Month: February 2018

Reading this piece today from 2012 on Larry Krauss’ “Something From Nothing”. I reviewed it myself and saw him talk on the topic at that time too. It was pretty disingenuous hype, even though much of the reality was acknowledged in the detail, if not the headings and headlines of his titles and talks. I missed the spat reported here, but see now it was eventually mediated by (my hero) Dan Dennett. I’ve posted previously on Dan’s ongoing attempts to educate the other atheist-scientist poster-boys – Dawkins, Harris, Pinker – on philosophical (ontological and epistemological) considerations beyond their narrow rationalist ken.

Talking of them as “poster boys” – in the light of latest Krauss allegations (anonymous and unconfirmed other than single BuzzFeed article, so unrepeated and unlinked for now – see first comment below) – I also posted previously on sexual chemistry (Pinker) and flirting (Krauss). Ultimately his wife (!) in the former case; incorrigible I said in the latter; but entirely mutual and consenting in both cases in my experience.

Post Notes:

The Larry Krauss stuff does seem serious enough, which is sad. I’m no fan of Larry that’s clear, but sad none-the-less.

I see Sam Harris expressing the same sadness re Krauss in his own way:

“This is a very serious business. We have a colleague and a friend and a person with a very serious and much cherished scientific reputation under assault now.”
[talking in Phoenix Feb 23]

“I think we should be slow to destroy a person‘s reputation … ”
[tweeting in defence of the above statements.]

(Nowhere does Harris defend Krauss actions, whatever they were.) But what is interesting – appalling – to me is the “warfare” between the scientistic public intellectuals (Dawkins, Harris, Pinker, Krauss etc) and their critics. C J Werleman is one critic I have some time for, he gets the fault with their scientism. The same scientism I too am relentless in criticising – and providing constructive alternative epistemologies. But this warlike class of critics – I got the above from @danarel retweet by Werleman – are hateful people, and haters gonna hate, so I’m not including their links.

Everybody on whichever side is fighting whilst humming “we didn’t start the fire”. No disputing that the scientistic horsemen started their careers pouring scorn and hatred on the superstitions of their religious enemies with very little real claim to any enlightened high-ground other than, you know, because science. Choosing sides is the last thing anyone should do.

Time for (proper!) dialogue. Come in Jordan Peterson and the intellectual dark web. Equally sad that true intellectual dialogue has to create its own dark web and leave social and mainstream media to the numbskulls.

Leland (Lee) Beaumont has been corresponding with several of us for more than a decade in dialogue about what we mean by practical wisdom and where more formal ideas about knowledge should fit in. A little constructive synthesis amidst all the dialectical debates between right and wrong, good and bad, science and religion, the daily cut and thrust of liberal vs conservative politics and truth vs fake-news.

His many articles published at Best Thinking and organised as a course on Wikiversity in the last 3 years or so represent a great collection of evolving resources in their own right, but recently he posted a 30 minute summary on “Living Wisely by Seeking Real Good“. Worth 30 minutes of anyone’s time. [Neat evolving dynamic feature of Wikimedia is that Pinker’s latest “Enlightenment Now” is already in the further reading list!]

Understanding reality and being motivated towards the good involves topics that might easily be cast as conflicting positions and binary dichotomies but what this simple presentation highlights is that real good is an integration across all of these driven from basic human dignity – the same dignity that underpins the ubiquitous golden rule and the original UN Universal Declaration on Human Rights and Freedoms. Plain and simple yet, as a distillation of so much material, quite profound.

Whilst many epistemological questions of why and how will always require more detailed consideration, of rationality and science, philosophy and theology, even if wisdom itself remains aloof from definitional consideration, it’s good to progress through life with the basics in action at all times.

The trick is realising the integration and convergence of the true and the good, when they might appear as divergent axes on a typical Boston Consulting 2 x 2 grid.

[Post Note: Would love to see a Cynefin (Certainty & Chaos) version of that 2×2 grid.]

In the spirit of “long-read” here is a long-watch (1hr 40mins).

So far I’ve only watched the first few minutes (with false start *) … but it bodes well.
(* Missing start available here.)

Firstly, Rubin makes it clear in his “no rules” facilitation that this is about people talking to each other, himself included at their discretion. The rules come from the enlightened civility of the participants. No adversarial debate either between the two participants or simplistic fault-finding between journalist and participant(s). Proper dialogue as I call it. (Let’s see if they get to first base … I know very little about Rubin, a scarcely more about Shapiro and a little more about Peterson.)

But this is 1hr 40mins. How is a journalist / interviewer to achieve proper dialogue in a 5-10 minute package for a current affairs programme? I’m thinking of the Peterson / Newman interview where I support both parties – Cathy got stuff wrong for sure, but where does the fault really lie? People who learn from mistakes are the kind of people we really need more of.

Anyway here’s hoping the rest of this piece illustrates my point. I’ll be back.

[Spoiler alert – it does, in spades.]

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Real time notes (All human life is here. Material enough for several doctoral theses in here!):

The end of post-modern despair – (PoPoMo) Post-Post-Modernism as I’ve called my own position.

(Remember now why I find Shapiro hard – that whiney accented voice – prejudice, sorry!)

Stating understanding of mutual positions back to the other – and agreeing! (Proper dialogue)

Values … metaphysical … even if a holy book can be a useful repository. Agreed

Biological evolution does not exhaust the archetypes. Precisely! Meaning and value is revealed much more deeply than the cortical.

(Personally believe enlightened understandings of consciousness already get this – so less misunderstood than Peterson suggests.)

Mutual conversational pod-casting … seen as weird but productive … (See Jacob Kishere’s Medium post).

Metaphysical first principles, practically theological. No real distinction.

Internet has exposed what’s “wrong” – enabled us to see (if we’re looking / listening) the problem.

Come for the scandal, stay for the content.
(Comment – “The ultimate clickbait. So happy it turned out to be genuine. 😀“)

Cathy Newman video raised as an example. – A flashpoint of “scandal” that might have achieved genuine “aha” – exactly as I posted. The thing that made it special was Cathy’s “You got me” in the moment. Precisely.

Levels-of- and meta-to- the topic at hand. Hear, hear.

I don’t know who you’re talking to – it isn’t me. (Peterson’s 12 rules & Rappaport rule)

The media is not in the “smart and decent” business.

Classic journalism has been degenerate for quite some time … the summarising back after brief Q&A interviews – but summaries are for media and consumer needs, not for the benefit of the content topic. ie a general point – Cathy just a useful example.

[Jacob says this Peterson post-Cathy analysis with Rogan covers this better. Not sure I agree, but there are many “intellectual dark-web” post-mortems out there.]

Radical left can’t even get their insults right.

PoMo’s are owed some thanks for getting is through to this point. Sure! PoPoMo as I say.
They had a point – so many points of possible interpretation (ie hard) – but “therefore no good point” error is nihilistic. Common sense idea of real.

Iterations across many “games”. (Game theory of memetic evolution – in a nutshell.)

Not caring about offence, hurting feelings? …. not sure about this … ah, identity politics between individual and groups? Alt-right opportunism in dominating identity politics. (Part of game on levels and timescales when it comes to causing offence – NOT caring IS a problem.)

Bringing anger and emotion to a “proper dialogue” – common fault, OK if used sparingly and knowingly acknowledged. Minimum force in defence, not destroying (shellacking) your opponent. This is why the Newman interview worked.

When is gender the actual point at issue? Easy categorisation when opposite sexes are involved …. but often mythical. But honesty says that sometimes the interaction is subtly defined by inter-gender inter-action. It’s the game strategy that varies, not the intellectual content. Shows how many layered this is.

Judaeo-Christian religious historical relations …

(Tremendous positivity in the comment threads – pesumably over the heads of most trolls … See Jacob’s point.)

[….]

Identifier-s, not simply identit-y – oh yes. Individual and group identities – cyclical co-evolution – essential to development.

Psychedelics … Jungian wisdom on LSD – beware the unearned wisdom – beware the crushing responsibility of the enlightening experience. Maybe more real than you want it to be. Careful what you wish for.

Counter-productive to preach – to force faith – on people.

Sam (Harris) cannot be an evolutionary biologist AND say enlightenment values do not come from Judaeo-Christian tradition. (Did I get that right.) I believe that. Values are the elephant in the room generally.

Putting Harris and Dennet in same boat – denying consciousness and free-will (?) – actually neither do. Dennett most obviously, but even Sam contrary to most people’s beliefs. Evolution of religion more than a “spandrell” (a la Pinker) – agreed.

Always possible to commit the error of saying something stupid in defence of your position. Possibly the main thing to strive to avoid in playing “the game” – ethical responsibility too. Main risk to undermining your progress. (Thinking of David Bellamy’s fall from grace.) We’re all human and fallible.

Looking at government and thinking – “is this the best we can do?”.
Rather be (feel) the dumbest person in a smart civilisation.

OK to fake it if your intentions are right.

AI is going to change humanity – reason why WE need to care enough to help define (and achieve) that future vision.

SJW’s are on their way out (thank god).

Teaching vs indoctriniation – on those PC / IDP topics …. dangerous, but risk being true. It’s all risk – hear, hear.

Find what you’re good at. (Popular doesn’t imply good.) Find what bothers you directly, that affect you and you can effect directly – there are enough problems out there.

Ends with – let’s keep the conversation going, and widen it. EXCELLENT. RECOMMENDED.

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[Post Note: Just a 30 minute watch, but an exemplary “Proper Dialogue” – Jordan Peterson meets Iain McGilchrist. And yet quite the opposite, a Jordan Peterson spat with Slavoj Zizek.]