one of the very words that enslave us, but the only effect will be to poison the wells of society. The fact remains.
Facts are indeed findable. We may fail to find them, but let's not be tricked into losing them by sophists who tell us they were never more than made-up things.
As for conclusions, we'd be wise to accept those of people who at least strive to get at objective truth instead of starting from the assumption that truth is what you make it.
http://thefamilyproperty.blogspot.jp/
To say that the crowd at Donald Trump's inauguration was smaller than the one at another president's is to state a conclusion reached by the evaluation of evidence using one's powers of judgement. Of course there is an underlying fact, whatever it may be, but the intervening evidence and judgement are arguably suspect. The statement of a conclusion is a bid to represent a fact. The notion that conclusions are made and not found is sound enough.
But to say that Donald Trump was inaugurated on January 20, 2017, is to state a fact. It can be forgotten or ignored (at one's peril), but it cannot be deconstructed or relegated to the realm of competing narratives. Neither can, say, the fact that the institution of slavery once existed in the United States of America. One can become a denier of some fact, and yet the fact remains. One can play word games, perhaps making "slavery" out to be one of the very words that enslave us, but the only effect will be to poison the wells of society. The fact remains.
Facts are indeed findable. We may fail to find them, but let's not be tricked into losing them by sophists who tell us they were never more than made-up things.
As for conclusions, we'd be wise to accept those of people who at least strive to get at objective truth instead of starting from the assumption that truth is what you make it.
http://thefamilyproperty.blogspot.jp/
Casey WIlliams-- your premise is based on an assumption, that for many Americans, appears to be beyond the realm of "false fact." Perhaps Trump's early morning tweets are manifestations of a mental and emotion disorder, the ramblings of a borderline psychotic, who mixes an early morning semi-dream state with a subconscious desire to escape from painful truths. Maybe if he were not president, some of his assertions would be grounds to "Baker Act" the man for be mentally delusional and dangerous to himself and others.
2
If Trump was still just Trump, the ugly male gigolo of real estate and public face for the tragedy of untreated egotism, we wouldn't care that much about his lifelong ignorance of the truth.
Our concerns about his talent at taking third grade taunts and elevating them to supposedly brilliant corporate strategy would be more a matter of ongoing "look! there's a train wreck!" fascination than occasion for philosophizers to wax grandiloquent.
The point is, Trump and his antics matter more or less depending on your relationship to him; depending upon where you stand.
Sadly, everybody here now stands beneath him, our President. So we take his childish sputterings with a grain of concern we certainly otherwise would not.
An important reason this is so are the cynical, self-serving positions of many formerly small power groups who see at long last a way to grab some good old Presidential power for themselves: generals; obvious corporate shills, money grubbers of every stripe, climate deniers, and Evangelical quacks all benefit from and reinforce Trump's inherent unreliability and willingness to say and do anything because he can. Because he likes to see us jump.
Philosophers should know better. They ought to point out that this emperor is indeed wearing very little, not debating the meaning of his pocket square.
Critique is valuable only when deployed with care where appropriate. In the present case, all Williams is doing is ennobling and legitimizing pathology.
Our concerns about his talent at taking third grade taunts and elevating them to supposedly brilliant corporate strategy would be more a matter of ongoing "look! there's a train wreck!" fascination than occasion for philosophizers to wax grandiloquent.
The point is, Trump and his antics matter more or less depending on your relationship to him; depending upon where you stand.
Sadly, everybody here now stands beneath him, our President. So we take his childish sputterings with a grain of concern we certainly otherwise would not.
An important reason this is so are the cynical, self-serving positions of many formerly small power groups who see at long last a way to grab some good old Presidential power for themselves: generals; obvious corporate shills, money grubbers of every stripe, climate deniers, and Evangelical quacks all benefit from and reinforce Trump's inherent unreliability and willingness to say and do anything because he can. Because he likes to see us jump.
Philosophers should know better. They ought to point out that this emperor is indeed wearing very little, not debating the meaning of his pocket square.
Critique is valuable only when deployed with care where appropriate. In the present case, all Williams is doing is ennobling and legitimizing pathology.
1
Trump knows how to stretch the truth to make it fit his alternative reality.
No and no. Donald Trump lies wit deceit. Do not give him intellectual cover.
In times like ours where there is no consensus on values, the "truths" that show the best results for the greatest number will win the day.
For a recent book on how economists socially created their vocabulary, see Robert Mitchell's The Language of Economic: Socially Constructed Vocabularies and Assumptions (Palgrave MacMillan, 2016).
2
"... a critical attitude allows us to question dominant systems of thought." Kind of reminds me of guy named Sokal.
It seems, according to the writer, that there is a least one objective truth: the truth that all truth is relative.
And this is why, as a scientist, I think most of modern philosophy is as useless to me as the Bible or Koran. Scientists have to belive there is objective truth. True we all have biases, and those may blind us to a better explanation and in some sense, truth if provisional. But that doesn't mean is doesn't exist. We work off the best theories and hypotheses we have until they are disproven or a better explanation comes along. But all of this is premised on the idea that their is an objective truth. To think otherwise is just plain stupid. Here is a recommendation. When you begin to loose faith that their is objective truth, look to math. 1+1 will always equal 2 no matter how much we might want it to be otherwise. If junk philosophy (the kind you describe) is what got us here, it is long past time for philosophers to stop their intellectual masturbation and figure out a modern philosophy that helps us understand objective reality, rather than 'deconstruct' it. The so called "intellectual rigour" of philosophy is no different than the ancients using 'reason' to figure out how many angels can dance on the head of a pin. It may be satisfying, but the starting premise is wrong to start out with.
Philosophy that works against us knowing the truth in not only antithecical to the original intent of the discipline but dangerous. Just as Mulder said, "The truth is out there".
Philosophy that works against us knowing the truth in not only antithecical to the original intent of the discipline but dangerous. Just as Mulder said, "The truth is out there".
1
This feels more psychological than philosophical. Just another snake oil salesman selling his wares. It's always in the Midwest, too.
The rejection of a basically agreed upon objective reality by post-modernist fools has paved the way for villains like Brannon and Trump. Thanks a lot.
1
This "extreme relativism" goes way too far. There are certain basic tenets of "truth", for example the "law of non-contradiction" (i.e. something cannot by x and not x), and basic laws of identity (i.e. this is x e.g there is a person/building etc here) without which no society can communicate. When people say Trump is a pathological liar, they are referring to his constant breaking of these two basic tenets of truth, and they are correct.
David Halle
David Halle
It has nothing to do with confusing facts or the relativism of truth. This really is all about the fear of losing white hegemony in America. There is no evil too great that his supporters would not support in their attempt to maintain there position above other races.
Williams' commentary here really is regrettable. Leaving aside the questionable merit of the piece itself -
Not only does he go along with the banal and deeply false conflation of various 'isms' with simple relativism. I'd like him to provide a single example of any of these 'critical social scientists and humanists' (why humanists? who are these people exactly?) asserting epistemological relativism.
Not only does he assert - completely falsely and in fact meaninglessly (in the terms of Kant's philosophy) - that for Kant 'We can never have certain knowledge about the world in its entirety,'
And to say that Kant thinks that 'Claiming to know the truth is therefore a kind of assertion of power' is scandalous. It was Immanuel Kant who wrote in his famous newspaper article (not famous enough it seems) 'What is Enlightenment?', that the motto of the enlightenment itself is *Sapere Aude* - Dare to know.
The one trace element in Williams' article that is worth keeping is the claim that power always tries to arrogate the right to truth. There is nothing new in this, nor in the need to assert that the category of truth, and of rationality, is worth defending, must be defended.
As the much misunderstood (alleged relativist) Jean-François Lyotard puts it, our context is one marked by a 'weariness with regard to "theory," and the miserable slackening that goes along with it (new this, new that, post-this, post-that, etc.). The time has come to philosophise.' (The Differend)
Not only does he go along with the banal and deeply false conflation of various 'isms' with simple relativism. I'd like him to provide a single example of any of these 'critical social scientists and humanists' (why humanists? who are these people exactly?) asserting epistemological relativism.
Not only does he assert - completely falsely and in fact meaninglessly (in the terms of Kant's philosophy) - that for Kant 'We can never have certain knowledge about the world in its entirety,'
And to say that Kant thinks that 'Claiming to know the truth is therefore a kind of assertion of power' is scandalous. It was Immanuel Kant who wrote in his famous newspaper article (not famous enough it seems) 'What is Enlightenment?', that the motto of the enlightenment itself is *Sapere Aude* - Dare to know.
The one trace element in Williams' article that is worth keeping is the claim that power always tries to arrogate the right to truth. There is nothing new in this, nor in the need to assert that the category of truth, and of rationality, is worth defending, must be defended.
As the much misunderstood (alleged relativist) Jean-François Lyotard puts it, our context is one marked by a 'weariness with regard to "theory," and the miserable slackening that goes along with it (new this, new that, post-this, post-that, etc.). The time has come to philosophise.' (The Differend)
"... influential thinkers like Nietzsche, Foucault and Derrida..." What about the boards at the National Rifle Association and the Federal Reserve for Bankers? Those are influential thinkers, right?
is there anything more laughable than the idea that philosophy shops matter? After two hundred years outsiders have discovered that our philosophers ignore the eastern world. The thinkers have to think about that.
How wonderful that the Times lets the unimportant have a say.
is there anything more laughable than the idea that philosophy shops matter? After two hundred years outsiders have discovered that our philosophers ignore the eastern world. The thinkers have to think about that.
How wonderful that the Times lets the unimportant have a say.
The existence of certain “truth” may be debatable, but as I sit here in the hills of Vermont communicating with the NYT, listening on the web to NPR before I get in my car to drive somewhere using GPS (dependent on the theory of relativity, of course), and possibly looking through a telescope tonight at some distant galaxy, I’m thinking that maybe we do know some things objectively, even it Newton, and maybe even Einstein, did not get it exactly right.
We can be empathetic to the few Trump supporters who have been “bent out of shape from society's pliers” (to quote a Nobel prize winner), but most of the Trumpniks are not in that position. They are people who are, in fact, 100% certain that God implants immortal souls at the “moment” of conception, that Hillary committed treason, and that there is no connection between the Trump campaign and Putin. They, apparently, do believe in facts, or at least alternative facts. Then there are Pruitt, Ebell, and Lamar Smith, all lawyers, who in their brilliance know more about science and climate change than the folks at the National Academy of Sciences and the American Meteorological Society.
When faced with such mendaciousness, it’s good to remember what Jefferson said: Ridicule is the only weapon which can be used against unintelligible propositions. A good dose of contempt is also well-justified.
We can be empathetic to the few Trump supporters who have been “bent out of shape from society's pliers” (to quote a Nobel prize winner), but most of the Trumpniks are not in that position. They are people who are, in fact, 100% certain that God implants immortal souls at the “moment” of conception, that Hillary committed treason, and that there is no connection between the Trump campaign and Putin. They, apparently, do believe in facts, or at least alternative facts. Then there are Pruitt, Ebell, and Lamar Smith, all lawyers, who in their brilliance know more about science and climate change than the folks at the National Academy of Sciences and the American Meteorological Society.
When faced with such mendaciousness, it’s good to remember what Jefferson said: Ridicule is the only weapon which can be used against unintelligible propositions. A good dose of contempt is also well-justified.
"In March, the president fired off a tweet accusing former President Barack Obama of wiretapping Trump Tower."
We don't know that Obama did not. After all we know that he wiretapped both Mrs. Merkel and the Dilma Roussef, the president of Brazil. Maybe Obama did wiretap Trump and maybe he did not.
If you want to accuse Trump of lying (and I am not claiming that he did not lie) you need to come up with something which is clear and non-partisan.
We don't know that Obama did not. After all we know that he wiretapped both Mrs. Merkel and the Dilma Roussef, the president of Brazil. Maybe Obama did wiretap Trump and maybe he did not.
If you want to accuse Trump of lying (and I am not claiming that he did not lie) you need to come up with something which is clear and non-partisan.
I think there is a difference between:
"People who produce facts — scientists, reporters, witnesses — do so from a particular social position (maybe they’re white, male and live in America) that influences how they perceive, interpret and judge the world."
And people knowingly lying.
"People who produce facts — scientists, reporters, witnesses — do so from a particular social position (maybe they’re white, male and live in America) that influences how they perceive, interpret and judge the world."
And people knowingly lying.
1
Nietzsche nailed the point back in 1873 when he wrote:
“Truth is a mobile army of metaphors.”
Casey insightfully explicates the conundrum which Nietzschean influenced post-modernism has created in its pursuit of the truth that truth is socially, and ultimately metaphorically, constructed.
A way out of the maze is to provide critical substance to the existential reality that animates our imaginations, and hence our pursuit of truth, namely, that truth is ultimately accepted in the heart, with heads following in tow. That is to say, it is finally ratified as truth in affectivity.
Ratified fallibilistically and subject to ongoing critique and adjustment to be sure.
By making affectivity the capstone of truth – which is rarely pure and never simple (Wilde) - we acquire a powerful dialectical weapon to use against a sociopathic liar such as Trump
“It just doesn’t feel right to me to throw 24m people off health insurance."
“You, Mr. Trump? Critical theory tells me that you apparently do feel that it is right to throw 24m people off health insurance. Perhaps to subserve some other, unarticulated, motivations?
“So, let's start with explicating our respective affective, i.e., motivational narratives. Certainly follow up with as many reasons and facts as you like. But then ask the people, which affective narrative, critically vetted, gives them a better feeling.”
Truth is about the motives, stupid.
And sociopathic narcissists tend to have, upon disclosure, smarmy motives.
“Truth is a mobile army of metaphors.”
Casey insightfully explicates the conundrum which Nietzschean influenced post-modernism has created in its pursuit of the truth that truth is socially, and ultimately metaphorically, constructed.
A way out of the maze is to provide critical substance to the existential reality that animates our imaginations, and hence our pursuit of truth, namely, that truth is ultimately accepted in the heart, with heads following in tow. That is to say, it is finally ratified as truth in affectivity.
Ratified fallibilistically and subject to ongoing critique and adjustment to be sure.
By making affectivity the capstone of truth – which is rarely pure and never simple (Wilde) - we acquire a powerful dialectical weapon to use against a sociopathic liar such as Trump
“It just doesn’t feel right to me to throw 24m people off health insurance."
“You, Mr. Trump? Critical theory tells me that you apparently do feel that it is right to throw 24m people off health insurance. Perhaps to subserve some other, unarticulated, motivations?
“So, let's start with explicating our respective affective, i.e., motivational narratives. Certainly follow up with as many reasons and facts as you like. But then ask the people, which affective narrative, critically vetted, gives them a better feeling.”
Truth is about the motives, stupid.
And sociopathic narcissists tend to have, upon disclosure, smarmy motives.
The Trumpian version of Kipling's, "If" might be:
If you can meet with truth and falsehood, and treat those two imposters just the same.
Oh, that's right, that's also the phenomonelogical version of Kipling.
If you can meet with truth and falsehood, and treat those two imposters just the same.
Oh, that's right, that's also the phenomonelogical version of Kipling.
If the world is the collection of facts, not things, and if facts are created not discovered, then the question is what facts do we want to build what kind of world? Sure they are all alternative facts. And some are unspeakable: racial and gebder bias, to name two.
If all facts are "made up" then the fact that all facts are made up is made up.
Yes, very nice essay, but "liar liar pants on fire" is still a more compelling rebuttal to the likes of professional prevaricators like tRump, Spicey and CONherWAY.
2
Facts derived from the Latin verb facere are made. Not all facts are equally made because they differ on account of their author, their times, the reasons they were made. To approach the reality in facts we have to ask questions about their origin, the intentions of the originator and the possible effects.
As a sociologist of international relations I have proposed a future set of realities that are integrated by the purpose of dealing with humanity’s most impactful challenge of a looming climate catastrophe. The conceptual, institutional, ethical and strategic dimensions of a carbon-based international monetary system with its monetary standard of a specific tonnage of CO2 per person are presented in Verhagen 2012 "The Tierra Solution: Resolving the climate crisis through monetary transformation" and updated at www.timun.net. Very few people feel close to the reality of this proposal, though an unsolicited review on Amazon is an exception. Also an exception is the opinion of Bill McKibben who wrote his realistic view on the future and my book on May 17, 2011: “The further into the global warming area we go, the more physics and politics narrows our possible paths of action. Here’s a very cogent and well-argued account of one of the remaining possibilities.”
As a sociologist of international relations I have proposed a future set of realities that are integrated by the purpose of dealing with humanity’s most impactful challenge of a looming climate catastrophe. The conceptual, institutional, ethical and strategic dimensions of a carbon-based international monetary system with its monetary standard of a specific tonnage of CO2 per person are presented in Verhagen 2012 "The Tierra Solution: Resolving the climate crisis through monetary transformation" and updated at www.timun.net. Very few people feel close to the reality of this proposal, though an unsolicited review on Amazon is an exception. Also an exception is the opinion of Bill McKibben who wrote his realistic view on the future and my book on May 17, 2011: “The further into the global warming area we go, the more physics and politics narrows our possible paths of action. Here’s a very cogent and well-argued account of one of the remaining possibilities.”
It seems that we could distill Casey Williams' essay to: "Truth is relative. Lies aren't." I don't know if you get to have it both ways.
One concern is that we may incorrectly assume that anyone who challenges received wisdom must be correct. I think of it as a post-Watergate mindset. With Watergate, our tendency to trust our President took a nosedive from which it hasn't recovered.
For years, The Washington Post has had a weekly feature on "Five Myths About _____." It seems based on the premise that anyone who labels some conventional wisdom as a "myth" must automatically be correct. The Post published my critique, "Five Myths about Five Myths," but the misleading series has continued.
For years, The Washington Post has had a weekly feature on "Five Myths About _____." It seems based on the premise that anyone who labels some conventional wisdom as a "myth" must automatically be correct. The Post published my critique, "Five Myths about Five Myths," but the misleading series has continued.
2
Physical truth enforces itself. Unfortunately historical truth does not ... there's that snarky line of McGuire's in "Wicked" that goes: “Where I'm from, we believe in all sorts of things that aren't true... we call it history.”
You can sing "Defying Gravity" all you like, but gravity will never bend to your will.
You can sing "Defying Gravity" all you like, but gravity will never bend to your will.
1
Academics, read this in your charge:
New Donald Trump is but old Jacques Derrida writ large
or rather, bigly
Seriously, you cannot have it both ways. You cannot deplore his 'alternative facts' when you have been doing the very same thing for at least 40 years. As for them being 'our ideas', have postmodernists ever heard of Pyrrho of Elis (360-270 BC). Google him.
New Donald Trump is but old Jacques Derrida writ large
or rather, bigly
Seriously, you cannot have it both ways. You cannot deplore his 'alternative facts' when you have been doing the very same thing for at least 40 years. As for them being 'our ideas', have postmodernists ever heard of Pyrrho of Elis (360-270 BC). Google him.
"For decades, critical social scientists and humanists have chipped away at the idea of truth." -- you are johnny-come-lately to this approach.
"Claiming to know the truth is therefore a kind of assertion of power" -- farting into a windstorm is a kind of assertion of power. This is kind of a trivial statement.
"facts are socially constructed" -- except to those outside society, like my cat, who tends to take things at face value.
"making truth means exercising power." If power is the ability to take action whose consequences are salient to someone, then most social actions are exercising power -- there is nothing special here about assertions of truth.
"perhaps our critiques can also reveal new ways of thinking" -- they haven't yet, so dream on.
"Claiming to know the truth is therefore a kind of assertion of power" -- farting into a windstorm is a kind of assertion of power. This is kind of a trivial statement.
"facts are socially constructed" -- except to those outside society, like my cat, who tends to take things at face value.
"making truth means exercising power." If power is the ability to take action whose consequences are salient to someone, then most social actions are exercising power -- there is nothing special here about assertions of truth.
"perhaps our critiques can also reveal new ways of thinking" -- they haven't yet, so dream on.
1
It is sad when philosophy becomes a servant of the Democratic party. Trump is not the biggest advocate of truth. But neither is he the biggest liar. To pick HIM to make a philosophical point is to put politics above understanding.
And a graduate student in literature is chosen to sum up philosophy?
Just what IS the matter with the New York Times?
And a graduate student in literature is chosen to sum up philosophy?
Just what IS the matter with the New York Times?
"It often feels like Drumpf has stolen our ideas and weaponized them." You nailed it. It is exactly this trespass thatI find personally so dispiriting, because you just know these salivating clowns don't have a clue what critical theory is let alone how much work is involved in the process of testing truth claims. It is starting to feel like the Enlightenment never happened. Where are you David Hume?
This video explains that Trump will complete the system of German idealism that Kant could not:
https://youtu.be/iOk6HB609po?t=40s
https://youtu.be/iOk6HB609po?t=40s
Fact is fiction until you step on a plane, take medicine, use the internet, or trust an elevator. These postmodernists, relativists, deconstructionists, whatever you want to call them use facts moment by moment, all day, and then pontificate against them in class. Here's another fact: They're hypocrites.
2
Hifhfalluting gibberish! Trump is a habitual snd unrepentant liar, plain and simple. Why,dignify his fsbricsfiins with even a tongue-in-cheek philosophical analysis? Don't philosophers believe in plain speech?
Never underestimate the abject willful ignorance of the " uneducated " Trump supporter. Add racism, sexism, xenophobia. Add a heaping handful of gay bashing, gun clenching and, of course, abortion. All promulgated by the " preachers " and by FOX. That is the philosophy, and strategy.
1
Foucault is dead. Literally. The insights of relativist thinking should not lead to the utter abandonment of truth. People do die. That is not a social construction. Guns and explosives kill people. Presidents order their use. Presidents kill people. All the time. I am not sure there was one who was not ever a murderer.
174
Hyper-real Donald Trump, Hyper-real according to Jean Beaudrillard: "Fundamentally it's a domain where you can no longer interrogate an event, a character, a discourse about its degree of original realty." In short, It is one's incapacity to distinguish the real from a simulation of the real. It is a condition when the real, and what is fiction is intermingled resulting in no difference between the two.
Jimmy Carter.
It's always been a need. It's about ethical reasoning.
It's the intellectual discipline of critical thinking skills. Detecting bias. Recognizing propaganda. Using logical thinking strategies and a strong sense of logic. Depth of thinking and reasoning.
It's more as if in the Trump era, we're dealing with people's self-deception.
So more valuable than ever is a free press that monitors, analyzes, assesses the tricks, lies + deceit from politicians misleading the people.
And journalists joining in television programs to appeal to reason and evidence as to fraud and deception.
Speaking truth to power.
It's the intellectual discipline of critical thinking skills. Detecting bias. Recognizing propaganda. Using logical thinking strategies and a strong sense of logic. Depth of thinking and reasoning.
It's more as if in the Trump era, we're dealing with people's self-deception.
So more valuable than ever is a free press that monitors, analyzes, assesses the tricks, lies + deceit from politicians misleading the people.
And journalists joining in television programs to appeal to reason and evidence as to fraud and deception.
Speaking truth to power.
17
Yeah, Where were these so-called journalists during the recent campaign?
Too busy fixating on what he wanted them to---Hillary's emails.
Bill's past. Meanwhile there was not one darn thing in those emails. It was manufactured outrage.
And Bernie--he's still not helping. He's criticizing Democrats every time you see him. He did what Trump did:
Took a party he wasn't really a member of and ran as one.
Both guys hijacked the party they ran in.
And those vain third party candidates let Trump win by proxy.
Top that with James Comey keeping it secret they were investigating Trump's ties to Russia, and Wikileaks being treated as a legitimate outlet.
And Comey feeling the need to take away momentum from Hillary, days before the election.
The media never stopping filming Trump to let us see Hillary's policy speeches. The media wasn't harsh enough on him as to what a failure he was in every debate. The media turned the election into Trump TV.
Bill's past. Meanwhile there was not one darn thing in those emails. It was manufactured outrage.
And Bernie--he's still not helping. He's criticizing Democrats every time you see him. He did what Trump did:
Took a party he wasn't really a member of and ran as one.
Both guys hijacked the party they ran in.
And those vain third party candidates let Trump win by proxy.
Top that with James Comey keeping it secret they were investigating Trump's ties to Russia, and Wikileaks being treated as a legitimate outlet.
And Comey feeling the need to take away momentum from Hillary, days before the election.
The media never stopping filming Trump to let us see Hillary's policy speeches. The media wasn't harsh enough on him as to what a failure he was in every debate. The media turned the election into Trump TV.
A little googling confirmed my suspicion that Williams is more a Literature student than a philosopher.
I guessed this because "critical theory" and "post-modernism" are no longer taken very seriously in Philosophy - if they ever were.
Nietzsche is still respectable, but no one in Philosophy reads Foucault or Derrida anymore - and rightly so in my opinion.
However, literature students - who rarely have any training in real Philosophy - virtually equate critical theory and post-modernism with Philosophy.
I don't know why this is so. I suspect it is part of a strategy like religionists sometimes use: "Everyone is religious, so we're no more crazy than you are".
If everything is just "narrative" and "stories" than maybe studying literature isn't a complete waste of time.
There is, of course, a grain of truth in post-modernism. Of course we have to be careful about bias. And Foucault and Kuhn have done a valuable service in emphasizing how subtly bias can come in.
But, of course, good science absorbs this insight, in order to do better science. You don't therefore reject science as just another "narrative".
There are no "post-modernists" on an airplane.
I guessed this because "critical theory" and "post-modernism" are no longer taken very seriously in Philosophy - if they ever were.
Nietzsche is still respectable, but no one in Philosophy reads Foucault or Derrida anymore - and rightly so in my opinion.
However, literature students - who rarely have any training in real Philosophy - virtually equate critical theory and post-modernism with Philosophy.
I don't know why this is so. I suspect it is part of a strategy like religionists sometimes use: "Everyone is religious, so we're no more crazy than you are".
If everything is just "narrative" and "stories" than maybe studying literature isn't a complete waste of time.
There is, of course, a grain of truth in post-modernism. Of course we have to be careful about bias. And Foucault and Kuhn have done a valuable service in emphasizing how subtly bias can come in.
But, of course, good science absorbs this insight, in order to do better science. You don't therefore reject science as just another "narrative".
There are no "post-modernists" on an airplane.
268
Thank-you.
You perfectly encapsulated my thoughts and saved me the effort to reply to this essay.
You perfectly encapsulated my thoughts and saved me the effort to reply to this essay.
1
Tut,tut, John. If you looked at the end of the article, you could have saved yourself the trouble of googling.
This is a really good post. Virtual high-fives for you, sir.
1
Trump's peculiar relationship with the truth was great on the campaign trail, and got him elected, but it's not helping him govern. Sure, the photo-ops of him signing his 39-plus executive orders and memos create the illusion that much is getting done, but the fact is that only 12 of them will actually "do" something.
The midterms will be around before we know it. All the Democrats need to do is ask voters "Are you better off today than you were two years ago?". We'll see where Trump's lies get his GOP buddies then.
The midterms will be around before we know it. All the Democrats need to do is ask voters "Are you better off today than you were two years ago?". We'll see where Trump's lies get his GOP buddies then.
5
If it feels good, it is good.
True or False?
True or False?
3
That we may never be in possession of "Absolute truth" is hard to deny (although isn't it in itself a sort of absolute truth?). However, as science itself does, we can ascribe more or less probability to certain statements about the world, and as well we can assign with more or less accuracy "expectation values" to various consequences of these statements if they are true. Both Pascal's Wager and a bet in AC are cases of this.
Global warming is an excellent example. This is a statement about a physical "truth": "The Earth's atmosphere and oceans are trending warmer, due to the human-caused increase of green-house gases in the air". This statement correlates with any number of physical manifestations and is therefore highly likely. It may be untrue...but if it is true than the consequences (also not absolutely certain but again highly likely) are so serious that it would be most irrational to bet against it (which, of course, our post-truth president is doing, and dragging us along with him).
In any case, does anyone think that trump or Bannon or Kushner or Sessions have any need of or interest in Foucault?
Global warming is an excellent example. This is a statement about a physical "truth": "The Earth's atmosphere and oceans are trending warmer, due to the human-caused increase of green-house gases in the air". This statement correlates with any number of physical manifestations and is therefore highly likely. It may be untrue...but if it is true than the consequences (also not absolutely certain but again highly likely) are so serious that it would be most irrational to bet against it (which, of course, our post-truth president is doing, and dragging us along with him).
In any case, does anyone think that trump or Bannon or Kushner or Sessions have any need of or interest in Foucault?
9
Eleven years ago, Al Gore's lecture was published as a video titled "An Inconvenient Truth". Lets say that to a first approximation everybody in the USA watched the video or at least heard the title.
What was dimly apparent at the time was considerable social change would be required for the US to move to a much smaller CO2 emission pattern.
I suggest that what happened in the minds of everybody is everybody experienced anticipatory grief. Anticipatory grief is the neural experience when you contemplate a story about the future that causes causes mental discomfort or crying.
In other words, Al Gore's title "An inconvenient truth" is correct in a tragic sense. None of us can see the future. Stories about the future like Blade Runner and Road Warrior are creations of art that make the substantial inconvience of the global warming event bearable.
The point about Mr. Trump is he heard the words "inconvient truth" about 9 or 10 years ago and he has gone through the same emotional calculus as everybody else.
To connect with your Global warming example: Trump has adopted a rhetoric that steers around the emotional pain associated substantial social changes to reduce global and national global warming gas emissions.
In the classical Greek sense of Oedipus, A blind nation is meeting itself in the form of unknown and unnamed approaching hurricanes.
What was dimly apparent at the time was considerable social change would be required for the US to move to a much smaller CO2 emission pattern.
I suggest that what happened in the minds of everybody is everybody experienced anticipatory grief. Anticipatory grief is the neural experience when you contemplate a story about the future that causes causes mental discomfort or crying.
In other words, Al Gore's title "An inconvenient truth" is correct in a tragic sense. None of us can see the future. Stories about the future like Blade Runner and Road Warrior are creations of art that make the substantial inconvience of the global warming event bearable.
The point about Mr. Trump is he heard the words "inconvient truth" about 9 or 10 years ago and he has gone through the same emotional calculus as everybody else.
To connect with your Global warming example: Trump has adopted a rhetoric that steers around the emotional pain associated substantial social changes to reduce global and national global warming gas emissions.
In the classical Greek sense of Oedipus, A blind nation is meeting itself in the form of unknown and unnamed approaching hurricanes.
We’ve marginalized the simple Enlightenment rules for human truth (with a small t) found in ordinary dictionaries: facts are agreed upon descriptions of phenomena (things and events); theories are agreed upon explanations of phenomena; opinions are anything humans are capable of uttering; and truth is made of facts and theories.
So the foundation of human truth relies on the replicability (“agreement”) of descriptions and explanations of phenomena (reality), and the willingness not to be dishonest about it.
Take away that honesty and we foreclose on a reliable conversation about reality – and we get what we have now.
So the foundation of human truth relies on the replicability (“agreement”) of descriptions and explanations of phenomena (reality), and the willingness not to be dishonest about it.
Take away that honesty and we foreclose on a reliable conversation about reality – and we get what we have now.
20
I was trained as a scientist back when advanced schooling was still affordable and valued beyond career training. It was an important lesson, that legitimate scientific knowledge is presented in terms of probability. This leaves any scientific discovery open to challenge and modification. It seems our anti-science demagogues have seized on this as the Achilles heel of scientific knowledge. And they feed this element of doubt to the base who want absolute truths, even if their "truths" are total falsehoods. Thank you for a good article.
62
Please, not so fast. You load the argument by a subtle linguistic trick--"people who produce facts..." is a self-serving description of what goes on in science. In fact, scientists and others produce "findings" "results" or "conclusions." Following Wittgenstein or Rorty (or better yet, Peirce), these findings do not become "facts" until they have gradually been found to be unassailable by all who try to discredit them.
162
Thank you for your mention of Charles S. Peirce, a thinker who was confident in our ability to discover (not merely manufacture) truth at the same time that he was well aware that our reasonings are situated and fallible. And in identifying the "method of tenacity" as the most unreflective (and perhaps most dangerous) of the four ways in which human beings are inclined to establish their opinions, he put his finger 140 years ago on why Trump's base continues to support him in the face of the obvious fact that he has already betrayed them. "If the settlement of opinion is the sole object of inquiry, and if belief is of the nature of a habit," Peirce suggests, "why should we not attain the desired end, by taking as answer to a question any we may fancy, and constantly reiterating it to ourselves, dwelling on all which may conduce to that belief, and learning to turn with contempt and hatred from anything that might disturb it? . . . [T]he instinctive dislike of an undecided state of mind, exaggerated into a vague dread of doubt, makes men cling spasmodically to the views they already take. The man feels that, if he only holds to his belief without wavering, it will be entirely satisfactory. " Trump, an enemy of truth if there ever was one, manipulates his base by making a show of the method of tenacity when he doubles down on his so-called '"alternative facts." In so doing, he reinforces their own anti-intellectual habits and their attachment to him.
1
Trump's free-style, constant lying isn't novel, it goes right back to Ronald Reagan. Reagan was quoted somewhere (fact-check this) is explaining that making up stories was more effective politically than sticking to known facts. Actually it might go back to Lyndon Johnson and the conduct of our war in Vietnam. But it is very different from the familiar cliche about "dishonest politicians". That's just lazy cynicism. In real life, some administrations in some situations (Johnson, Nixon, Reagan, Trump) have broken away from truth in really major ways, far beyond the everyday over-simplifications and minor mis-directions that characterize all human interaction, including politics.
Fascinating to apply the ideas of academic philosophy to real-life situations. Maybe it should be a requirement for a degree - write a paper about an episode from a recent newspaper, showing how your favorite theory helps us understand what's going on.
Fascinating to apply the ideas of academic philosophy to real-life situations. Maybe it should be a requirement for a degree - write a paper about an episode from a recent newspaper, showing how your favorite theory helps us understand what's going on.
4
“For decades, critical social scientists and humanists have chipped away at the idea of truth.” Better understood, critical thinkers chip away the crust of received wisdom that constantly threatens to conceal truth under an mask of self-serving ideas. Only right-wing ideologues are deluded enough to believe that they have the god-like power to create a “fact.” They are helpless when faced with the task of understanding the truth and history of their own ideology.
6
Foucault, Derrida, et al, absolutely helped make Trump possible. Own it, postmodernists. Your ideas did matter after all, god help us.
6
I'm imagining a survey looking at Trump voting and Foucault/Derrida familiarity - in my imagination, the correlation is pretty low. I don't think they influenced significant numbers in his favor. I think you could say that these thinkers studied the tendencies that made Trump's win possible - their ideas may clarify what happened - but they didn't help it happen.
How ironic the author fell for his own critics of mr. Trump!
He did mention the episode of young Washington's cherry tree as a "deception", linking to a website where the episode is called a myth.
But how can we agree on that?
Truth is to be counted on his side the author should provide what is called an "explanation", which indeed proceeds chronologically and with some attached logic (to be understandable to others) And he missed it altogether.
Then it's no wonder the article concludes with a call for researching the "why" and the "effects on people", since the author rejected any counterfactual thesis to the unconventional, that is challenging the unconventional the same way you challenge the conventional by questioning its veracity.
He didn't question the gift of an hatchet from father to son, the presence of witnesses who caught him in-the-act, the chance young Washington could have been in its sorroundings, the wrinkle the tool could have produced on his hands by using it, and the likes of the critical thinking would require.
No he goes on by the same "weaponized" thinking of mr. Trump: by sheer assertion!
Moreover he recognizes that insights could be the base for few structured subsequent theories, but denies such validation for the insights of having numbers, whose meaning is universally shared, as base for mathematics, thus the validation of hard science.
Then what remains is none other but opinions stripped of facts, the same as mr. Trump, alas.
He did mention the episode of young Washington's cherry tree as a "deception", linking to a website where the episode is called a myth.
But how can we agree on that?
Truth is to be counted on his side the author should provide what is called an "explanation", which indeed proceeds chronologically and with some attached logic (to be understandable to others) And he missed it altogether.
Then it's no wonder the article concludes with a call for researching the "why" and the "effects on people", since the author rejected any counterfactual thesis to the unconventional, that is challenging the unconventional the same way you challenge the conventional by questioning its veracity.
He didn't question the gift of an hatchet from father to son, the presence of witnesses who caught him in-the-act, the chance young Washington could have been in its sorroundings, the wrinkle the tool could have produced on his hands by using it, and the likes of the critical thinking would require.
No he goes on by the same "weaponized" thinking of mr. Trump: by sheer assertion!
Moreover he recognizes that insights could be the base for few structured subsequent theories, but denies such validation for the insights of having numbers, whose meaning is universally shared, as base for mathematics, thus the validation of hard science.
Then what remains is none other but opinions stripped of facts, the same as mr. Trump, alas.
1
I worried about the syntax there - someone unfamiliar with the whole story might have thought, from the way Williams wrote it, that GW himself made claims about super-honesty, and told the cherry tree story. In an article about truth and falsehood, it probably would have been better to carefully point the finger at that notorious old fabulist Weems.
1
It is one thing to assert that all truth claims contain an irreducible autobiographical component; it is quite another to assert that all truth claims are thoroughly autobiographical. We have evidence for the former, but not for the latter, and it is only the latter, however sloppily arrived at, that can be weaponized. For the record, this weaponization is not only a tactic of the political Right, but of the religious Right as well. Of savvy Evangelicals like Hauerwas. To void truth claims of all truth value is unwarranted and pernicious. There is every reason to believe that both social location AND EVIDENCE matter. To say otherwise is ideology.
8
"when debates about policy were guided by a commitment to truth and reason. "
Sounds like the good old days!
The article makes a good case for relativism but in the end, the truth will out.
Sounds like the good old days!
The article makes a good case for relativism but in the end, the truth will out.
1
Philosophers are too eager to admit that all facts are constructed, because they are in a race to see who can appear more intellectually honest. That is the power contest in philosophy. That's their path to tenure, at least in some institutions.
Trump bears no resemblance to such people. Trump exploits the nonsensical idea that "all facts are relative" like a juvenile delinquent who hasn't done his homework. "What is "homework" anyway?" he asks. Trump has done us the favor of discovering that small subset of facts that cannot be relative. "I have no deals in Russia" when he receives bailouts from oligarch investors. Then he refuses his salary as President and plays a round of golf. Better to have someone who accepts his salary, along with the responsibilities that go with it.
Trump bears no resemblance to such people. Trump exploits the nonsensical idea that "all facts are relative" like a juvenile delinquent who hasn't done his homework. "What is "homework" anyway?" he asks. Trump has done us the favor of discovering that small subset of facts that cannot be relative. "I have no deals in Russia" when he receives bailouts from oligarch investors. Then he refuses his salary as President and plays a round of golf. Better to have someone who accepts his salary, along with the responsibilities that go with it.
5
To my previous incomplete comment...
An assertion can NEVER be the truth. It can at best be a hypothesis that can be tested. That is one reason why it has often been said "the search for truth".
An assertion can NEVER be the truth. It can at best be a hypothesis that can be tested. That is one reason why it has often been said "the search for truth".
2
Is the assertion you just made true?
Like anyone educated in the ideas discussed here, I was intrigued by journalists appeal to the truth. But I've always been struck by the deep ignorance and irresponsibility of a total constructivist approach, overstating the case about power and truth because any admission of an objective reality would undermine the cause. Well, how's that worked out?
1
"We can never have certain knowledge about the world in its entirety."
The key word here is "certain".
All sort of theists and other obfuscators love to focus on "certainty" in order to undermine belief in science.
Depending on how radically skeptical one is willing to get, we can't be "certain" of anything.
But there is no reason to equate knowledge with certainty. There is nothing wrong with claiming e.g. to "know" that my mother's name is Sally, even if I'm not "certain" of it, against radical skepticism.
Demanding that knowledge be "certain" is a cheap trick of intellectual hucksters.
The key word here is "certain".
All sort of theists and other obfuscators love to focus on "certainty" in order to undermine belief in science.
Depending on how radically skeptical one is willing to get, we can't be "certain" of anything.
But there is no reason to equate knowledge with certainty. There is nothing wrong with claiming e.g. to "know" that my mother's name is Sally, even if I'm not "certain" of it, against radical skepticism.
Demanding that knowledge be "certain" is a cheap trick of intellectual hucksters.
22
The distinction is between ambiguity at the margins -- a legitimate problem -- and wholesale lying. A difference in degree can (as here) be a difference in kind. Asserting that the climate is changing is not "blind faith in objectivity", however much debate there may be about the pace of change, and asserting that climate change is a Chinese hoax is not a matter of differences on a continuum. They are two different things.
13
I enjoy philosophy and its arcane debates; its nuances and ways of dealing with its own negations. I esp. enjoy when philosophy has to make contact with reality. Alas, the writer never quite got beyond his theme; his is a "class" paper (which omits minority and women thinkers and the strong morality of 19th century thought) that also omits the history and reality of race, bias, power, wealth, corruption, and corporations on the creation of Trump's narratives; he avoids the psychology use of praise and fear that Trump employs, and overlooks how Trump personalizes morality in his narcissism as "good" and "bad."
I strongly suggest the writer take a break (and a notebook) and go visit Mama Dip's. Listen and talk to the folk who are present. They have a philosophy, a sense of truth, that has been preserved and refined, and embraces contradictions within its construction.
Outside of the veil of the academe is a longstanding folk discussion, time tested, paralleling the journals and the peer-reviewed. Mama Dips chicken alone could lead to a new epiphany! (As Leon Damas once said, "I speak French perfectly. I chose to speak the language of the people."
I strongly suggest the writer take a break (and a notebook) and go visit Mama Dip's. Listen and talk to the folk who are present. They have a philosophy, a sense of truth, that has been preserved and refined, and embraces contradictions within its construction.
Outside of the veil of the academe is a longstanding folk discussion, time tested, paralleling the journals and the peer-reviewed. Mama Dips chicken alone could lead to a new epiphany! (As Leon Damas once said, "I speak French perfectly. I chose to speak the language of the people."
4
If a philosopher has lost the ability to call a lie a lie, he is a very bad philosopher.