--------------C2DB5868D96D5E01B974300C
Jay Hanson wrote:
But in truth, our propensity to destroy the planet is innate. That's
why capitalism is so successful: it's genetic.
----------------
Problem with a post like Jay Hanson's last post is that it reads like
satire. I feel a little foolish, thinking that I might be getting
tricked into responding seriously to a joke and appearing to have no
sense of humor. But the issues raised are pretty important, so I'll take
that risk. Of course, I don't know anything about Jay Hanson,
personallly, so I don't mean this as an attack against him personally.
Just the ideas, which many other people espouse as well.
The philosophical-theological tract "REQUIEM" that he cites is the kind
of pseudo-science that appeals to people who like to use philosophical
arguments devoid of serious data to argue their own particular
standpoint. The advantage of using "common sense" is that it has great
appeal -- like apeals to "Ockham's
Razor" it allows impatient people to grasp at simplistic answers to
complex questions, thereby enabling people to avoid the hard work of
analysis and the ever so stressful feeling that accompany the
indeterminacy that is a part of analyzing data. The disadvantage, of
course, is that "common sense" rhetoric can be used to prove anything,
and is often contradictory.
For example:
One can attempt to dismiss the attempts of scientists to understand
human behavior and instead resort to a kind of pseudo-populist appeal to
people who are frustrated with the ambiguities of science by making a
remark such as this (as Jay Hanson did in his recent post):
But the human mind is not rational, the human mind just happened.
This type of quote allows one to dismiss those types of analysis with
which one disagrees by implying that the analysts are grasping at
conclusions based on wishful thinking when really, the intelligent
analysis understands that the situation is very complex and it foolish
to seek underlying explanations.
Having dispensed of all opposing theories based on some attempt at
science/data analysis, the writer is then free to LO AND BEHOLD! advance
a theory based on pseudo-scientific rhetoric of his own......in this
case, a pseudo-biological explanation that is based, not on evidence,
but on speculation about how genes may have responded to the
environment. For example:
The human mind evolved to ignore slow changes and routine events,
but notice sudden changes and respond rapidly to them. It was
vital for primitive man to find the right food at the right time,
to mate well, to generate children, to avoid marauders, to
respond to an emergency quickly. Genes for a panic response to
threat are millions of times more likely to pass on to future
generations than genes for contemplation -- the runner wasn't as
likely to get eaten as the thinker. "Rationality is a great idea
and ideal, but we never had the time for it; we don't have time
for it now, and thus we don't have the mind for it."[11
Why am I bothering to respond to this foolishness? Because sociobiology
and other forms of biological determinism are not "bad science." Worse,
they are theology, posing as science. They play fast and loose with the
data, relying on speculation, folklore, and other hunches that have the
appeal of common sense. The ultimate conclusion, however, is that we
should just go along with oppression, because it is so-called "Human
Nature." Taken to its extreme, of course, we find ourselves in the
universities of Germany in the late 1930's, where cynicism and fatalism
were given a pseudo-scientific camoflauge by intellectuals, helping to
lay the basis for genocide.
There is a certain comfort that some people take in giving up. If they
have an occasional twinge of conscience about that, it then becomes
necessary to assert that this is natural, and then to recruit more
people to the fatalistic position. The more people who adopt cynicism as
their philosophy, the more the cynics can feel self-assured that they
were correct to write humanity off. Despite what many liberals say, the
main danger is not from the fanatics -- it is from the cyncism and
passivity that can convince people, at least for a time, that opposing
the oppression is futile, or even "unnatural!" Who wants to be
considered unnatural?!!!
I plan to use the section from REQUIEM in my classes as a fine
(negative) example of subjective theological philosophy posing as
science to advance the personal opinions of those who want to justify
their own cynicism and inaction and recruit others to passivity as well.
Alan Spector
--------------C2DB5868D96D5E01B974300C
Jay Hanson wrote:
But in truth, our propensity to destroy the planet is innate.
That's why capitalism is so successful: it's genetic.
----------------
Problem with a post like Jay Hanson's last post is that it reads like
satire. I feel a little foolish, thinking that I might be getting tricked
into responding seriously to a joke and appearing to have no sense of humor.
But the issues raised are pretty important, so I'll take that risk.
Of course, I don't know anything about Jay Hanson, personallly, so I don't
mean this as an attack against him personally. Just the ideas, which
many other people espouse as well.
The philosophical-theological tract "REQUIEM" that he cites is the kind
of pseudo-science that appeals to people who like to use philosophical
arguments devoid of serious data to argue their own particular standpoint.
The advantage of using "common sense" is that it has great appeal -- like
apeals to "Ockham's
Razor" it allows impatient people to grasp at simplistic answers to
complex questions, thereby enabling people to avoid the hard work of analysis
and the ever so stressful feeling that accompany the indeterminacy that
is a part of analyzing data. The disadvantage, of course, is that
"common sense" rhetoric can be used to prove anything, and is often contradictory.
For example:
One can attempt to dismiss the attempts of scientists to understand human behavior and instead resort to a kind of pseudo-populist appeal to people who are frustrated with the ambiguities of science by making a remark such as this (as Jay Hanson did in his recent post):
But the human mind is not rational, the human mind just happened.
This type of quote allows one to dismiss those types of analysis with which one disagrees by implying that the analysts are grasping at conclusions based on wishful thinking when really, the intelligent analysis understands that the situation is very complex and it foolish to seek underlying explanations.
Having dispensed of all opposing theories based on some attempt at science/data analysis, the writer is then free to LO AND BEHOLD! advance a theory based on pseudo-scientific rhetoric of his own......in this case, a pseudo-biological explanation that is based, not on evidence, but on speculation about how genes may have responded to the environment. For example:
The human mind evolved to ignore slow changes and routine events,
but notice sudden changes and respond rapidly to them. It
was
vital for primitive man to find the right food at the right time,
to mate well, to generate children, to avoid marauders, to
respond to an emergency quickly. Genes for a panic response
to
threat are millions of times more likely to pass on to future
generations than genes for contemplation -- the runner wasn't as
likely to get eaten as the thinker. "Rationality is a great
idea
and ideal, but we never had the time for it; we don't have time
for it now, and thus we don't have the mind for it."[11
Why am I bothering to respond to this foolishness? Because sociobiology
and other forms of biological determinism are not "bad science."
Worse, they are theology, posing as science. They play fast and loose
with the data, relying on speculation, folklore, and other hunches that
have the appeal of common sense. The ultimate conclusion, however, is that
we should just go along with oppression, because it is so-called "Human
Nature." Taken to its extreme, of course, we find ourselves in the
universities of Germany in the late 1930's, where cynicism and fatalism
were given a pseudo-scientific camoflauge by intellectuals, helping to
lay the basis for genocide.
There is a certain comfort that some people take in giving up. If they
have an occasional twinge of conscience about that, it then becomes necessary
to assert that this is natural, and then to recruit more people to the
fatalistic position. The more people who adopt cynicism as their philosophy,
the more the cynics can feel self-assured that they were correct to write
humanity off. Despite what many liberals say, the main danger is
not from the fanatics -- it is from the cyncism and passivity that can
convince people, at least for a time, that opposing the oppression is futile,
or even "unnatural!" Who wants to be considered unnatural?!!!
I plan to use the section from REQUIEM in my classes as a fine (negative)
example of subjective theological philosophy posing as science to advance
the personal opinions of those who want to justify their own cynicism and
inaction and recruit others to passivity as well.
Alan Spector --------------C2DB5868D96D5E01B974300C--