Having Opinions
More Dalrymple, via NER, from an interview in the American Spectator:
Many young people now end a discussion with the supposedly definitive and unanswerable statement that such is their opinion, and their opinion is just as valid as anyone else’s. The fact is that our opinion on an infinitely large number of questions is not worth having, because everyone is infinitely ignorant. My opinion of the parasitic diseases of polar bears is not worth having for the simple reason that I know nothing about them, though I have a right to an opinion in the sense that I should not receive a knock on the door from the secret police if I express such a worthless opinion. The right to an opinion is often confused (no doubt for reasons of misplaced democratic sentiment) for the validity of an opinion, just as the validity of an argument is often mistaken for the truth of a conclusion.
The “democratic sentiment” behind this flattening of truth claims is sometimes made explicit, as when Frederique Apffel Marglin railed against smallpox vaccination – and “science’s claim to be a superior form of knowledge” – while romanticising the Indian worship of Sitala, the goddess of smallpox, as an equally valid “narrative”. Or when Madeleine Bunting sprang to the defence of Islamic theology and confidently informed her readers, “We are profoundly irrational and… rationality is a social construction.” Bunting is, it seems, happy to conflate knowledge and fairness, and can be counted on to do so on a fairly regular basis. Unfortunately, such pretensions are not uncommon and are typically expressed as a belief that no one epistemological position – at least not a “Western” one – can be “privileged” above another, especially one deemed more colourful and “authentic”, supposedly in the interests of resisting “cultural imperialism.” This kind of epistemic egalitarianism may seem quite thrilling to a subset of leftist ideologues, particularly those who resent the functional pre-eminence of Western societies and who feel it is somehow wrong that so-called “Western ways of knowing” are also pre-eminent in their accuracy and effectiveness.
As I wrote in one of my first posts,
Cultural equivalence underlies the current fashion for religious protectionism, whereby reason and scientific methodology are depicted as equivalent to faith and merely a matter of lifestyle choice, as if logical enquiry had no attributes that set it apart from religious ideology and a priori belief. But to equate these very different phenomena requires one to flatten values and empty the mind in the ostensible interest of ‘fairness’ – perhaps to spare the blushes of the less capable among us.
In one recent discussion I was told that, “science is based on assumptions; an assumption is essentially a belief, so science is based on belief.” But the scientific method is based on the testing of formal hypotheses, as opposed to beliefs, which are not the same thing at all. Strictly speaking, a scientific hypothesis must be self-consistent, must explain existing observations and must predict new ones. These formal obligations and restraints are not comparable with the unquestioning acceptance of unverifiable assumptions as a priori truth, which is the signature of religion. There is a profound epistemological difference.
The scientific method is one of the best practical lessons in intellectual humility and one can only wish a few clerics – and a few Guardian columnists – would avail themselves of this tool. As the mathematician Ian Stewart pointed out: “Science is the best defence against believing what we want to.” And the willingness to defer to evidence – as opposed to one’s own wishes and beliefs – is the antithesis of fundamentalism…
Curiously, the person who so adamantly equated science with belief also maintained that the theories of relativity (the details of which escaped him) are “beliefs” and thus in no way “vulnerable to the scientific method.” When I drew attention to evidence to the contrary, the subject was swiftly changed and other things were asserted with even greater adamance. This is one of the incidental rewards of cultural equivalence; it blunts the critical senses and levels all values until people who know nothing about any given subject feel entitled to assert things about that subject with great confidence and a whiff of righteousness. One can, as Ian Stewart warned, believe whatever one wants.
“rationality is a social construction”
Doesn’t attempting to present a rational argument against rationality cause her the slightest headache?
Have you seen the debate going on over on Stephen Law’s blog between him and Ibrahim Lawson? Law refers to attacks against rationality as “going nuclear” – as it just leaves an arid wasteland where once fertile debate could be found.
http://stephenlaw.blogspot.com/search/label/Ibrahim%20Lawson
Matt,
Thanks, I hadn’t seen that. From the link above:
“But you are arrogantly applying Western-techno-rationality, yet failing to acknowledge its own limits… It does all make sense – only in some profound way inaccessible to us mere humans… I know as an absolute, incontrovertible certainty that there is no god but Allah and Muhammad is his prophet and messenger.”
So, using tools and evidence that can be measured, debated and revised (and which necessarily define their own limits) is deemed arrogant, while resorting to invisible voodoo, non sequitur and claims of paranormal authority is not at all arrogant? Oh my. And “Western-techno-rationality”? Hand me the gun. No, the big one. It’s time to direct some buckshot towards a fool’s ass.
It’s absurd and corrosive stuff, of course – it blunts the critical senses, and thus undermines the foundation of any serious argument. Hence the circular vacuity of Mr Lawson’s claims. In the name of being “radical” or “devout” it undermines real progress and makes it very difficult to say why things that work – say, vaccinations – are preferable to things that don’t. And it’s striking just how readily this flaccid, opportunist nonsense has spread, not only among the usual scoundrels and peddlers of hokum, but also – and perhaps more seriously – among much of the academic left. To whom impressionable youngsters are entrusted.
David
It’s the writing of posts like that that make me visit your site. Thank you!
I do try to keep the punters happy.
As a non-religious person, I certainly agree that reason is ultimately the only method for determining truth, however, I do feel we often overstate the extent to which people in general are rational. In my opinion, while we humans are the most rational creatures on Earth, we are still on the whole not very rational. In the past, I believed that a person becomes more human to the extent that they become more rational, but I no longer believe that. I think it’s important to retain some respect for traditional beliefs (prejudice, rightly understood), especially when they were developed in societies that embrace reason and as long as we are willing to hold them up to the light of reason from time to time. In other words, we should not expect humans to be perfectly rational.
In fact, it is the myth of perfect rationality that allows people like Bunting to twist logic into a form of philosophical disputatiousness in an attempt to justify whatever it is she really wants to believe. You have to be both smart and dishonest to reach most of the dumb conclusions intellectuals have reached in the last century or so.
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David, I think this video of Mark Steyn illustrates, in his typically humorous fashion, a lot of the good points you raise.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=CdEGJb5W5ks
Steven,
Heh. Thanks for the clip. I like the point about inhibiting attempts to fathom truth. If all positions are equally valid, or must be treated as such, why bother looking further? (Unless, of course, you have some dastardly motive…) And, as Steyn says, it very often absolves you of knowing anything. Plus no-one’s precious feelings get hurt. Unfortunately, it also leads to unrealism and dishonesty and makes a discussion in good faith extremely unlikely.
Along these lines, the Op-Ed page of the Baltimore Sun included a piece that amusingly displayed the kind of epistemic egalitarianism discussed in this post. This rigid doctrine surely seems quite thrilling to a subset of leftist ideologues, particularly those who resent the functional pre-eminence of males in many amateur and professional sports settings. One supposes that these authors feel it is somehow wrong that their enemies would dare to claim that so-called “Western ways of knowing” — pre-eminent in their accuracy and effectiveness — could be applied to obtain empirical data.
As if common sense and simple observation were insufficient to demonstrate that men and women are not the same. As if physics and physiology are irrelevant to most of the performance gaps between the genders.
The essay is “Separate but not equal–Why is gender segregation in sports normal? Males and females should play together.”
http://tinyurl.com/2atjhu
Of course, it *might* be a subtle lampoon. More likely and more drearily, Orwell’s remark comes to mind–only intellectuals could write something so stupid.
Going back to Dalrymple, what’s your view on
In Praise of Prejudice
http://www.amazon.co.uk/Praise-Prejudice-Necessity-Preconceived-Ideas/dp/1594032025/ref=pd_bbs_sr_3?ie=UTF8&s=gateway&qid=1202466682&sr=8-3
and Junk Medicine: Doctors, Lies and the Addiction Bureaucracy
http://www.amazon.co.uk/Junk-Medicine-Doctors-Addiction-Bureaucracy/dp/1905641591/ref=pd_bxgy_w_h__text_b?ie=UTF8&qid=1202466682&sr=8-3
In the former case, I am sure that “discriminate” was a verb which once enjoyed neutral (or perhaps benign) connotations. eg. Discriminating palate. However, we have to acknowledge that words (eg. gay) change their meaning overtime and that attempts to reuse them in their original way will either cause confusion or mirth. Thus I find myself agreeing with Theodore that we need to find a way to eliminate relativism but thinking that he has chosen a particularly hard way to achieve it.
In the latter case I have no specialist knowledge
TDK,
Morning. Can’t say I’ve read either. (My mountain of books to read grows steadily. There’s a copy of Jonah Goldberg’s “Liberal Fascism” still waiting untouched.) But I very much agree that the creep of blunted or loaded language is a defining feature of the age and attempts to avoid appearing bigoted can leave one stupefied. Tendentious phrases such as “social justice”, “cultural racism” and “Islamophobia” are used like talismans and it’s become remarkably difficult to state certain facts without appearing beyond the pale. As I said, it’s a blunting of the senses in the name of fairness.
TDk,
I think those are both profound books, especially “In Praise of Prejudice”. I would say he argues more for the recovery of the idea of prejudice in that book than for the word. Although I suppose he could have used terms like social custom, social convention, traditions or etiquette, I think he’s careful to explain what he means, and personally I think there really is no word that captures the idea better. A “pre-judgement” is the exact concept. Anyway, it’s a great read.
I also enjoyed “Junk Medicine” (published in the U.S. as “Romancing Opiates”). I was shocked to learn how benign heroin withdrawal really is and how views about the nature of addiction have changed.
I am plowing through Liberal Fascism at the moment, and I am already amazed at the extent to which our modern views on Right and Left are so obviously wrong (at least in the U.S.). Jonah Goldberg has said that his book simply plucks some “low-hanging fruit” and that historians ought to be ashamed of themselves, and there is no question that he is right.
Steven,
“I am already amazed at the extent to which our modern views on Right and Left are so obviously wrong (at least in the U.S.).”
It’s not just a U.S. phenomenon. If you cast an eye over the “left-liberal” Guardian, especially Comment is Free, you’ll see just how confused, even perverse, the labelling has become. The Guardian’s comment pages aren’t exactly the first place to look if you want liberal thinking – by which I mean classical liberal thinking. On the other hand, if you want uptight resentment, demands for state interference, blatant racism and teetering pretension, it’s a real hoot.
Likewise the Liberal Conspiracy blog, which claims to be “creating a new liberal-left alliance for Britain” (and which was heavily promoted by the supposedly impartial BBC). Again, a decidedly illiberal urge runs throughout much, perhaps most, of the commentary. And it’s hard not to trip over the usual loaded and dubious terms – “social justice”, “communities”, “society’s money”, etc – terms that are never quite defined, but whose coercive implications are generally accepted by default.
Dalrymple rocks!