Fashion in the '90s
Randolph Fritz
specializes in hip-hop clothes & snow boards. I chanced to be walking
by one evening, and I noticed the manager locking up. She was wearing
a sweater and loose bright water-color print pants. All very late
60s/early 70s. And then one detail--Doc Martens military boots.
Welcome to the 90s--the 60s with Doc Martens! ;-)
__R
Mike O'Connor
(Randolph Fritz) writes:
:by one evening, and I noticed the manager locking up. She was wearing
:a sweater and loose bright water-color print pants. All very late
:60s/early 70s. And then one detail--Doc Martens military boots.
:Welcome to the 90s--the 60s with Doc Martens! ;-)
You're not the first person to say that about '90s fashion, I can
assure you. My Doc Martens are great -- they kinda fit in with
everything I want to wear, whether it be work garb or club garb or
whatnot. Maybe they're not really ubiquitous and I'm just too much of
a fashion-slave? Nahh... :)
...Mike
--
Michael J. O'Connor | Internet: m...@fmsrl7.srl.ford.com
Ford Motor Company, OPEO | UUCP: ...!fmsrl7!opeo!mjo
20000 Rotunda, Bldg. 1-3001 | Phone: +1 (313) 248-1260
Dearborn, MI 48121 | Fax: +1 (313) 323-6277
Peter Nelson
Back in the 60's I knew LOTS of people who wore various
styles of military, hiking, or work-boots, which were not
significantly different from Doc Martens. I really think
"grunge" is fairly old hat.
Hip hop styles seem more original, but again, so what?
I mean I would hope if there really IS a "twentysomething"
generation, or "Generation X" that they would be defined by
more than something as superficial and temporary as styles
and fads. How about some underlying philosophy, politics,
or body of literature or art to leave as a legacy, not just
to future generations but also to themselves as they grow
older?
My parents' (father b. 1898, mother b. 1914) generation had
writers, poets, and playwrights such as Hemingway, F Scott
Fitzgerald, Baldwin, Faulkner, Huxley, O'Neill, Simon, Hughes,
etc, etc, composers and musicians such as Copeland, Bernstein,
Gershwin, Porter, Ellington, Armstrong, Heifetz etc.
I saw "Crazy For You" on Broadway last Saturday. This is all
Gershwin music and the place was packed with people who weren't
even born when that music was first popular. Culturally what
has my "generation" produced that will outlive its time? Lennon/
McCartney perhaps? Stephen King? The Dead? (God I hope not --
aging hippies driving resurrected VW microbuses with marijuana
leaves painted on the windows following them around the country)
And the "twentysomethings"? Time will tell.
---peter
Randolph Fritz
looks like chaos. As for political theories--they're being worked out
now.
__R
Peter Nelson
OK, for "Generation X", but what about culture from the 60's?
That was 25 years ago, and I think that's enough time to
separate the wheat from the chaff. Certainly by 1960 it
was pretty clear that the Hemingways, the F Scott Fitzgeralds,
the Gershwins, the Copelands, the Duke Ellingtons, of the
1930's were established as major, lasting, cultural icons.
And 30+ years later (today) their stuff can be bought in any
book or record store, it's widely performed, read, enjoyed,
studied in colleges, whatever. In fact I was reading recently
that college radio stations and dance classes are experiencing
a big resurgence in interest in Swing-era music and dance.
I'm not sure who, if anyone, from my "generation" has that
sort of stature, or will still have it in another 30 years.
---peter
Randolph Fritz
musicians had to fight for acceptance and so did the writers of the
"lost generation." The next decade or so will probably be the one
where we decide what, if anything, we want to keep of the sixties. We
are already beginning--some of the clothing and interior design styles
that began in places like the Haight are gaining widespread
acceptance. Isn't that what started this whole discussion--a
60s/70s-based clothing style? Music--it's hard to say. Folk and
neo-folk is definitely making a comeback; Steeleye Span is still
heard, the Greatful Dead have survived (:-) [in the Bay Area that's
who our generation mostly listens to on New Years Eve--oh no, they've
usurped Lawrence Welk! :-)], so has Neil Young.
__R
Peter Nelson
>"lost generation." The next decade or so will probably be the one
>where we decide what, if anything, we want to keep of the sixties. We
>are already beginning--some of the clothing and interior design styles
>that began in places like the Haight are gaining widespread
>acceptance. Isn't that what started this whole discussion--a
>60s/70s-based clothing style? Music--it's hard to say. Folk and
>neo-folk is definitely making a comeback; Steeleye Span is still
>heard, the Greatful Dead have survived (:-) [in the Bay Area that's
>who our generation mostly listens to on New Years Eve--oh no, they've
>usurped Lawrence Welk! :-)], so has Neil Young.
One thing that will determine what music survives is how well
60's music can retain it's impact with new arrangements or
performers. 30 or so years from now, when Mr. Garcia really
IS a dead head, will someone else be able to take his lyrics
or arrangements and make them speak to new listeners? Janis
Joplin was able to take the Gershwin song "Summertime" from
_Porgy and Bess_ and make it fresh. I have a collection of
CD's by Balcolm and Morris of songs by Gershwin and Cole Porter
which I can listen to endlessly. The current Broadway success
of _Crazy For You_, also speaks to the enduring quality of
Gershwin's work. I think that lyricists and composers have
a certain advantage here over performers. But you never know -
I was AMAZED to hear the 10-year old daughter of a friend
the other day going about the house singing "Ghost Riders in
the Sky", an old Vaughn Monroe hit from the 1940's. Has some-
one released a new arrangement of this?
As for Steeleye Span, although they're not really a 60's
group, they actually demonstrate the enduring quality of
some earlier, traditional music. Most of their work is modern
arrangements of traditional English folk music. Their music
is fascinating to me because they can take a traditional
melody and lyrics and rearrange it with an electric guitar
and bass, and it sounds perfectly natural.
I think Lennon/McCartney music can withstand new arrangements
and new instruments and survive. I'm not sure about the 'Stones
(I recently heard a truly perverse, sick, twisted, attempt by
whatever muzak company supplies our local supermarket to do
"I Can't Get No Satisfaction" as elevator music, complete with
soaring violins and castanets. Yow! Joni Mitchell's lyrics
might survive unto future generations - certainly a lot of her
contemporaries have seen fit to use her songs. (Chelsea Clinton
was named after a the Judy Collins' version of Mitchell's _Chelsea
Morning_.)
---peter
AMERIKA MARK
thru 28th. Many interesting readings, film/vid showings,
adult pop-up novels, exhibits and musical events to take
place and it's FREE so whoever can make it really should.
I'll be there to "bring out" the new Black Ice Books
which feature new work by John Shirley, Kathy Acker,
William T. Vollmann, Larry MCCaffery and many others
(who will be attending the event). If you can't
make it to Providence and want more info on the series
then contact me. If you do plan on going, stop by the
happenings and say hey.
Gordon Fitch
as music from India, Africa, central Asia, some of it made
yesterday, some of it thousands of years old. I listen to
music made by chainsaws sawing 55-gallon drums in half. So
do a lot of other people. This stuff about who's really
good and who's really bad -- it doesn't matter any more.
You can't tote it up and write it in a book. There is no
Sixties. It's gone. So is the scheme of things.
--
)*( Gordon Fitch )*( g...@panix.com )*(
( 1238 Blg. Grn. Sta., NY NY 10274 * 718.273.5556 )
Kevin Brooks
my generation (20-something) was sold into slavery by the previous 2 or 3
generations.
BOB HOOKER
Nelson) writes:
Culturally what
> has my "generation" produced that will outlive its time?
Thomas Pynchon
Kurt Vonnegut
Heller
David Mamet
Joyce Carol Oates
John Updike
Robert Nozick
Vladimir Nabokov
Samuel Beckett
Gore Vidal
Saul Bellow
Allen Ginsburg
Noam Chomsky
Phillip Glass
John Cage
And many many many many more.
And Genration X will do fine for itself as well thank you.
If these people had there way we would all still be living in caves talking
about how great those who lived in tress were.
Peter Nelson
>In article <C2nI3...@apollo.hp.com>, nels...@apollo.hp.com (Peter
>Nelson) writes:
> Culturally what
>> has my "generation" produced that will outlive its time?
>
>
>Thomas Pynchon
>Kurt Vonnegut
>Heller
>David Mamet
>Joyce Carol Oates
>John Updike
>Robert Nozick
>Vladimir Nabokov
>Samuel Beckett
>Gore Vidal
>Saul Bellow
>Allen Ginsburg
>Noam Chomsky
>Phillip Glass
>John Cage
I think even today a lot of this stuff is pretty arcane.
I'm not talking about what will survive on some dusty
academic shelf or as the occasional subject of some
graduate thesis. I'm talking about what will survive
in the minds of ordinary people. Many of the songs of,
say, George Gershwin and Cole Porter are still recognizable
to people in "our generation". The current Broadway musical
Crazy For You won the Tony for Best Musical in 1992. In
my High School English class F Scott Fitzgerald, Hemingway,
Faulkner were all required reading.
Of your above list I think Vonnegut, Updike, Heller will make
it. One or two others, maybe. The rest, I think, are much
too esoteric and will only be of academic interest. Indeed
several of them even now are only of interest to effete
intellectual snobs, including myself.
---peter
Peter Nelson
>nels...@apollo.hp.com (Peter Nelson) writes:
>> I saw "Crazy For You" on Broadway last Saturday. This is all
>> Gershwin music and the place was packed with people who weren't
>> even born when that music was first popular. Culturally what
>> has my "generation" produced that will outlive its time? Lennon/
>> McCartney perhaps? Stephen King? The Dead? (God I hope not --
>> aging hippies driving resurrected VW microbuses with marijuana
>> leaves painted on the windows following them around the country)
>>
>> And the "twentysomethings"? Time will tell.
>>
>my generation (20-something) was sold into slavery by the previous 2 or 3
>generations.
Oh, nonsense. According to Business Week, Wall Street Journal,
etc, the reason why new job prospects are so poor is that
we have seen such a huge increase in productivity in recent
years that it just doesn't take as many people as it used to
to run the economy. Lots of companies, like this one (HP)
are generating vastly more sales and unit output with FEWER
employees. Moreover, new technology has made modern jobs
much more portable. I can work with someone in India with
the same ease I can with someone in the next office, and I
do! See the recent cover story in Fortune on this: Indians
are brilliant, productive engineers who are a lot cheaper
than Americans. Lots of US companies that are cutting back
at home are hiring overseas.
The deficit WILL become a problem, but it's not one yet. If
it were we wouldn't be having record low interest rates.
So the only sense in which the older generation is resposnsible
for this is that we've created the technology to make it all
possible. Welcome to the future. Besides we get it too.
How many of those engineers and manufacturing employees at
Boeing, IBM, DEC, etc who are being laid off are twentysomethings?
Most are in their 30's or 40's or older. Welcome to the future.
We all have to deal with it.
Besides, what does this have to do with the topic at hand?
The 30's were economically a lot worse than today and produced
a wealth of great literature, music and art.
Anyway, who are you slaves to? And what do you think should
be done about it. I saw a great ("great" because it agreed
with stuff I've been saying for years!) article in the New York
Times this weekend on Clinton's plan to use education and training
to deal with the "jobs" problem. It asked, "**WHAT** jobs?"
You can educate and train the hell out of people but there are
no jobs. 10's of thousands of good engineers and scientists
are unemployed and college grads are flipping burgers, and soon
even many of these jobs will be automated (a process that's
being speeded up by the recent hepatitis outbreaks on the west
coast: machines can't cough, sneeze, or otherwise contaminate
food).
I'm really curious to hear a 20-something's view on what should
be done to make a better future and ensure good, well-paying jobs
in the postmodern future.
---peter
BOB HOOKER
Lemonheads have done a very fresh "Mrs. Robinson",
I went to a Rave a few months ago and the D.J. was mixing alot of the Who
and the Beatles into a Techno beat and the stuff sounded great. Ofcourse
if you think the Dead have had no effect on modern music check out
Deadicated with modern groups covering Dead tunes, including Janes
Addiction.
And what about Black Sabbeth (70 for sure), without whom their would
likely have never been Grunge. Groups like Sacred Reich, The Melvins,
Alice in Chains, The Jesus Lizard, etc, would not be what they are today
with BS.
And then agian what about Punk-- groups like Black Flag and Sex Pistols.
Sure it is not 60s music but it is late baby boomer stuff.
I have a theory about culture which I admit is not very creative. New
trends in the arts are always confusing at the time. This is because they
arise from social forces that are new and not as yet been institutionized.
Over time the new products loss there dynamic and become part of the
history of a culture. As such they are recorded, catagorized and
classisized. They become rule governed things with fairly clear meaning.
Without the traditionalization of art there would be not collective record,
no collective record is no culture. Without the endless new there would
be no innovation, no innovatiopn means nothing for the collective memory to
remember. Balance.
uel...@guvax.acc.georgetown.edu
>> has my "generation" produced that will outlive its time?
How about this:
sit-coms
hypocrisy
debt
disease
superficiality
If it weren't for Hendrix, the generation born between 1945-1965
would offer a good excuse for a cultural revolution/genocide.
Please, baby boomers, end your delusions of relevance.
You've had your time. Now get the fuck out of the way.
MU
kevin brooks
>
> I'm really curious to hear a 20-something's view on what should
> be done to make a better future and ensure good, well-paying jobs
> in the postmodern future.
what is so "postmodern" about the future? who do you think is and will be
paying ($$$) for the vietnam war and the s&l debacle, as well as the
banking crisis on the horizon? are we going to simply, in postmodern
fashion, move a binary bit here and there and make everything alright?
the point is that WORK of the industrial variety is still going to pay
for these. people starved during modernism and they are going to starve
in postmodernism.
kevin brooks
Peter Nelson
>> Culturally what
>>> has my "generation" produced that will outlive its time?
>
>
>
>How about this:
>
>sit-coms
>hypocrisy
>debt
>disease
>superficiality
Sorry, but all of these were invented long before us.
>If it weren't for Hendrix, the generation born between 1945-1965
>would offer a good excuse for a cultural revolution/genocide.
I doubt whether in 50 years anyone will be able to recognize a single
Hendrix tune.
>Please, baby boomers, end your delusions of relevance.
>You've had your time. Now get the fuck out of the way.
I hope this analysis isn't representative of the intellectual
capabilities of all your contemporaries. If we're not relevant
then we're ALREADY out of the way. Besides you haven't demon=
strated that boomers think theat they are relevant -- haven't you
been following this thread?
---peter
Peter Nelson
>In article <C2yoo...@apollo.hp.com> nels...@apollo.hp.com (Peter Nelson) writes:
>>
>> I'm really curious to hear a 20-something's view on what should
>> be done to make a better future and ensure good, well-paying jobs
>> in the postmodern future.
>
>
>what is so "postmodern" about the future?
It is, literally, "post-" "modern". I.e., it occurs in a context
in which modernism is old-hat, outdated, passe'.
> who do you think is and will be paying ($$$) for the vietnam war and
> the s&l debacle, as well as the banking crisis on the horizon? are
> we going to simply, in postmodern fashion, move a binary bit here and
> there and make everything alright?
What do "bits" have to do with postmodernism? Postmodernism does
not necessarily imply computers or technology (although these are
certainly enabling technologies). Postmodernism implies a rejection
of the precepts of modernism, one of which, actually, is the sort
of determinism implied by moving bits around in a computer. Post-
modernism is the ethos that realizes that while the output of a
state machine like a computer may be deterministic, its **meaning**
is not.
>the point is that WORK of the industrial variety is still going to pay
>for these.
That's not a very postmodern idea. Besides, you haven't shown that
this "WORK" will even be available to the likes of you and I.
---peter
Randolph Fritz
Ulysses--we're taking a long long vacation! :-) :-) :-) :-) :-) :-)
More or less seriously, we not-quite-boomers kind of figure we were
sold to pay for the Cold War. And, hey, you know--they're not
drafting you X'ers.
__R (who remembers being that arrogant & depressed)
Gordon Fitch
You're deluded. There are no generations any more. The
"generation" is a journalistic concept, used to sell products.
Forget it. It's one more empty organizing principle gone
yellow around the edges.
Otherwise you're going to pay $199 for a pair of sneakers
whose clear purple color greases your sense of alienation
from people you are repeatedly assured are there.
Yellow; purple.
Mark Evenson
>
> I'm really curious to hear a 20-something's view on what should
> be done to make a better future and ensure good, well-paying jobs
> in the postmodern future.
>
we're talkin' 'bout a revolution . . .
throw your gats in the air,
shoot 'em like you just don't care
Julie Chason
>nels...@apollo.hp.com (Peter Nelson) writes:
>>In article <1993Feb16....@netcom.com> rand...@netcom.com (Randolph
>Frit
>>
>>
>> I saw "Crazy For You" on Broadway last Saturday. This is all
>> Gershwin music and the place was packed with people who weren't
>> even born when that music was first popular. Culturally what
^^^^^^^^^^^^^^
>> has my "generation" produced that will outlive its time? Lennon/
^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^
>> McCartney perhaps? Stephen King? The Dead? (God I hope not --
>> aging hippies driving resurrected VW microbuses with marijuana
>> leaves painted on the windows following them around the country)
Last Friday I saw the Kronos Quartet perform Hendrix's "Foxy Lady," to the
great joy of the audience. Now I was only about four or so when Hendrix was
popular but I have an appreciation of him and other performers of the late
60's/early 70's. I think that a lot of the music of that time has become
an integral part of our popular culture, and will last for a great while
longer.
By the way, hippies (both aging and neo) ARE still following the Dead around.
Laura D Martz
> Culturally what
>> has my "generation" produced that will outlive its time?
And Bob Hooker replies:
>
>
>Thomas Pynchon
>Kurt Vonnegut
>Heller
>David Mamet
>Joyce Carol Oates
>John Updike
>Robert Nozick
>Vladimir Nabokov
>Samuel Beckett
>Gore Vidal
>Saul Bellow
>Allen Ginsburg
>Noam Chomsky
>Phillip Glass
John Cage
First of all - even assuming you know when Peter was born - these people
are not all members of the same "generation."
But even more disturbing - you found only _one_woman_ important enough
to include here in a list of FIFTEEN 20th c. "enduring artists."
If the postwar twentieth century is a generation, did you ever hear of
something called the feminist movement?
Friedan, de Beauvoir, Steinem?
Or did none of them in your opinion really make a splash?
Also, (and Bob, I hate to do it to you twice, but):
>trends in the arts are always confusing at the time. This is because they
>arise from social forces that are new and not as yet been institutionized.
>Over time the new products loss there dynamic and become part of the
>history of a culture. As such they are recorded, catagorized and
>classisized.
More specifically, they become *commodified*. We can all make sense of
anything when it's presented to us as another consumer product (the same
yet "different"). (Disposable, nonthreatening, not tied in the least to
anything like a "social force.") This is what happened to what they used
to call "alternative music." It's now a megabuck industry with merely a
different market niche.
Laura D Martz
>for these. people starved during modernism and they are going to starve
>in postmodernism.
There is a difference between postmodernISM and postmodernITY.
Postmodernity is an economic condition (some say era or period). (Liken
it to postfordism, postindustrial era.) Postmodernism is used more in
reference to certain artistic practices.
Tristan Riley
>You've had your time. Now get the fuck out of the way.
>
>
> MU
<chuckle>
Tristan Riley
>In article <1993Feb24....@guvax.acc.georgetown.edu> uel...@guvax.acc.georgetown.edu writes:
>
>>Please, baby boomers, end your delusions of relevance.
>>You've had your time. Now get the fuck out of the way.
>
> I hope this analysis isn't representative of the intellectual
> capabilities of all your contemporaries.
>
>
<chuckle>
Tristan Riley
>
>You're deluded.
>
>Yellow; purple.
<chuckle>
Peter Nelson
>> You know, I listen to music that doesn't have notes. As well
>> as music from India, Africa, central Asia, some of it made
>> yesterday, some of it thousands of years old.
[ . . . ]
>I agree with you that the line between music and noise has opened up pretty
>wonderfully in the Postmodern age. I had the good luck to see John Cage
>perform just before he died. One piece involved the a radio being turned
>to a random channel while some other strange sound was happening. It was
>amazing, after a while this music makes you face music in the face, it
>makes you see how the musicness that we take for granted is a socially
>constructed system.
I'm not sure this is true.
Music has an interesting property. It is one of the relatively few
human activities that is an absolute universal. Societies that don't
have agriculture, or hunting, or war, still have music. This sug-
gests that, despite the fact that we don't have a clue what its
evolutionary function is, it appears that music is pretty built-in,
biological, one might say.
And the interesting thing is that if you listen to music of even
primitive people you still RECOGNIZE it as music. If you listen to
an Australian Aboriginal playing a didgeredoo (sp??) there is simply
no question that he is making "music". It's like language (another
human universal); someone can jabber at you in some language you
have never heard, maybe even using a phoneme set that your native
language doesn't use, but you still recognize it as speech.
So to me this raises the question of whether some experiments
like those of Cage's really are "music". Just 'cause Cage
called it "music", does that make it "music"? If you happened
to hear the same combination of sounds while walking down the street
would you recognize it as music? Or does it only "become" music
when some experimental composer calls it music.
>I agree that our concept of musicness has changed greatly in our postmodern
>age. As Pynchon said the process of a growing democracy of sounds, where
>all sounds are equal is coming more and more into being. Mixing and
>Industrial is really giving a push to all of this.
But these are still recognizably musical. As is rap music, which
often has no melody at all, but it still has rhythm. There may also
be examples of melody that have no rhythm.
>That said, I don't see any reason to assert that who is good or who is bad
>is no longer a meaningful question.
We weren't discussing who was good or bad. I wasn't holding up
things like, say, Gershwin from the 30's as "good", I was holding
them up as "still popular to later generations of listeners".
The 20's and 30's produced art (music, literature, architecture,
design) which still appeals to many people today, and not just
in the geriatric set. The question being asked was whether any-
thing from the 60's would have that property, i.e., would be able
to stand outside of its time. I was skeptical that much of it
would.
> Ofcourse soem music is better then other music. "James Brown is Dead" sucks
> the latest Genesis album is just total garbage, I have seen alot of local bands
> here at Chicago that really sucked bad.
I don't know whether this is true. "Good" and "bad" may be in the
ear of the beholder. What I'm suggesting, above, is that "music" may
be biologically defined for us by the way our brains are wired up.
Saying something is *bad* music and saying it is *not* music may
not be the same at all.
---peter
Tristan Riley
>>
our postmodern
>sucked bad.
>
>There is still such a thing as failure in
>art.
<guffaw>
BOB HOOKER
> as music from India, Africa, central Asia, some of it made
> yesterday, some of it thousands of years old. I listen to
> music made by chainsaws sawing 55-gallon drums in half. So
> do a lot of other people. This stuff about who's really
> good and who's really bad -- it doesn't matter any more.
> You can't tote it up and write it in a book. There is no
> Sixties. It's gone. So is the scheme of things.
>
Ah, CurGor + n is has been a long time since I have disagreed with you so
that I have had to assume the persona of Anti-CurGor + n, but this one
just made me regress into my early more promative anti-postmodern persona.
I agree with you that the line between music and noise has opened up pretty
wonderfully in the Postmodern age. I had the good luck to see John Cage
perform just before he died. One piece involved the a radio being turned
to a random channel while some other strange sound was happening. It was
amazing, after a while this music makes you face music in the face, it
makes you see how the musicness that we take for granted is a socially
constructed system.
After listening to Cage I began to listen to the infinite number of radio
frequencies which are not stations. I listened more and more to the
mixtures that chance would create. Sometimes a Southern Preacher would
rave under a harsh punk version, sometimes static would produce some
fantastic rythems.
I agree that our concept of musicness has changed greatly in our postmodern
age. As Pynchon said the process of a growing democracy of sounds, where
all sounds are equal is coming more and more into being. Mixing and
Industrial is really giving a push to all of this.
That said, I don't see any reason to assert that who is good or who is bad
is no longer a meaningful question. Ofcourse soem music is better then
other music. "James Brown is Dead" sucks the latest Genesis album is just
total garbage, I have seen alot of local bands here at Chicago that really
Gordon Fitch
| >sucked bad.
| >
| >There is still such a thing as failure in
| >art.
tri...@weber.ucsd.edu (Tristan Riley) writes:
| <guffaw>
Well, Bob's certainly got _your_ number. Do
you know about the dog noises?
Johan Schimanski
D Martz) wrote:
> There is a difference between postmodernISM and postmodernITY.
> Postmodernity is an economic condition (some say era or period). (Liken
> it to postfordism, postindustrial era.) Postmodernism is used more in
> reference to certain artistic practices.
"You're fooling yourself...we're living in a..."
I think the post-modernism/post-modernity distinction is a necessary
prerequisite for discussion about whatever it is we are talking about, but
as Derrida points out, any line drawn between two genres (of text, of lines
of thought, etc) will automatically lead to complications and infoldings.
A question: is post-modernism truly post-modern, or is it modern?
If we accept that post-modernity is characterized by the lack of the great
projects, then perhaps post-modernism has too much project-nature to count.
Another paradox: theoreticians of post-modernism are often so enthusiastic
about their object that it is almost as if they have some kind of
late-modern project on their hands.
"gotta wear shades"
Johan Schimanski johan.sc...@inl.uio.no
pb.1015 Blindern N-0315 OSLO, Norway
my love is like a liquid it flow fitful day and night
Gordon Fitch
| >That said, I don't see any reason to assert that who is good or who is bad
| >is no longer a meaningful question.
Actually, I feel that some sawings of 55-gallon
drums are better than others, but let's bypass
this for the moment.
nels...@apollo.hp.com (Peter Nelson) writes:
| We weren't discussing who was good or bad. I wasn't holding up
| things like, say, Gershwin from the 30's as "good", I was holding
| them up as "still popular to later generations of listeners".
| The 20's and 30's produced art (music, literature, architecture,
| design) which still appeals to many people today, and not just
| in the geriatric set. The question being asked was whether any-
| thing from the 60's would have that property, i.e., would be able
| to stand outside of its time. I was skeptical that much of it
| would.
This seems precisely like saying that certain
music is "good" in some global, eternal, obvious
sense, but saying it in a disguised way. What
other basis of prediction do you propose?
Gordon Fitch
| > There is a difference between postmodernISM and postmodernITY.
| > Postmodernity is an economic condition (some say era or period). (Liken
| > it to postfordism, postindustrial era.) Postmodernism is used more in
| > reference to certain artistic practices.
johan.sc...@inl.uio.no (Johan Schimanski) writes:
| "You're fooling yourself...we're living in a..."
|
| I think the post-modernism/post-modernity distinction is a necessary
| prerequisite for discussion about whatever it is we are talking about, but
| as Derrida points out, any line drawn between two genres (of text, of lines
| of thought, etc) will automatically lead to complications and infoldings.
That would be good for Derrida's business, anyway.
| A question: is post-modernism truly post-modern, or is it modern?
The dissolution which underlies postmodernism allows
recovery of the orignal "modernism", for what it's
worth. Modernism, soi-disant, became "High Modernism",
that is, it was overcome by the principles of a dying
classicism.
| If we accept that post-modernity is characterized by the lack of the great
| projects, then perhaps post-modernism has too much project-nature to count.
A good point, if postmodernism is taken as a positive
thing, an obtrusion into the world rather than an
_absence_.
| Another paradox: theoreticians of post-modernism are often so enthusiastic
| about their object that it is almost as if they have some kind of
| late-modern project on their hands.
Exactly. So we know where _they're_ at.
| "gotta wear shades"
Yep.
ObPomo: "Knock, knock."
Peter Nelson
>nels...@apollo.hp.com (Peter Nelson) writes:
>| We weren't discussing who was good or bad. I wasn't holding up
>| things like, say, Gershwin from the 30's as "good", I was holding
>| them up as "still popular to later generations of listeners".
>| The 20's and 30's produced art (music, literature, architecture,
>| design) which still appeals to many people today, and not just
>| in the geriatric set. The question being asked was whether any-
>| thing from the 60's would have that property, i.e., would be able
>| to stand outside of its time. I was skeptical that much of it
>| would.
>
>This seems precisely like saying that certain
>music is "good" in some global, eternal, obvious
>sense, but saying it in a disguised way.
I don't agree that everything that is "good" is popular,
or vice versa. I'm just trying to keep the discussion
on a more objective level -- we can clearly show that
something is popular but in matters of art I don't think
we can clearly show that something is "good".
Oh well, I'm getting bored with this so I'm going to
deconstruct my own argument here. I'm surprised that
no one else here has already done this but they're probably
bored, too.
Way back in the 1960's I actually was punished (made to stay
after school) for arguing with my music teacher. He had made
the claim that the Beatles didn't make great music in the same
sense that, say, Beethoven did because their popularity was
transitory. We still played Beethoven (then:) 150 years
after his work but who would remember Paul McCartney or John
Lennon even by 1975? I didn't disagree with him about that,
but instead I took a more sophisticated position, for a ninth
grader, anyway -- I suggested that there was no intrinsic
property of great music that implied it had to be long-lasting
or long-remembered. Where was it written that the greatest
piece of music ever written might not only be popular for only
a week, or not at all? He didn't like my questioning of his
basic assumptions in front of the class so I had to stay after
school.
---peter
kevin brooks
Subject: Re: PoMo-ISM/ITY
Summary:
Followup-To:
Distribution: world
Organization: The University of Texas at Austin, Austin, Texas
Keywords:
kevin brooks
uio.no (Johan Schimanski) writes:
>I think the post-modernism/post-modernity distinction is a necessary
>prerequisite for discussion about whatever it is we are talking about, but
>as Derrida points out, any line drawn between two genres (of text, of lines
>of thought, etc) will automatically lead to complications and infoldings.
>
>A question: is post-modernism truly post-modern, or is it modern?
your comments touch on the rhetorical structure of this "historical"
distinction -- modern/postmodern. in _fact_, it can be argued that both
terms arise from a bifurcation within representation itself, and that this
bifurcation is converted by theoreticians into a mytho-historical origin.
briefly, we can figure representation as either iconic or indexical. in fact,
any representation can be discussed using both conceptual terms. but
in attempting to establish a ground for interpretation,
we try to set up, conceptualize, an originary condition for representation.
if we set this origin as indexical, then we privilege modernist authorial
intent. if, on the other hand, we set up the originary condition as iconic,
then we assume a classicist or post-modernist position. this explanation is
a bit schematic, but i'm not trying to write a major paper on this newsgroup.
the point is that the iconic and the indexical are quite incompatible,
yet, both modes are necessary for interpretating representations.
in so being, they produce history as much as they are subject to it.
kevin brooks
kbr...@emx.utexas.ed
hh student 179781
If PoMo seeks to escape order but can not replace it with chaos,
what is to be done?
Derrida tends to fold textuality into itself, but PoMo is not
seamless, or reduced to relativism, due to the nature of its
contradictions.
As Alice says,
-These are my favorite lines. I'll whisper them.
"I have taught you that the sky in all its zones is mortal....
Let me now re-emphasize the extreme looseness of the structure of
all objects."
Ahh, Mr. Ondaatje,
you are beautiful.
j.j.
Peter Nelson
>In article <1nepq8...@emx.cc.utexas.edu> kbr...@emx.cc.utexas.edu (kevin brooks) writes:
>>In article <johan.schimans...@hf-mac93.uio.no> johan.schimanski@inl.
>>your comments touch on the rhetorical structure of this "historical"
>>distinction -- modern/postmodern. in _fact_, it can be argued that both
>>terms arise from a bifurcation within representation itself, and that this
>>bifurcation is converted by theoreticians into a mytho-historical origin.
>>briefly, we can figure representation as either iconic or indexical.
Do you really talk this way?
---peter
kevin brooks
why do you ask? do you "really" talk like the ways you write?
kevin
>
>
>---peter
>
Christopher J Carne
A most subtle reflexive comment on the project of postmodernity.
Chris
Peter Nelson
less jargon-y way.
The hard sciences often use jargon because they NEED special
words to describe phenomena or forces that don't exist in
people's daily experience or ordinary vocabulary.
But it's my contention that many other fields, especially the
humanities, which describe things that ARE part of daily experience,
(e.g., culture, relationships, feelings, society) often use jargon
unnecessarily, perhaps to lend their fields an aura or cachet of
intellectual sophistication or exclusivity.
> do you "really" talk like the ways you write?
Generally, yes.
---peter
Tristan Riley
all the names because i couldn't figure out who said what and it
really looked confusing with a big pile of names at the top of the
post):
>> >>>your comments touch on the rhetorical structure of this "historical"
>> >>>distinction -- modern/postmodern. in _fact_, it can be argued that both
>> >>>terms arise from a bifurcation within representation itself, and that this
>> >>>bifurcation is converted by theoreticians into a mytho-historical origin.
>> >>>briefly, we can figure representation as either iconic or indexical.
>>>
>>>
>>> Do you really talk this way?
>>
>>why do you ask?
>
> Because I think it's possible to talk about these things in a
> less jargon-y way.
>
> The hard sciences often use jargon because they NEED special
> words to describe phenomena or forces that don't exist in
> people's daily experience or ordinary vocabulary.
>
> But it's my contention that many other fields, especially the
> humanities, which describe things that ARE part of daily experience,
> (e.g., culture, relationships, feelings, society) often use jargon
> unnecessarily, perhaps to lend their fields an aura or cachet of
> intellectual sophistication or exclusivity.
>
now i'm all for clarity when clarity's to be had--but i've yet to
hear any un-jargon-y/uncomplicated descriptions/definitions of ANY
of the "things" you mention (culture, society, relationships, etc.)
that weren't banal, reductionist in the extreme, or both.
i for one would love to hear a useful way to talk about "culture"
and "the individual" and "society" which all at once avoids positing
radical discreteness of the proposed "things", offers some means to
account for agency/structure questions (sorry about the jargon and
imposed dichotomies), is uncomplicated/un-jargon-y and yet isn't
just same old same old "building
blocks of society" mantra.
i'd be pleased to accept any offers.
tristan
Peter Nelson
>> Because I think it's possible to talk about these things in a
>> less jargon-y way.
>>
>> The hard sciences often use jargon because they NEED special
>> words to describe phenomena or forces that don't exist in
>> people's daily experience or ordinary vocabulary.
>>
>> But it's my contention that many other fields, especially the
>> humanities, which describe things that ARE part of daily experience,
>> (e.g., culture, relationships, feelings, society) often use jargon
>> unnecessarily, perhaps to lend their fields an aura or cachet of
>> intellectual sophistication or exclusivity.
>>
>
>now i'm all for clarity when clarity's to be had--but i've yet to
>hear any un-jargon-y/uncomplicated descriptions/definitions of ANY
>of the "things" you mention (culture, society, relationships, etc.)
>that weren't banal, reductionist in the extreme, or both.
>
>i for one would love to hear a useful way to talk about "culture"
>and "the individual" and "society" which all at once avoids positing
>radical discreteness of the proposed "things", offers some means to
>account for agency/structure questions (sorry about the jargon and
>imposed dichotomies), is uncomplicated/un-jargon-y and yet isn't
>just same old same old "building
>blocks of society" mantra.
The problem is this: We don't HAVE conceptual models of social
and cultural phenomena equivalent to what the hard sciences have
of their subject matter.
All this jargon merely serves to obscure that fact. There is
absolutely no reason to assume that a "common sense" (gut-level,
"gestalt", whatever-you-want-to-call-it) assessment of cultural
and social phenomena is any less accurate, precise, predictive,
or descriptive than a jargon-y one. In other words the jargon
may give the *appearance* of a sophisticated, systematic, or precise
understanding but there's no reason to assume that the person
using that jargon is able to "get" popular culture any better than
say, someone who simply watches a lot of MTV and hangs out at malls.
It's sort of like religion. Many religions attempt to "explain"
the physical universe. (I know religions do other things, too,
but this is the focus of my comments) They may have elaborate
systems involving pecial deities, hierarchies, prayers, terminology,
rituals, mantras, etc. But in the end it adds up to nothing -
they don't really understand anything because their models don't
work. The religious jargon merely becomes a language to talk about
the system of jargon -- not about the universe that jargon attempts
to describe.
Contrast this to the harder sciences where elaborate systems of
jargon result in things which are real even to those who don't
know/understand/recognize the jargon, e.g., smallpox vaccinations
or h-bombs "work" regardless of whether you know the jargon.
---peter
the happy existentialist
>In article <1odm9i...@network.ucsd.edu> tri...@weber.ucsd.edu (Tristan Riley) writes:
>
>>> Because I think it's possible to talk about these things in a
>>> less jargon-y way.
>>>
>>> The hard sciences often use jargon because they NEED special
>>> words to describe phenomena or forces that don't exist in
>>> people's daily experience or ordinary vocabulary.
i drop a pencil. it falls to the ground. a physics geek runs
up with a white board and starts jabbering about vectors and
weak forces and kepler and god-knows-what. i bend over, pick
up the pencil and jab him with it. i don't need special jargon,
i dropped the pencil and it fell, goddammit. now if i were burning
w/ curiousity about this phenomenon, i would run out and read
a pile of physics books (which i was silly enough to do in my
sordid youth) and become someone who gets invited to _even fewer_
parties than i am now (now _that_ would be a phenomenon :-).
weak satire aside, my point is you don't need special jargon
to describe physical phenomenon either (and it wouldn't be
special jargon if everyone watched 'cosmos' or did something
else to educate themselves, but that's another issue).
>>>
>>> But it's my contention that many other fields, especially the
>>> humanities, which describe things that ARE part of daily experience,
>>> (e.g., culture, relationships, feelings, society) often use jargon
>>> unnecessarily, perhaps to lend their fields an aura or cachet of
>>> intellectual sophistication or exclusivity.
yes, there are some humanities/social science types w/ "math envy".
what wimps.
>>>
>>
>>now i'm all for clarity when clarity's to be had--but i've yet to
>>hear any un-jargon-y/uncomplicated descriptions/definitions of ANY
>>of the "things" you mention (culture, society, relationships, etc.)
>>that weren't banal, reductionist in the extreme, or both.
>>
>>i for one would love to hear a useful way to talk about "culture"
>>and "the individual" and "society" which all at once avoids positing
>>radical discreteness of the proposed "things", offers some means to
>>account for agency/structure questions (sorry about the jargon and
>>imposed dichotomies), is uncomplicated/un-jargon-y and yet isn't
>>just same old same old "building
>>blocks of society" mantra.
>
> The problem is this: We don't HAVE conceptual models of social
> and cultural phenomena equivalent to what the hard sciences have
> of their subject matter.
and should be. they are different topics. ok, there are mathy
models and they do tell you something. and, you'd never know it,
but i am actually a hard-core reductional determinist who thinks
if you had enough computing power to map everything, the
universe could be an information driven state machine and i
could tell you what you were going to have for lunch. big deal.
we don't (ok, i don't ;-) operate on that level so trying
to define things at that level isn't necessarily going to be
helpful.
>
> All this jargon merely serves to obscure that fact. There is
> absolutely no reason to assume that a "common sense" (gut-level,
> "gestalt", whatever-you-want-to-call-it) assessment of cultural
> and social phenomena is any less accurate, precise, predictive,
> or descriptive than a jargon-y one. In other words the jargon
> may give the *appearance* of a sophisticated, systematic, or precise
> understanding but there's no reason to assume that the person
> using that jargon is able to "get" popular culture any better than
> say, someone who simply watches a lot of MTV and hangs out at malls.
oh, come now, that's not the point of jargon and you know it. i could
just as easily argue that "hard" scientists put on airs because they
resort to latin. in fact, they use the language because it provides an
easy shorthand that all the other "hard" scientists understand. however,
when i see a housefly, i don't say, "wow, a *musca domestica*" before
i swat it with my dictionary. i could just as easily argue that the "hard"
sciences are a pretentious pile of twaddle because they've resorted
to this gibberish when all they've got is a stupid bug.
>
> It's sort of like religion. Many religions attempt to "explain"
> the physical universe. (I know religions do other things, too,
> but this is the focus of my comments) They may have elaborate
> systems involving pecial deities, hierarchies, prayers, terminology,
> rituals, mantras, etc. But in the end it adds up to nothing -
> they don't really understand anything because their models don't
> work. The religious jargon merely becomes a language to talk about
> the system of jargon -- not about the universe that jargon attempts
> to describe.
>
> Contrast this to the harder sciences where elaborate systems of
> jargon result in things which are real even to those who don't
> know/understand/recognize the jargon, e.g., smallpox vaccinations
> or h-bombs "work" regardless of whether you know the jargon.
poetry, elections and 'wheel of fortune' appear to work quite nicely
whether or not you know the jargon that seeks to explain them.
>
>
>---peter
extremist arguments aside, "hard" and "soft" sciences are unlikely to
successfully explain (or even understand) each other anytime soon. that's
why we have newsgroups.
steven pennebaker
Peter Nelson
>In article <C4Ar0...@apollo.hp.com> nels...@apollo.hp.com (Peter Nelson) writes:
>>In article <1odm9i...@network.ucsd.edu> tri...@weber.ucsd.edu (Tristan Riley) writes:
>>
>>>> Because I think it's possible to talk about these things in a
>>>> less jargon-y way.
>>>>
>>>> The hard sciences often use jargon because they NEED special
>>>> words to describe phenomena or forces that don't exist in
>>>> people's daily experience or ordinary vocabulary.
>
>i drop a pencil. it falls to the ground. a physics geek runs
>up with a white board and starts jabbering about vectors and
>weak forces and kepler and god-knows-what. i bend over, pick
>up the pencil and jab him with it. i don't need special jargon,
>i dropped the pencil and it fell, goddammit.
[ . . .]
>weak satire aside, my point is you don't need special jargon
>to describe physical phenomenon
You would if you wanted to describe it with any precision
or predictive power.
But you're right - at a commonsense, daily experience level
you DON'T need special jargon. And what I'm saying is that
social and cultural phenomena are currently ONLY understood
at that level - the conceptual models of social and cultural
stuff at the level of "vectors and weak forces and kepler
and god-knows-what" simply doesn't EXIST and no fancy verbiage
can conceal this fact.
>> All this jargon merely serves to obscure that fact. There is
>> absolutely no reason to assume that a "common sense" (gut-level,
>> "gestalt", whatever-you-want-to-call-it) assessment of cultural
>> and social phenomena is any less accurate, precise, predictive,
>> or descriptive than a jargon-y one. In other words the jargon
>> may give the *appearance* of a sophisticated, systematic, or precise
>> understanding but there's no reason to assume that the person
>> using that jargon is able to "get" popular culture any better than
>> say, someone who simply watches a lot of MTV and hangs out at malls.
>
>oh, come now, that's not the point of jargon and you know it. i could
>just as easily argue that "hard" scientists put on airs because they
>resort to latin. in fact, they use the language because it provides an
>easy shorthand that all the other "hard" scientists understand.
I agree, but what they are "understanding" in that case is the
phenomena in question - they aren't using jargon just to talk
about systems of jargon, which is what I claim the original
poster was doing.
> however, when i see a housefly, i don't say, "wow, a *musca
> domestica*" before i swat it with my dictionary.
[ . . . ]
> i could just as easily argue that the "hard"
>sciences are a pretentious pile of twaddle because they've resorted
>to this gibberish when all they've got is a stupid bug.
True, except that they've already established that they AREN'T
a pretentious pile of twaddle. It's not the use of the jargon,
per se, that I'm complaining about. It's that the jargon, IMO,
is being used to imply, suggest, or cast-an-aura-of, a deep,
systematic or precise understanding or system where none really
exists.
>> Contrast this to the harder sciences where elaborate systems of
>> jargon result in things which are real even to those who don't
>> know/understand/recognize the jargon, e.g., smallpox vaccinations
>> or h-bombs "work" regardless of whether you know the jargon.
>
>poetry, elections and 'wheel of fortune' appear to work quite nicely
>whether or not you know the jargon that seeks to explain them.
What's your point? BTW, poetry is a good example of the problem.
There is special jargon to describe poetic meter, for instance.
But this has nothing to do with why or whether it "works". There
is NO systematic conceptual model of poetry that allows one to
create poetry that "works" in the sense of creating a particular
emotional response in the listener/reader.
---peter
corc...@student.msu.edu
--How about Maya Angelou
Audre Lorde...?
---neil p. corcoran-----------------------------( Deconstruct
)-------------
----------------------------------------------( Your
)-----------
---co...@student.msu.edu--------------------( Gender
)------------
the happy existentialist
>In article <1993Mar23.0...@pony.Ingres.COM> s...@Ingres.COM (the happy existentialist) writes:
>>In article <C4Ar0...@apollo.hp.com> nels...@apollo.hp.com (Peter Nelson) writes:
>>>In article <1odm9i...@network.ucsd.edu> tri...@weber.ucsd.edu (Tristan Riley) writes:
>>>
>>>>> Because I think it's possible to talk about these things in a
>>>>> less jargon-y way.
>>>>>
>>>>> The hard sciences often use jargon because they NEED special
>>>>> words to describe phenomena or forces that don't exist in
>>>>> people's daily experience or ordinary vocabulary.
>>
>>i drop a pencil. it falls to the ground. a physics geek runs
>>up with a white board and starts jabbering about vectors and
>>weak forces and kepler and god-knows-what. i bend over, pick
>>up the pencil and jab him with it. i don't need special jargon,
>>i dropped the pencil and it fell, goddammit.
>
>[ . . .]
>
>>weak satire aside, my point is you don't need special jargon
>>to describe physical phenomenon
>
> You would if you wanted to describe it with any precision
> or predictive power.
yes!
>
> But you're right - at a commonsense, daily experience level
> you DON'T need special jargon. And what I'm saying is that
> social and cultural phenomena are currently ONLY understood
> at that level - the conceptual models of social and cultural
> stuff at the level of "vectors and weak forces and kepler
> and god-knows-what" simply doesn't EXIST and no fancy verbiage
> can conceal this fact.
i'm not convinced that this is true. i agree that i have
no special incantation that will guarantee that you will buy
ham and cheese at lunch, but the mechanisms that make disneyland,
apple computer ads and frank capra movies 'work' appear to me
to be well understood.
why so intimitaded by the technical language stuff anyway? yeah,
that post you were responding to was a little on the thick side, but
i don't find the technical jargon in the "soft" sciences to be all
that laborious. look at plato, most of freud, joseph campbell and
on and on - it's not tricky stuff. and the authors who do develop
a technical language of their own do usually do an ok job of explaining
it.
>
>
>>> All this jargon merely serves to obscure that fact. There is
>>> absolutely no reason to assume that a "common sense" (gut-level,
>>> "gestalt", whatever-you-want-to-call-it) assessment of cultural
>>> and social phenomena is any less accurate, precise, predictive,
>>> or descriptive than a jargon-y one. In other words the jargon
>>> may give the *appearance* of a sophisticated, systematic, or precise
>>> understanding but there's no reason to assume that the person
>>> using that jargon is able to "get" popular culture any better than
>>> say, someone who simply watches a lot of MTV and hangs out at malls.
>>
>>oh, come now, that's not the point of jargon and you know it. i could
>>just as easily argue that "hard" scientists put on airs because they
>>resort to latin. in fact, they use the language because it provides an
>>easy shorthand that all the other "hard" scientists understand.
>
> I agree, but what they are "understanding" in that case is the
> phenomena in question - they aren't using jargon just to talk
> about systems of jargon, which is what I claim the original
> poster was doing.
perhaps, i don't appear to have kept the original posting.
could be the orignal poster was a doody head. it happens.
however, it seems rather rash to dismiss an idea just because it is
phrased obscurely (i hope i can't be fired for that ;-).
>
>> however, when i see a housefly, i don't say, "wow, a *musca
>> domestica*" before i swat it with my dictionary.
>
> [ . . . ]
>
>> i could just as easily argue that the "hard"
>>sciences are a pretentious pile of twaddle because they've resorted
>>to this gibberish when all they've got is a stupid bug.
>
> True, except that they've already established that they AREN'T
> a pretentious pile of twaddle. It's not the use of the jargon,
> per se, that I'm complaining about. It's that the jargon, IMO,
> is being used to imply, suggest, or cast-an-aura-of, a deep,
> systematic or precise understanding or system where none really
> exists.
understood to be all encompassing by whom? the "soft" sciences are
speculative. i think they know that.
>
>
>>> Contrast this to the harder sciences where elaborate systems of
>>> jargon result in things which are real even to those who don't
>>> know/understand/recognize the jargon, e.g., smallpox vaccinations
>>> or h-bombs "work" regardless of whether you know the jargon.
>>
>>poetry, elections and 'wheel of fortune' appear to work quite nicely
>>whether or not you know the jargon that seeks to explain them.
>
> What's your point? BTW, poetry is a good example of the problem.
aah. the "problem".
> There is special jargon to describe poetic meter, for instance.
> But this has nothing to do with why or whether it "works". There
> is NO systematic conceptual model of poetry that allows one to
> create poetry that "works" in the sense of creating a particular
> emotional response in the listener/reader.
you say that in "the harder sciences where elaborate systems of jargon
result in things which are real" which suggests what appears to me to
be a remarkably odd view of causality. i was under the impression that
the elaborate systems of jargon were meant to be explanatory ;-).
as for poetry, there are volumes written on why given poems 'work'.
you can't reduce it to an equation, but i'm not sure that it is
as poorly understood as you would imply. and the poems generally
work whether you've read the volumes of analysis or not.
>
>---peter
steven pennebaker
Peter Nelson
>>>weak satire aside, my point is you don't need special jargon
>>>to describe physical phenomenon
>>
>> You would if you wanted to describe it with any precision
>> or predictive power.
>
>yes!
>
>>
>> But you're right - at a commonsense, daily experience level
>> you DON'T need special jargon. And what I'm saying is that
>> social and cultural phenomena are currently ONLY understood
>> at that level - the conceptual models of social and cultural
>> stuff at the level of "vectors and weak forces and kepler
>> and god-knows-what" simply doesn't EXIST and no fancy verbiage
>> can conceal this fact.
>
>i'm not convinced that this is true. i agree that i have
>no special incantation that will guarantee that you will buy
>ham and cheese at lunch, but the mechanisms that make disneyland,
>apple computer ads and frank capra movies 'work' appear to me
>to be well understood.
I'm not convinced this is true, i.e., I'm not convinced that
what makes these work is not the creative genius of the artist,
even if, after the fact, we can find certain patterns in what
they did.
And even when certain mechanisms can be used to create certain
results, is this understanding at the level that requires special
jargon? It *could* still be at the level of "put a puppy in it,
it gets 'em every time". Or alternatively it could be a very
detailed discussion of, e.g., the famous Mac Superbowl ad with all
kinds of references to 1984, and IBM, and so forth. But such a
discussion could be carried on by any well-read laymen, without
resorting to arcane jargon.
>i don't find the technical jargon in the "soft" sciences to be all
>that laborious. look at plato, most of freud, joseph campbell and
>on and on - it's not tricky stuff.
But I'm not sure what your point is. To take Freud - he had
a lot of special jargon about the "id" and various "complexes"
and so forth, but at the end of the day, it's not clear he had
any more insight into human psychology than a decent grandparent.
>>> i could just as easily argue that the "hard"
>>>sciences are a pretentious pile of twaddle because they've resorted
>>>to this gibberish when all they've got is a stupid bug.
>>
>> True, except that they've already established that they AREN'T
>> a pretentious pile of twaddle. It's not the use of the jargon,
>> per se, that I'm complaining about. It's that the jargon, IMO,
>> is being used to imply, suggest, or cast-an-aura-of, a deep,
>> systematic or precise understanding or system where none really
>> exists.
>
>understood to be all encompassing by whom?
I don't know - where did the phrase "understood to be all
encompassing" appear?
>> There is special jargon to describe poetic meter, for instance.
>> But this has nothing to do with why or whether it "works". There
>> is NO systematic conceptual model of poetry that allows one to
>> create poetry that "works" in the sense of creating a particular
>> emotional response in the listener/reader.
>
>you say that in "the harder sciences where elaborate systems of jargon
>result in things which are real" which suggests what appears to me to
>be a remarkably odd view of causality. i was under the impression that
>the elaborate systems of jargon were meant to be explanatory ;-).
I dunno - are smallpox vaccinations or H-bombs "created" or
merely "explained"?
---peter
the happy existentialist
the points were getting obscured, so am boiling out the fat:
my point is that jargon in the sciences, "hard" and "soft", is useful
when it's useful to those who use it. a conspiracy of exclusion seems
unlikely, counterproductive and like bad science. doesn't mean it doesn't
happen, just means i feel your concerns about the "soft" sciences,
specifically, are inflated. using big words isn't a crime.
correct me if i'm wrong, but my impression is that you further argue
that jargon in the "soft" sciences is hubris and that you imply that
those who don't understand the jargon in the "hard" sciences
are clueless. sounds improbable (and arrogant, dammit! ;-) and
i disagree. yes, i phrased that bluntly, feel free to rephrase
if i've missed the spirit of the thing.
further, you appear to be arguing that the social sciences have
produced nothing of any particular value compared to say, the h-bomb
or the automobile. what about the u.s. constitution (very much
the product of social and philosophical thought of it's time)? what
about "the lord of the rings" (prof t. did major research)? what
about the clinton campaign (a major excericise in demographic/social
manipulation)? ok, sure, something that really turned out a good piece
of toast would be better ;-).
steven pennebaker
jlam...@pomona.claremont.edu
First, before someone flames me for something I definitely do not mean to say:
I completely agree that jargon in the humanities is often used only to give
an appearence of precision and profundity to vague and/or obvious statements.
I am not here defending all uses of jargon, what I am defending is the
usefulness of the terminology, when used properly, that the humanities have
devised.
There are, as I see it, two uses of specialized terminology:
First, most terminology is no more than convenient shorthand. Philosophers got
tired of saying "a person who studies knowledge--what we know, how we know
it, what it means to know something, etc.--you know, one of _those_ people",
so they created the term "epistemologist". I don't think anyone is objecting
to this sort of jargon, especially when it's directed specifically to people
who can reasonably be assumed to know the terminology.
The second sort of terminology is, I think, the point of contention here. This
is terminology which is specifically meant to provide a different construction
of what is being talked about. Take the very word "construction", as used
above. I would challenge anyone to find an "everyday" word that would be
equivalent. There is none, because the very concept of construction challenges
"everyday" notions of what we know and how we know it. To use an "everyday"
word would be to say something different. More than that, it would be to set
the discourse (forgive the jargon, but I know of no "everyday" way of saying
what I'm trying to say) within an entirely different set of constructions,
an entirely different discursive space with an entirely different set of logic
and rules. What would have happened to quantam mechanics if physicists had
continued using Newtonian terminology and thus implicitly the entire Newtonian
conception of matter?
Unlike science, there are no empirical tests of the superiority of one set of
constructions over another, but this does not lead directly to the conclusion
that those which are more obscure or harder to understand are worse than our
"everyday" notions. It seems to me that in the absense of any "objective"
standard on which to judge different constructions, there is all the more
reason to attempt to explore as many possible constructions of reality as
possible, and yes, most of these will be difficult to understand and will
require the use of obscure, polysyllabic words with tortuous etymologies.
A significant part of the discussion so far has revolved around the predictive
power of systems. First, I don't think this is a valid criterion on which to
judge all discourse. (I, along with Habermas, shudder at the thought that all
discursive systems may one day be enslaved to the tyrannies of purely
instrumental reason. Unlike Habermas, though, I'm beginning to think that this
is inevitable, and so humanity had better just deal.) Second, even where
predictability is a legitimate goal -- where a "soft" science would like to
become a "hard" science -- it is only through experimenting with different
constructions that one can hope to find a system that does have predictive
value, or in which there is even the possibility of formulating theories
with predictive value. Remember that the scientific method itself did not
just happen, it was discovered by philosophers through just such blind
gropings among alternate constructions of reality.
Jason
(No, I don't have a cute sig file. And I NEVER use smileys.)
Peter Nelson
>initially, i added more bon mots to our witty debate, but decided
>the points were getting obscured, so am boiling out the fat:
>correct me if i'm wrong, but my impression is that you further argue
>that jargon in the "soft" sciences is hubris and that you imply that
>those who don't understand the jargon in the "hard" sciences
>are clueless.
No I don't.
All I'm saying is that a detailed, rigorous, precise understanding
of something may require a detailed, rigorous, precise sort of language
(jargon) because everyday language doesn't have those properties.
Physics, chemistry, biology, etc have both the detailed, rigorous
precision, and the language (jargon) to express it. You can't talk
about solid state physics or biochemistry without using specialized
language because ordinary, everyday language isn't capable of
expressing some of those concepts. There is no value judgement
implicit in this about people who aren't into the hard sciences.
It's just that you NEED the jargon to speak with precision about
those topics, and, moreover, it is POSSIBLE to speak with precision
those topics.
What I'm saying is that it's NOT possible, at the current state
of the art, to speak with detailed, rigorous, precision, about
cultural phenomena. Unlike, say, organic chemistry, the use
of the jargon in discussing the effect of televison on our moral
values, does not lend to the person who uses that jargon any special
insights or understanding. It doesn't demonstrably IMPROVE our
ability to describe or understand the subject matter.
>further, you appear to be arguing that the social sciences have
>produced nothing of any particular value compared to say, the h-bomb
>or the automobile. what about the u.s. constitution (very much
>the product of social and philosophical thought of it's time)?
But not a product of anything resembling a "science". That is
it was the product of men of vision who shared a more-or-less
common value system, and while a radical idea at the time, it
has been vindicated by history. But it was not the product
of any kind of FORMAL, CONCEPTUAL MODEL; there was nothing
ALGORITHMIC about it. You could just as easily say that
Beethoven's Ninth Symphony was a "product" of art because it
reflected the musical and poetic sensibilities of its time.
---peter
the happy existentialist
smiley-ridden sniping.
steven pennebaker
the happy existentialist
>In article <1993Mar24.0...@pony.Ingres.COM> s...@Ingres.COM (the happy existentialist) writes:
[... stuff deleted ...]
peter, please see jlam...@pomona.claremont.edu's excellent article,
i'd be interested in your response to that.
>>further, you appear to be arguing that the social sciences have
>>produced nothing of any particular value compared to say, the h-bomb
>>or the automobile. what about the u.s. constitution (very much
>>the product of social and philosophical thought of it's time)?
>
> But not a product of anything resembling a "science". That is
> it was the product of men of vision who shared a more-or-less
> common value system, and while a radical idea at the time, it
> has been vindicated by history. But it was not the product
> of any kind of FORMAL, CONCEPTUAL MODEL;
it's a sad comment on both our educations that the best i can do is
say "you're wrong: hobbes, locke and others" and be completely unable
to produce any details. our fellow readers, however, are probably
very relieved.
> there was nothing
> ALGORITHMIC about it.
not an appropriate criteria. again, refer to jlamport@pomona.
claremont.edu who addresses that issue clearly.
> You could just as easily say that
> Beethoven's Ninth Symphony was a "product" of art because it
> reflected the musical and poetic sensibilities of its time.
and might - but since that is safely in the realm of the undecidable,
i'd be disinclined to spend any time trying to defend the idea.
>
>
>---peter
>
steven pennebaker
Gordon Fitch
| ...
| All I'm saying is that a detailed, rigorous, precise understanding
| of something may require a detailed, rigorous, precise sort of language
| (jargon) because everyday language doesn't have those properties.
|
| Physics, chemistry, biology, etc have both the detailed, rigorous
| ...
| What I'm saying is that it's NOT possible, at the current state
| of the art, to speak with detailed, rigorous, precision, about
On the contrary, it's quite possible to speak with
detailed, rigorous precision about cultural phenomena.
And in the case of some theories about culture, it's
absolutely necessary to use jargon. The problem is
not that elaborate, dense, carefully-worked-out theories
can't exist in the soft sciences, it's that they can't
be proved. Even if one sits around and observes for
years, the number and quality of the variables involved
makes any conclusions pretty chancy.
However, the situation isn't hopeless, if you regard
hardness as a desirable goal. Once upon a time,
linguistics -- then called philology -- was a soft
science, and one studied it mostly by piling up
apparently unrelated facts and accumulating vague
impressions. Beginning in the 17th century, however,
proto-linguists began to make progress, and while we
are far from any complete explanation or description
of language, we have unquestionably reached the point
where very "hard", precise statements not only can,
but _must_ be made. In fact, much of linguistics
has achieved the production of funny symbols, putting
it almost on the rarefied level of pure mathematics.
Peter Nelson
>nels...@apollo.hp.com (Peter Nelson) writes:
>| ...
>| All I'm saying is that a detailed, rigorous, precise understanding
>| of something may require a detailed, rigorous, precise sort of language
>| (jargon) because everyday language doesn't have those properties.
>|
>| Physics, chemistry, biology, etc have both the detailed, rigorous
>| precision, and the language (jargon) to express it. ...
>| ...
>| What I'm saying is that it's NOT possible, at the current state
>| of the art, to speak with detailed, rigorous, precision, about
>| cultural phenomena. ...
>
>On the contrary, it's quite possible to speak with
>detailed, rigorous precision about cultural phenomena.
>And in the case of some theories about culture, it's
>absolutely necessary to use jargon. The problem is
>not that elaborate, dense, carefully-worked-out theories
>can't exist in the soft sciences, it's that they can't
>be proved. Even if one sits around and observes for
>years, the number and quality of the variables involved
>makes any conclusions pretty chancy.
Which obviates any claim these might have to being rigorous
or precise, and this confirms my original statement.
Just because I postulate that the buttons on the uniforms
of the flying saucer pilots are green, and *happen to be right*
doesn't make my claim about their uniforms detailed, rigorous
precise; it just makes it lucky.
What I'm saying is that, unlike the hard sciences, jargon
in discussing culture does not clearly bring to the table
any deeper understanding or grasp of the culture. It just
isn't clear that an associate professor of media at a Calif-
ornia university "understands", say, MTV, any better than a
17-year-old viewer who gets B-minuses in all his classes
and works at the local Wendy's.
>However, the situation isn't hopeless, if you regard
>hardness as a desirable goal.
I don't care about the goals, in and of themselves.
I am questioning the use of jargon. In the case of
the hard sciences jargon appears to be necessary to
advance *science's* goals of rigorous precision. In
terms of this discussion, I don't care whether hard
science, or cultural theories, are rigorously precise
or not. I'm just saying that jargon seems to serve
a purpose in science but that it doesn't seem to serve
this purpose in discussions of culture. I'm suggesting
that in discussions of culture it serves a wholly different
and more ignominious purpose - that of creating the illusion
of deep understanding where none exists, of trying to
raise the intellectual status of a small group of intel-
lectuals.
Typical of this thinking is the comment in the current
Mondo 2000 by Lydia Lunch, that "Americans are so ignorant
of culture!" Americans are not ignorant of culture. It's
just that a shopping mall, TV advertisement, or neighbors
trying to outdo each other covering their houses with
brighter, more garish, lights at Christmas, is just as
much *culture* as the prancing, posturing of a performance
artist.
Although someday this may change, at the moment it's nothing
but snobbery to claim that we need special words to describe
the very things that we all create on a daily basis.
---peter
Peter Nelson
>In article <C4Ar0...@apollo.hp.com> nels...@apollo.hp.com (Peter Nelson) writes:
>
> |and cultural phenomena equivalent to what the hard sciences have
> |of their subject matter.
>
>of "hard science" are superior.
I didn't say it was "superior", at least not here or in this context.
(Why do people on every newsgroup ALWAYS read more into my postings
than I put in them?!)
*What I said* was that the jargon in science clearly served
science's purpose of building more rigorous conceptual models
of its subject matter. And that this was not clearly happening
in descriptions of culture. In other words the jargon here
serves no apparent purpose, unless that purpose is to advance
the cause of intellectual snobbery.
Whether or not science's model is superior is a whole 'nother
topic.
> |All this jargon merely serves to obscure that fact. There is
> |absolutely no reason to assume that a "common sense" (gut-level,
> |"gestalt", whatever-you-want-to-call-it) assessment of cultural
> |and social phenomena is any less accurate, precise, predictive,
> |or descriptive than a jargon-y one. In other words the jargon
>
>these statements help underline your basic misunderstanding of
>the _theoretical_ approaches fashionable in many english departments.
Maybe not. I notice you say "fashionable". Since my thesis is
that the jargon is serving a social purpose, you may be confirming
my claims.
> |or descriptive than a jargon-y one. In other words the jargon
> |may give the *appearance* of a sophisticated, systematic, or precise
> |understanding but there's no reason to assume that the person
> |using that jargon is able to "get" popular culture any better than
> |say, someone who simply watches a lot of MTV and hangs out at malls.
>
>your argument could be applied to the "hard sciences" as well.
I don't think so. Everyone knows at a gut level what it's like
be sick, just as we all share the everyday experience of living
within a culture. But science has developed more formal models
of sickness that in many cases allow them to produce cures, or
vaccines to prevent the sickness in the first place. So I claim
that science "gets" the concept of sickness in a different and
"better" way than the casual observer.
> |Contrast this to the harder sciences where elaborate systems of
> |jargon result in things which are real even to those who don't
> |know/understand/recognize the jargon, e.g., smallpox vaccinations
> |or h-bombs "work" regardless of whether you know the jargon.
>
>"work" how?
They produce the predicted results.
> are you so sure things "work?" your metaphor is taken
>from a particular epoch when things are understood with respect to
>mechanization and causality. what about chemo-therapy? does that
>work? -- it seems to sometimes have the desired effects, but
>it always has "side effects."
But it still produces the predicted results - a certain statistical
distribution of recoveries and side effects. Ditto with QM theory -
you get a specified statistical distribution of outcomes.
Whether any of this is "superior" is moot. These are the criteria
sciences uses and the use of the jargon advances those aims. It
is not clear what aims jargon in cultural discussions serves, but
I've suggested those aims are mainly social, i.e., to assert a
particular identity or social status.
---peter
Peter Nelson
>peter nelson writes :
> All I'm saying is that a detailed, rigorous, precise understanding
> of something may require a detailed, rigorous, precise sort of language
> (jargon) because everyday language doesn't have those properties.
>
>
> have you lived in the suburbs all your life without wondering out
> for even an instant?
I wonder out of the suburbs all the time.
---peter
Ulrich R. Herken
>
>my point is that jargon in the sciences, "hard" and "soft", is useful
>when it's useful to those who use it. a conspiracy of exclusion seems
>unlikely, counterproductive and like bad science. doesn't mean it doesn't
>happen, just means i feel your concerns about the "soft" sciences,
>specifically, are inflated. using big words isn't a crime.
>
who has dealt with a branch of science which is located between
"hard" and "soft", medicine (ok doctors, flame me :-)
Doctors tend to use too much latin. But there are more reasons
than one for this. First, the "latin" terms almost always have
a well defined meaning (myocardial infarction _is_ something
different from a heart attack). Information interchange between colleagues
thus is shorter and more secure (fewer misunderstandings).
Second, the patient is not always meant to understand everything
spoken _between doctors_ e.g. not to frighten him.
Third, a doctor speaking latin to a patient sometimes isn't able
anymore to translate his "inborn" language into daily speech
(sad but true). This may well be the same for a lot of scientists
in other fields. You just use the code all the time.
Fourth, there even might be some doctors using a lot of
latin just to give the impression of mental superiority.
(Not that I knew of any ;-)
What I want so say is, the use of hardly understandable so called
"elevated code" (hey, I'm doing it too) will happen in _all_
sciences. On many occasions it is necessary. But you have to
watch out to whom you are speaking. To use technical terms
your code should be adjusted to the context. I.e. don't use
highbrow technical terms when talking to a layman.
Which leads us to the problem newsgroups. You don't know
in advance who will be reading your post. If you make it understandable
for everyone, you can't have a scientific discussion.
If you use only the special technical terms other people will
flame you for speaking what sounds like chinese to their ears
(except the chinese of course). If you use the special code
and put a translation next to it, you'll be wasting bandwith
( and _nobody_ will read it anymore).
So? Just do what you think is appropriate for the intended use.
[...]
>further, you appear to be arguing that the social sciences have
>produced nothing of any particular value compared to say, the h-bomb
>or the automobile. what about the u.s. constitution (very much
>the product of social and philosophical thought of it's time)? what
>about "the lord of the rings" (prof t. did major research)? what
>about the clinton campaign (a major excericise in demographic/social
>manipulation)? ok, sure, something that really turned out a good piece
>of toast would be better ;-).
IMHO that would be better than the h-bomb too. I find that
not too useful. Or is useful meant as "can be used"?
I think that developments like humanism or the magna charta are
a lot more valuable than refrigerators, tv-sets or the
detection of myons.
BTW, I wonder when the next level in this thread is going to start.
Since we already discussing not a topic, but how a topic is
discussed, someone please start on how to discuss this.
This is alt.postmodern, isn't it?
Regards
--
-------------------------------------------------------------------------
Ulrich R. Herken,M.D. u...@specs.de | SPECS GmbH Berlin Germany
Believe me, I'm a doctor. | Surface Analysis & Computer Tech.
-------------------------------------------------------------------------
Laura D Martz
>--How about Maya Angelou
> Audre Lorde...?
good on you.
>
>---neil p. corcoran-----------------------------( Deconstruct
>)-------------
>----------------------------------------------( Your
>)-----------
>---co...@student.msu.edu--------------------( Gender
Right on!
Somewhere along the way this bboard seems to have lost some of its more
clueless idiots. When I joined it seemed to be about the less inspired
kinds of mainstream pop culture. If I remember right.
kevin brooks
|phenomena in question - they aren't using jargon just to talk
|about systems of jargon, which is what I claim the original
|poster was doing.
is it possible that you are not ""understanding"" the phenomenon in
question? poetry, science texts, newsgroups, the phenomenon is called:
language, textuality, representation. but, paradoxically, we have to
generate representation in order to talk about representation -- just as
you seem to be having so much difficulty doing in this thread. the
humanities, focusing on these problems, operate at a level of reflexivity
unallowable to the physical sciences. this is because the subject of their
studies is the mode through which that subject is "known" in the first place.
kant probed this problem. our engineers have no use for this problem.
kevin brooks
center for the study of modernism
kevin brooks
|The problem is this: We don't HAVE conceptual models of social
|and cultural phenomena equivalent to what the hard sciences have
|of their subject matter.
ok. but i don't think that there is any reason to think that the model
of "hard science" are superior. by the very fact that they are "models,"
they are subject to all the problems that plague the _theories_ (as
opposed to "models") of representation that are used to analyze
cultural phenomena.
|All this jargon merely serves to obscure that fact. There is
|absolutely no reason to assume that a "common sense" (gut-level,
|"gestalt", whatever-you-want-to-call-it) assessment of cultural
|and social phenomena is any less accurate, precise, predictive,
|or descriptive than a jargon-y one. In other words the jargon
these statements help underline your basic misunderstanding of
the _theoretical_ approaches fashionable in many english departments.
it also sheds light on how a _theoretical_ approach comes to be used
in the service of "truth," without first questioning if truth should
be assumed _a priori_. the point is that these _theoretical_ approaches,
insofar as they are theoretical, are not valuable as truth, but, rather, as
novel approaches toward sensing how it is that truth operates.
|or descriptive than a jargon-y one. In other words the jargon
|may give the *appearance* of a sophisticated, systematic, or precise
|understanding but there's no reason to assume that the person
|using that jargon is able to "get" popular culture any better than
|say, someone who simply watches a lot of MTV and hangs out at malls.
your argument could be applied to the "hard sciences" as well.
|It's sort of like religion. Many religions attempt to "explain"
|the physical universe. (I know religions do other things, too,
|but this is the focus of my comments) They may have elaborate
|systems involving pecial deities, hierarchies, prayers, terminology,
|rituals, mantras, etc. But in the end it adds up to nothing -
|they don't really understand anything because their models don't
|work. The religious jargon merely becomes a language to talk about
|the system of jargon -- not about the universe that jargon attempts
|to describe.
again, no model works in all cases. for example, some models seem to
account for almost all possibilities within a particular historical
frame, but they may not work very well in a different one.
|Contrast this to the harder sciences where elaborate systems of
|jargon result in things which are real even to those who don't
|know/understand/recognize the jargon, e.g., smallpox vaccinations
|or h-bombs "work" regardless of whether you know the jargon.
"work" how? are you so sure things "work?" your metaphor is taken
from a particular epoch when things are understood with respect to
mechanization and causality. what about chemo-therapy? does that
work? -- it seems to sometimes have the desired effects, but
it always has "side effects." these side effects cannot be incorporared
into the model of work. they are marginalized toward the "side."
what you observe as working is only a function of how you look at the
world.
kevin brooks
|---peter
kevin brooks
All I'm saying is that a detailed, rigorous, precise understanding
of something may require a detailed, rigorous, precise sort of language
(jargon) because everyday language doesn't have those properties.
i wonder:
have you lived in the suburbs all your life without wondering out
for even an instant?
kevin brooks
kevin brooks
peter nelson writes :
All I'm saying is that a detailed, rigorous, precise understanding
of something may require a detailed, rigorous, precise sort of language
(jargon) because everyday language doesn't have those properties.
have you lived in the suburbs all your life without wandering out
kevin brooks
peter nelson writes:
|> |The problem is this: We don't HAVE conceptual models of social
|> |and cultural phenomena equivalent to what the hard sciences have
|> |of their subject matter.
i respond:
|>ok. but i don't think that there is any reason to think that the model
|>of "hard science" are superior.
peter responds:
| I didn't say it was "superior", at least not here or in this context.
| (Why do people on every newsgroup ALWAYS read more into my postings
| than I put in them?!)
peter, i could go on responding to you but it is seems to me that i
would be wasting my time, since, judging from your posts, you
are unable to think science with respect to its history. Do you think
that all the "jargon" used in science today was developed only
in reference to its object of study? as many other people on this
newsgroup have pointed out, science is full of metaphors. these
metaphors, because they are rhetorical figures (i recommend
looking some of these up: _the longman dictionary of poetic terms_),
can be understood to refer to many different things -- including
other metaphors. just because engineers today are not required
to obtain an education, only a technical degree, and they unable
to connect these metaphors in their texts to different contexts,
it doesn't mean that your metaphorical jargon has any greater
claim to objectivity than that used in the humanities.
your thinking is caught in a 19th century positivism (look it up)
that does not take into account the metaphoricity of 18th c.
science, nor the anti-positivism of 20th century
philosophy. i'm going to point something out to you: the
humanities are dealing with the problem of texts and meaning.
did you get that? above, you ask: "Why do people on every
newsgroup ALWAYS read more into my postings | than I put
in them?" this is the type of question one might deal with
in an english department. in dealing with it, we develop
theories of reading and meaning and language. the problem
is that while language, for renee decartes, could be maped,
tamed, by clearly (or so he believed, but he had problems
doing it) definable grids called grammar, his failure, as
well as that of many others, can now be studied as
symptomatic of a problem about language, in general.
that problem is that language is somehow unable to
be fully described by systems which are built out
of linguistic terms themselves. i'm not going to
explain this any more, but i am going to suggest
some books to you.
jorge luis borges, labrinths
renee decartes, meditations
ludwig wittgenstein, philosophical investigations
jacques derrida, of grammatology
jacques derrida, writing and difference
roland barthes, mythologies
donna haraway, simians, cyborgs, and women
after you read these i'll be happy to continue arguing
with you. however, i suspect that we will not
be corresponding again, since you will be unable to
read these books because they contain words that
they didn't tell you about in school, and now you
can't even use a dictionary -- that's what this
argument is all about, IN THE FINAL ANALYSIS.
kevin brooks
Peter Nelson
>
>
>peter nelson writes:
>
>|> |The problem is this: We don't HAVE conceptual models of social
>|> |and cultural phenomena equivalent to what the hard sciences have
>|> |of their subject matter.
>
>i respond:
>
>|>ok. but i don't think that there is any reason to think that the model
>|>of "hard science" are superior.
>
>peter responds:
>
>| I didn't say it was "superior", at least not here or in this context.
>| (Why do people on every newsgroup ALWAYS read more into my postings
>| than I put in them?!)
>
>peter, i could go on responding to you but it is seems to me that i
>would be wasting my time, since, judging from your posts, you
>are unable to think science with respect to its history.
What does this mean? Who cares what the history of it is -
astronomy derived from astrology, chemistry from alchemy, etc.
So what?
> Do you think that all the "jargon" used in science today was
> developed only in reference to its object of study?
Again, the etymology of scientific jargon is irrelevant.
The only thing that matters is whether the use of the jargon
enables scientists to describe something real, or whether
they are merely describing artificial constructs that don't
demonstrably map to reality with any greater precision or
relibility than the non-jargon descriptions.
> as many other people on this newsgroup have pointed out, science is
> full of metaphors.
OF COURSE it is! All science does, or attempts to do, is to
construct conceptual models of the real world. You can call
these metaphors if you like. Which is the same thing that the
humanities and other fields do. The difference is that in the
case of science it can be shown that the conceptual models actually
map to the real, observed world with greater reliability than compet-
ing models (e.g., religion, mysticism) or lay models. These models
(metaphors, if you prefer) require jargon since non-jargony terms
have inadequate precision or specificity. So the jargon is
necessary for the models. The jargon exists in the humanities
for the same reason, EXCEPT that in their case the resulting models
do not appear to map to the real world any better than either
competing models or models by lay observers.
So my criticism, as I said before, is not with the fact that jargon
is used in discussions of culture, per se, it's that the use of the
jargon doesn't seem to buy anything, unless what it's buying is a
different social status or higher income for the speakers. (which
may be perfectly legitimate, but let's at least be honest about it)
The fact that jargon may be metaphors is irrelevant - the question
that applies is whether the metaphors are any good at providing a
more precise or rigorous understanding of what they are metaphors
for.
I have a metaphor for the physical universe which says that matter
is comprised of these things called "atoms" which are made up of
things called protons, neutrons, electrons, etc, that have certain
properties, etc, etc. I don't claim that atoms objectively exist!
I claim that using this model (metaphor) seems to work better than
a competing one which says that there are 4 elements; earth, air,
fire, and water. Note that Dirac's Sea never existed but this
didn't prevent it from predicting positrons! Don't knock metaphors.
>other metaphors. just because engineers today are not required
>to obtain an education, only a technical degree, and they unable
>to connect these metaphors in their texts to different contexts,
>it doesn't mean that your metaphorical jargon has any greater
>claim to objectivity than that used in the humanities.
No, *IT* doesn't mean that "metaphorical jargon has any greater
claim to objectivity than that used in the humanities", but other
things do, like the ability of science to make repeatable, test-
able predictions about its subject matter.
The point is that science can make a statement, let's say about the
rate of acceleration of falling bodies, and we can TEST to see
if this statement is true and we can COMPARE the predictions made
by this statement to those made by people who use different
metaphors, say practitioners of TM, and see which ones come closest.
Now granted terms like "gravity" and odd constructions like "feet
per second per second" may be metaphorical just as TM's "flying"
or "field of consciousness" are, in that both can never be more
than descriptions of an abstract conceptual model, not *the
thing itself*, but that doesn't mean they are equal in their
mapping to *the thing itself*.
>your thinking is caught in a 19th century positivism (look it up)
>that does not take into account the metaphoricity of 18th c.
>science, nor the anti-positivism of 20th century
>philosophy. i'm going to point something out to you: the
>humanities are dealing with the problem of texts and meaning.
>did you get that?
This depends on how you understand "dealing with". It's like
saying "welfare deals with poverty" or "religion deals with
an afterlife". Deals with, appears to mean in this case,
that it's a subject within its domain. It's a topic that
people in that field discuss or focus on. It doesn't imply
any particular success in "dealing with" these things. So
now I'm going to point something out to you: any child or teenager
"deals with the problem of texts and meaning" as they learn to
read, expand their vocabulary, or encounter the larger culture.
And I hope we adults continue to do so. But is there any reason
to assume that a 17-year-old who doesn't know humanities jargon
"deals with" these things any less effectively?
The question is whether the humanities, as a result of employing
jargon, deal with these things any better than someone who doesn't
use such jargon. This, I imagine, is where the question of
"superiority" may arise.
> above, you ask: "Why do people on every newsgroup ALWAYS read more into
> my postings | than I put in them?" this is the type of question one
> might deal with in an english department.
Or a psychology department. But either way, the issue isn't whether
they can "deal with" my question. The question is whether they
can answer it.
---peter
jlam...@pomona.claremont.edu
>> |or descriptive than a jargon-y one. In other words the jargon
>> |may give the *appearance* of a sophisticated, systematic, or precise
>> |understanding but there's no reason to assume that the person
>> |using that jargon is able to "get" popular culture any better than
>> |say, someone who simply watches a lot of MTV and hangs out at malls.
>>
>>your argument could be applied to the "hard sciences" as well.
>
> I don't think so. Everyone knows at a gut level what it's like
> be sick, just as we all share the everyday experience of living
> within a culture.
Except that we don't all experience culture the same way. I'm certain that
when you watch MTV you have a very different experience than I have when I
watch MTV. This difference is due in a large part to the fact that I have read
Derrida/Cixous/Baudrillard/et al. while you, I can only assume, haven't. Part
of the function of theory, of which jargon is a necessary part, is giving those
people who have read and understood it new ways to construct their experiences,
new _ways_ to experience.
You are stuck on the idea that theory is supposed to have some sort of
predictive value. That's not its function, and there is no point continuing
the discussion if you continue insisting that theory serve some purpose it was
never meant to serve.
You ask if the academic, with her bag-full of jargon, "understands" culture any
better than the 17-year old who watches lots of MTV. It depends on what you
mean by "better". If you're asking for an objective, empirically testable
criterion; there isn't one. But if you can allow such--admittedly non-
testable--criteria as breadth and complexity to count as "good", then I would
say that the academic has a much better understanding of culture than the 17-
year-old. The academic can view any particular text from dozens of different
perspectives while the teenager, ignorant of any alternatives, can probably
only view it from one. Also, the academic can understand and appreciate
cultural productions, such as performance art, which would simply baffle the
teenager.
You also imply that theory doesn't produce anything. This is not true. Theory
produces art, among other things, and it has always done so. Medieval
literature is just as much a product of the theology and philosophy of its
time as the latest avant-garde movements are a product of contemporary theory.
Art isn't "useful", you say? Of course it's not. That's what makes it art.
(Read Kant.)
I know someone is going to say that art which is based on theory is "snobbish"
and "academic". ALL art is based on theory. "Art should be about
self-expression" you say? Well, that's a theory, and moreover a fairly recent
one. (No one in the middle ages would have thought about "self-expression".)
As Paul De Man points out, even the opposition to theory is itself a theory.
You also say that different scientific models can be compared with each other.
The same is true of discursive systems, those sets of constructs which a
particular terminology engenders (or which engenders that terminology--it's
not a one-way causal relation). This is what metacriticism is all about,
comparing different representational systems to one another. Of course, I
don't think you're in a position to even understand what this would mean. It's
fairly obvious from what you have said that you have never actually read the
theories you attack. Because you don't understand any of the theories to which
academic jargons belong, you see "jargon" as just an amorphous blob of vaguely
defined words, rather than as linguistic manifestations of fundamentally
different _and_precise_ ways of constructing the world. You think that
"signify" is just a fancy way to say "mean", but it's not. Moreover, because
the term "signify" belongs to a specific theory of language, it is
fundamentally more precise that "mean", which refers only to vague,
inconsistent, "common-sense" ideas about language. It doesn't matter if
Saussurean linguistics isn't testable (I actually think it is, at least
potentially, but that's beside the point right now), it is a reasonably
consistent, well-defined model, unlike any common-sense notions of language
that you may have.
> Whether any of this is "superior" is moot. These are the criteria
> sciences uses and the use of the jargon advances those aims. It
> is not clear what aims jargon in cultural discussions serves, but
> I've suggested those aims are mainly social, i.e., to assert a
> particular identity or social status.
By now, you have received many, many different possible answers to the question
"what aims does jargon serve?" Yet you for the most part ignore them. Don't
just respond by telling us _yet_again_ that you happen to think that jargon is
only a way to make oneself sound intelligent. I don't think anyone would deny
that it is sometimes used for this purpose, but the same is true of jargon in
the sciences--I have read many scientific articles in which the experimentor
said in twenty-five technical terms what could easily have been said in ten
ordinary words. What we are arguing against is your assertion that this is its
only, or even its primary, purpose. The burden of proof is therefore on you to
demonstrate that the many legitimate functions of jargon that we have produced
as counter-examples are somehow not valid or could be entirely _and_easily_
satisfied without the use of jargon.
jason
Gordon Fitch
| >| ...
| >| All I'm saying is that a detailed, rigorous, precise understanding
| >| of something may require a detailed, rigorous, precise sort of language
| >| What I'm saying is that it's NOT possible, at the current state
| >| of the art, to speak with detailed, rigorous, precision, about
| >| cultural phenomena. ...
g...@panix.com (Gordon Fitch) writes:
| >On the contrary, it's quite possible to speak with
| >detailed, rigorous precision about cultural phenomena.
| >And in the case of some theories about culture, it's
| >absolutely necessary to use jargon. The problem is
| >not that elaborate, dense, carefully-worked-out theories
| >can't exist in the soft sciences, it's that they can't
| >be proved. Even if one sits around and observes for
| >years, the number and quality of the variables involved
| >makes any conclusions pretty chancy.
nels...@apollo.hp.com (Peter Nelson) writes:
| Which obviates any claim these might have to being rigorous
| or precise, and this confirms my original statement.
|
| Just because I postulate that the buttons on the uniforms
| of the flying saucer pilots are green, and *happen to be right*
| doesn't make my claim about their uniforms detailed, rigorous
| precise; it just makes it lucky.
You seem to have a curious definition of "rigorous"
and "precise" -- perhaps, to be in some kind of
positive relation with some kind of reality (to be
defined elsewhere). But Euclidian geometry is both
rigorous and precise without being in touch with
reality anywhere. On the other hand, a fuzzy theory
("I think it's gonna rain today") might well be
closely in touch with somebody's reality.
There is no reason not to work out elaborate,
logical, rigorously precise theories just because we
can't prove them. They may be elegant, amusing,
aesthetically rewarding, or even explanatory of
observed phenomena in some reasonably satisfactory
way. They may even create a reality, as witness
the theory of liberalism and the establishment of
the United States through the Declaration of Inde-
pendence, previously referred to in this thread or
one like it, I believe.
Peter Nelson
>In article <C4I33...@apollo.hp.com>, nels...@apollo.hp.com (Peter Nelson) writes:
>>> |or descriptive than a jargon-y one. In other words the jargon
>>> |may give the *appearance* of a sophisticated, systematic, or precise
>>> |understanding but there's no reason to assume that the person
>>> |using that jargon is able to "get" popular culture any better than
>>> |say, someone who simply watches a lot of MTV and hangs out at malls.
>>>
>>>your argument could be applied to the "hard sciences" as well.
>>
>> I don't think so. Everyone knows at a gut level what it's like
>> be sick, just as we all share the everyday experience of living
>> within a culture.
>
>Except that we don't all experience culture the same way. I'm certain that
>when you watch MTV you have a very different experience than I have when I
>watch MTV.
Everyone's experience of sickness is not the same either, but this
doesn't change the fact that a model of influenza based on viruses
and the underlying molecular biology is still more precise, and
yields demonstrably more reliable and consistent prevention and
treatment than a model of influenze based on "humours".
> This difference is due in a large part to the fact that I have read
>Derrida/Cixous/Baudrillard/et al. while you, I can only assume, haven't. Part
>of the function of theory, of which jargon is a necessary part, is giving those
>people who have read and understood it new ways to construct their experiences,
>new _ways_ to experience.
But you don't need special jargon to have new ways to experience popular
culture. A homeless person experiences it differently from a yuppie
lawyer, a black person differently from a white person, a "20-something"
from a "boomer", etc. "Neophilism" is easy to satisfy, but it's not
very satisfying.
>You are stuck on the idea that theory is supposed to have some sort of
>predictive value.
No, predictiveness is just a convenient metric. I'm stuck on the idea
that the purpose of a conceptual model is to provide a degree of under-
standing that is somehow more accurate, precise, rigorous, etc, than
what can be gained without that model.
If all you want out of jargon is a "different" experience of something
then it really doesn't matter *WHAT* jargon or model you choose. I could
arbitrarily create a model in which, say, sexually transmitted diseases
create "productism", the motive force underlying creative and economic
growth, based on the casual observation that places with high rates of
STDs have historically been cities, or nations with high rates of GDP
growth. Or I could arbitrarily come up with some whole new taxonomy
for humans based on some morphological feature not previously focussed
on, such as eye color or tendency to say "uh".
Now, as an academic exercise, a college student might play around with
such arbitrary ideas to see where they lead. Indeed, one of my "hobbies"
is statistical analysis of text just to see what kinds of interesting
patterns emerge when I look at different things (i.e., does the rate of
use of personal pronouns vary over the course of a long Usenet posting?)
But I don't claim that this provides any special insight into language
someone without such eccentricities doesn't have.
>You ask if the academic, with her bag-full of jargon, "understands" culture any
>better than the 17-year old who watches lots of MTV. It depends on what you
>mean by "better". If you're asking for an objective, empirically testable
>criterion; there isn't one. But if you can allow such--admittedly non-
>testable--criteria as breadth and complexity to count as "good", then I would
>say that the academic has a much better understanding of culture than the 17-
>year-old. The academic can view any particular text from dozens of different
>perspectives while the teenager, ignorant of any alternatives, can probably
>only view it from one. Also, the academic can understand and appreciate
>cultural productions, such as performance art, which would simply baffle the
>teenager.
This depends of what you mean by baffle. The teenager would have a
*different* experience of it. Example - when I was a teenager I
attended a production at Wellesley College of a Midsummer Night's
Dream. The director (this was in, I think, 1970), decided in the
revisionist and experimental mood of the time, to basically have
many of the little fairies or nymphs, played by Wellesley College
women, to basically be wearing, well, virtually nothing. Now, to
a 17 year old in 1970, being this close to actual college women
displayed in their all their comely naturalness was an intensely
erotic experience. Older, more sophisticated, or more worldly
viewers would no doubt have appreciated Shakespeare in ways that
I failed to, but I believe I experienced it in ways that they failed
to.
>You also imply that theory doesn't produce anything. This is not true. Theory
>produces art, among other things, and it has always done so. Medieval
>literature is just as much a product of the theology and philosophy of its
>time as the latest avant-garde movements are a product of contemporary theory.
I still disagree that the *theory* is what's producing the art. If
theory could produce art then you wouldn't need artists, just technicians
or engineers. Beethoven was a product of his time, so of course his
music reflects the sensibilities of his era - you wouldn't expect someone
in the early 19th century to produce hip-hop. But Beethoven's music was
not the result of an algorithm. Moreover, while it's possible today
to study stylistic features of Beethoven and produce music which "sounds
like" Beethoven, you can't make music that way that anyone likes. (just
as I could take your posting (or mine), and run it through a Markov-Chain
nonsense generator, and generate a new posting that would retain some
of the "flavor" of the original, it would, nonetheless, be hopeless
nonsense.)
>I know someone is going to say that art which is based on theory is "snobbish"
>and "academic". ALL art is based on theory.
Again, I say if this were true then great art could be generated by computers.
> "Art should be about self-expression" you say?
I never said this. Some of the greatest art ever made was made to express
ideas of the state, the church, or the patron.
> Well, that's a theory,
But it would be a theory *about* art, i.e., an art-critics's theory,
not an artist's theory.
>You also say that different scientific models can be compared with each other.
>The same is true of discursive systems
Of course they can be *compared*. There is a field called "comparative
theology" which examones and compares the way different religions look
at, describe, or think about certain topics.
I never said that cultural systems couldn't be compared. I did suggest
that they can't be compared in any way as to produce a resolution, unlike
science. That is, if it is the function of theology to describe or
understand God or the gods, (I would argue that it's true function is
sociological, but let's stick with its eymological one: "theo" - "ology")
then *comparisons* between different thorlogical systems should yield a
more precise understanding of the deity (-ies).
>academic jargons belong, you see "jargon" as just an amorphous blob of vaguely
>defined words, rather than as linguistic manifestations of fundamentally
>different _and_precise_ ways of constructing the world.
You haven't shown that they ARE precise except in terms of themselves.
I.e., you haven't shown that they represent precsion in terms of the
subject matter they purport to describe (literature, say, or TV, or
architecture)
>only, or even its primary, purpose. The burden of proof is therefore on you to
>demonstrate that the many legitimate functions of jargon that we have produced
>as counter-examples are somehow not valid or could be entirely _and_easily_
>satisfied without the use of jargon.
No one here has demonstrated that jargon in the discussion of culture,
actually serves these uses, they have only asserted it. Show us something
that this jargon enables us to do that is not recognizable only within
the system of jargon.
---peter
Peter Nelson
>nels...@apollo.hp.com (Peter Nelson) writes:
>| >On the contrary, it's quite possible to speak with
>| >detailed, rigorous precision about cultural phenomena.
>| >And in the case of some theories about culture, it's
>| >absolutely necessary to use jargon. The problem is
>| >not that elaborate, dense, carefully-worked-out theories
>| >can't exist in the soft sciences, it's that they can't
>| >be proved. Even if one sits around and observes for
>| >years, the number and quality of the variables involved
>| >makes any conclusions pretty chancy.
>
>nels...@apollo.hp.com (Peter Nelson) writes:
>| Which obviates any claim these might have to being rigorous
>| or precise, and this confirms my original statement.
>|
>| Just because I postulate that the buttons on the uniforms
>| of the flying saucer pilots are green, and *happen to be right*
>| doesn't make my claim about their uniforms detailed, rigorous
>| precise; it just makes it lucky.
>
>You seem to have a curious definition of "rigorous"
>and "precise" -- perhaps, to be in some kind of
>positive relation with some kind of reality (to be
>defined elsewhere). But Euclidian geometry is both
>rigorous and precise without being in touch with
>reality anywhere.
Math, in general, is rigorous and precise, "without being in touch
with reality", because it's not a science, but an artificial
system. BUT, what makes it more than an intellectual curiosity
is that I can use it to solve real world problems. I can reliably
use mathematics to tell me things that turn out to be true in the
real world. If I constructed a mathematical system in which
A^2 + b^2 != C^2 for a right-angle triangle it might be interesting
to chat with other mathematicians about it, but it would be of
limited value in talking about the real world.
>There is no reason not to work out elaborate,
>logical, rigorously precise theories just because we
>can't prove them. They may be elegant, amusing,
>aesthetically rewarding, or even explanatory of
>observed phenomena in some reasonably satisfactory
>way.
Sure, I have no problem with that. I'm just questioning the
claim that the jargon in the original posting is anything MORE
than that.
---peter
jlam...@pomona.claremont.edu
I was going to respond to your last post point-by-point, but it's becoming
increasing obvious that this would be futile. This discussion is just going
around in circles, and I think I now understand why: you keep changing the
subject.
The _real_ point of contention between us is on the value of a certain class of
theories that have arisen in the humanities over the past several decades, and
in particular their use of specialized terminology. One assertion which has
been implicit in my argument and which I think needs to be made explicit at
this point is this: specialized terminology is necessary for these theories to
be discussed intelligently, therefore to attack the value of terminology is to
attack the value of the theories to which they belong.
Your claim, or at least the claim that I am primarily interested in refuting,
is that the use of terminology, and thus these theories, have no other
function but to give an air of superiority to those who use them, and thus are
of no real value.
My claim is that these theories, and thus their use of terminology, serve
legitimate functions and thus are of value.
This question of value has misleadingly been conflated with the question of
rigor and precision, specifically that type of rigor and precision proper to
the hard sciences. THESE ARE TWO DISTINCT QUESTIONS. Even if you should
demonstrate that theory is neither rigorous nor precise (I think the
disagreement on this point has been primarily over semantics, as I shall
attempt to demonstrate), this would not prove theory to be of no value. You
would still have to demonstrate that rigor and precision were the only source
of value that theory could have. I'm not saying that the questions of
precision and value aren't related, I'm saying that they should not be equated.
When we talk of rigor and precision in the humanities, we are not talking
about exactly the same thing as when we talk of rigor and precision in the
hard sciences. The humanities and the hard sciences are different systems, and
thus use different standards. You presumably take science's use of the terms
rigor and precision to be definitive, thus, by your definitions, theory in the
humanities, to the extent that these two systems are commensurable, is less
rigorous and precise than scientific theories. Fine. I don't want to get into
an argument over semantics. But notice that nothing other than hard science is
rigorous and precise in this way. Do you really mean that nothing besides hard
science has any real value?
You might say that I'm changing the subject, but I don't think so. What has
kept people arguing against you is not your assertion that theory is less
rigorous and precise than hard science, but that it is of no value. Your
perpetually condescending and derogatory attitude towards theory and those who
engage in it is really pissing people off, including me. I'm not saying that
your position is inappropriate, but I am saying that it needs to be made
explicit. I'm willing to debate whether theory is of any value at all, but I'm
not willing to participate in a discussion in which you first claim that theory
is of no value, but then when someone argues against this you jump back and say
"all I'm saying is that theory isn't as precise as hard science." This sort of
inconsistency is infuriating.
Again, my arguments are these:
1.) Terminology is necessary to theory.
2.) Theory serves legitimate functions and thus has value.
I am prepared to defend both of these positions, but first please formulate
_precisely_ what your main position is in your next post, as I think this
discussion will continue to go in circles until we can agree on what exactly
we are discussing.
One more thing. You asked for positive, specific examples of the use of
theory. This is a legitimate request, but one which I don't think is possible
for anyone to satisfy in the space of a post. These theories are complex, and
very resistant to summarization, and as they are not concerned with such things
as concrete predictions, it is difficult or impossible to give any example of
what theory does to someone who does not understand the theory. Unlike hard
science, the results of theory are not separable from its method. If you are
genuinely interested in learning about theory, as opposed to blindly
criticizing it, here are some suggestions:
Saussure, Ferdinand --Course on General Linguistics-- almost all of later
theory is in some way related to structuralist linguistics, so if you don't
understand this, what is really meant by "sign", "signifier", "signified", and
"referent", you won't understand most theory.
Just about anything by Foucault.
Jameson, Fredric --Postmodernism--
I've chosen these in particular because I think they are fairly easy for the
layperson to understand, while being sufficiently part of contemporary theory
to give one some idea what it's all about.
I suggest avoiding any sort of summarization of theory (such as Eagleton's
"Literary Theory"), as they tend to greatly over-simplify and misrepresent the
original theorists' positions.
Peter Nelson
>Peter,
>The _real_ point of contention between us is on the value of a certain class of
>theories that have arisen in the humanities over the past several decades, and
>in particular their use of specialized terminology. One assertion which has
>been implicit in my argument and which I think needs to be made explicit at
>this point is this: specialized terminology is necessary for these theories to
>be discussed intelligently, therefore to attack the value of terminology is to
>attack the value of the theories to which they belong.
Of course. I'm saying that if these theories were "valuable" then this
should be demonstrable. That is, it's apparent even to a layman that
physics, molecular biology, etc are powerful tools for describing and
predicting the systems within their domain. You don't have to BE a
physicist or speak its jargon to see instances of it's "value" (maybe
"power" or "utilitiy" or "precision" might be better words).
>Your claim, or at least the claim that I am primarily interested in refuting,
>is that the use of terminology, and thus these theories, have no other
>function but to give an air of superiority to those who use them, and thus are
>of no real value.
I merely suggested this as a possible function. I don't know whether
it's the real function. But if the real function is to build a
conceptual model that demonstrably maps to the real world then I'd
like to see evidence of this mapping.
[ . . . ]
>the hard sciences. THESE ARE TWO DISTINCT QUESTIONS. Even if you should
>demonstrate that theory is neither rigorous nor precise (I think the
>disagreement on this point has been primarily over semantics, as I shall
>attempt to demonstrate), this would not prove theory to be of no value. You
>would still have to demonstrate that rigor and precision were the only source
>of value that theory could have.
I'm open to alternative suggestions. My explicit assumption is that
the objective is to create a conceptual model of the topic under dis-
cussion (say, popular culture, architecture, literature, whatever)
the way physics might attempt to build a conceptual model of matter
and that a "good" conceptual model is one with a tight mapping to
the subject itself. Precision and "rigour" (predictability, repeat-
ability, etc) are merely metrics for this property. How do you
suggest we tell if the model maps well to reality?
>rigorous and precise in this way. Do you really mean that nothing besides hard
>science has any real value?
In terms of theoretical or conceptual models, yes. Plenty of things
have "value" in some other sense. It is not the purpose of, say, a
stand-up comic to create a theoretical conceptual model but rather
to create laughter.
>You might say that I'm changing the subject, but I don't think so. What has
>kept people arguing against you is not your assertion that theory is less
>rigorous and precise than hard science, but that it is of no value.
I'm open to suggestion about what the value would BE of a non-rigorous,
non-testable, etc theory. I mean, it's true, I admit, that I regard the
goal of theory to be to construct a conceptual model of whatever the
thing is in the real world that is being considered.
> These theories are complex, and very resistant to summarization, and as
> they are not concerned with such things as concrete predictions, it is
> difficult or impossible to give any example of what theory does to
> someone who does not understand the theory. Unlike hard science, the
> results of theory are not separable from its method.
If the theory describes the real, concrete world, then why should
this be hard? The theory behind immunization is complex and still
incomplete, but that doesn't stop anyone from aprreciating the
significance of a smallpox vaccine (or verifying whether it works -
i.e., if I have the vaccine and then get smallpox then it failed)
Subatomic physics is awfully arcane, but a lay engineer like me
can still appreciate SQUIDs and tunnel diodes, etc
If the results of your theory are inseparable from the method then
it sounds like the theory only describes itself, rather than describing
the real world. How is this different from religious theories that
purport to describe the characteristics and relationships between
angels, saints, devils, heaven, hell, etc?
cr...@iscsvax.uni.edu
> What I'm saying is that, unlike the hard sciences, jargon
> in discussing culture does not clearly bring to the table
> any deeper understanding or grasp of the culture. It just
> isn't clear that an associate professor of media at a Calif-
> ornia university "understands", say, MTV, any better than a
> 17-year-old viewer who gets B-minuses in all his classes
> and works at the local Wendy's.
Agreed. But their knowledge-interests are not the same.
There is a sense in which the 17yr understands MTV *better* than the college
professor. But the college professor's jargon may enable him/her to
communicate something about that 17yr-old's lifeworld to someone else who does
not understand either 17yr-olds or MTV. It may not be perfect, but neither are
meteorological predictions. Jargon, used properly, provides a meta-language
that bridges the gap of understanding between two or more cultural contexts.
Like any hard science model, of course, to be useful the jargon must be decoded
back into terms understandable to people in their respective lifeworlds.
>
> I don't care about the goals, in and of themselves.
> I am questioning the use of jargon. In the case of
> the hard sciences jargon appears to be necessary to
> advance *science's* goals of rigorous precision. In
> terms of this discussion, I don't care whether hard
> science, or cultural theories, are rigorously precise
> or not. I'm just saying that jargon seems to serve
> a purpose in science but that it doesn't seem to serve
> this purpose in discussions of culture. I'm suggesting
> that in discussions of culture it serves a wholly different
> and more ignominious purpose - that of creating the illusion
> of deep understanding where none exists, of trying to
> raise the intellectual status of a small group of intel-
> lectuals.
Granted this happens all too often. But are you really ready to defend the
proposition that all the products of cultural sciences are "illusory?" No
deeper understanding of ourselves and others has *ever* been achieved by the
cultural sciences and the humanities? The concept of, say, alienation, does
not generate new and valid insights into the human condition?
>
> Typical of this thinking is the comment in the current
> Mondo 2000 by Lydia Lunch, that "Americans are so ignorant
> of culture!" Americans are not ignorant of culture. It's
> just that a shopping mall, TV advertisement, or neighbors
> trying to outdo each other covering their houses with
> brighter, more garish, lights at Christmas, is just as
> much *culture* as the prancing, posturing of a performance
> artist.
Okay. But plenty of social science and humanities scholars respect popular
culture and the point of view of the average person.
Also, pop culture itself contains jargon, or argot, that requires translation
for understanding... You dig? Word!
>
> Although someday this may change, at the moment it's nothing
> but snobbery to claim that we need special words to describe
> the very things that we all create on a daily basis.
>
Assuming that everybody attaches the same meanings to the same words, maybe.
But try telling your 17yr-old burger-flipper about the "flame war on the net."
This is something people "create on a daily basis," the meaning of which would
not be self-evident to a large portion of the mall-shopping, Xmas lighting,
etc. "average" persons out there. It is jargon, which is useful within a given
context. I.e., the goals *are* important in evaluating the use of jargon.
>
> ---peter
--------
keith, or somebody like him.
Kate Lynes
>In article <0096A65A...@pomona.claremont.edu> jlam...@pomona.claremont.edu
>
> [a _lot_ deleted]
>> These theories are complex, and very resistant to summarization, and as
>> they are not concerned with such things as concrete predictions, it is
>> difficult or impossible to give any example of what theory does to
>> someone who does not understand the theory. Unlike hard science, the
>> results of theory are not separable from its method.
>
> If the theory describes the real, concrete world, then why should
> this be hard? The theory behind immunization is complex and still
> incomplete, but that doesn't stop anyone from aprreciating the
> significance of a smallpox vaccine (or verifying whether it works -
> i.e., if I have the vaccine and then get smallpox then it failed)
> Subatomic physics is awfully arcane, but a lay engineer like me
> can still appreciate SQUIDs and tunnel diodes, etc
>
I've never posted here before (I've barely posted anywhere
before) though I've lurked for a while, but I felt I had to comment
on this debate since it is one which I have been thinking about
a lot lately. I'm sorry for intruding if this is meant to be a
more or less personal exchange--I wasn't sure.
I'm a graduate student who found the "god" of theory in her MA year
but has since come to question its value--hence my interest in this
thread.
My question to Peter Nelson would be: why do you assume that the
purpose of a theoretical model in the humanities is to "describe"
reality. I think the purpose of such a model is to _construct_
reality or a way of perceiving reality. And we should remember
that a certain amount of this sort of construction (as opposed
to your word "mapping") happens in the hard sciences also: cf,
for instance, the difference between notions of the physical world
derived from Newtonian physics and those derived from Chaos theory.
Your point about the pragmatic value of scientific "constructions"
is, however, in my view a valid one. Most scientific theories _work_
in a way that theories derived from Saussurian linguistics (and
from Nietzschian-Heideggerian philosophy) such as Deconstruction
cannot be said to do. But the latter may not be totally devoid of their
own kind of pragmatic value. Many theorists I have met as a Ph.D
student claim that the value of post-New Criticism theory in
English Studies (my area) is that it can help people to "read"
the world around them more critically. My personal problem with
this argument is its implicit elitism--i.e., its assumption that
your "average Jo" needs the theorist to teach him/her to be
critical. I think people are a lot more critical/cynical about
certain aspects of the world around them than theory-enthusiasts
give them credit for, even though they may not be capable of
expressing their critique in a manner that "your average
(ostensibly radical) theory professor would respect or understand.
Sometimes I wish more of them would actually buy a TV and turn
on _Roseanne_ :-)
Anyway, just my 2 cents.
--Kate
jlam...@pomona.claremont.edu
>In article <C4vM...@apollo.hp.com> nels...@apollo.hp.com (Peter Nelson) writes:
>>In article <0096A65A...@pomona.claremont.edu> jlam...@pomona.claremont.edu
>>
>> [a _lot_ deleted]
>
>>> These theories are complex, and very resistant to summarization, and as
>>> they are not concerned with such things as concrete predictions, it is
>>> difficult or impossible to give any example of what theory does to
>>> someone who does not understand the theory. Unlike hard science, the
>>> results of theory are not separable from its method.
>>
>> If the theory describes the real, concrete world, then why should
>> this be hard? The theory behind immunization is complex and still
>> incomplete, but that doesn't stop anyone from aprreciating the
>> significance of a smallpox vaccine (or verifying whether it works -
>> i.e., if I have the vaccine and then get smallpox then it failed)
>> Subatomic physics is awfully arcane, but a lay engineer like me
>> can still appreciate SQUIDs and tunnel diodes, etc
>>
>
>I've never posted here before (I've barely posted anywhere
>before) though I've lurked for a while, but I felt I had to comment
>on this debate since it is one which I have been thinking about
>a lot lately. I'm sorry for intruding if this is meant to be a
>more or less personal exchange--I wasn't sure.
Not at all. I for one would be glad to hear someone else's perspective.
>I'm a graduate student who found the "god" of theory in her MA year
>but has since come to question its value--hence my interest in this
>thread.
I'm an undergrad who discovered theory his sophomore year. Actually, I'm
interested in this thread for approximately the same reason. I've been
defending theory so vigorously partly because I think that the particular
objections launched against it so far have been wrong and have missed the
point, and partly because this seemed the most _productive_ position to take,
given the position of my willing and verbose opponent. [If I used smiley
faces, I'd put one here, but I DON'T.]
>My question to Peter Nelson would be: why do you assume that the
>purpose of a theoretical model in the humanities is to "describe"
>reality. I think the purpose of such a model is to _construct_
>reality or a way of perceiving reality. And we should remember
>that a certain amount of this sort of construction (as opposed
>to your word "mapping") happens in the hard sciences also: cf,
>for instance, the difference between notions of the physical world
>derived from Newtonian physics and those derived from Chaos theory.
I think Peter is using "describe" and "construct" interchangeably, and I think
he's justified in doing this. Very few well-educated people these days really
believe that there is any cartesian resemblance between our ideas and
"objective reality". Those of us steeped in theory tend to forget that this
wasn't an innovation of the post-structuralists, but that Hume said this over a
hundred years ago.
>Your point about the pragmatic value of scientific "constructions"
>is, however, in my view a valid one. Most scientific theories _work_
>in a way that theories derived from Saussurian linguistics (and
>from Nietzschian-Heideggerian philosophy) such as Deconstruction
>cannot be said to do. But the latter may not be totally devoid of their
>own kind of pragmatic value. Many theorists I have met as a Ph.D
>student claim that the value of post-New Criticism theory in
>English Studies (my area) is that it can help people to "read"
>the world around them more critically. My personal problem with
>this argument is its implicit elitism--i.e., its assumption that
>your "average Jo" needs the theorist to teach him/her to be
>critical. I think people are a lot more critical/cynical about
>certain aspects of the world around them than theory-enthusiasts
>give them credit for, even though they may not be capable of
>expressing their critique in a manner that "your average
>(ostensibly radical) theory professor would respect or understand.
>Sometimes I wish more of them would actually buy a TV and turn
>on _Roseanne_ :-)
I agree. I think saying that theory teaches people to be "critical" is both
elitist and untrue. I think most people who use this argument tend to equate
being critical with being cynical, and there seems to be a tendency in academia
to view cynicism as an intrinsically good thing. (Theory may, in fact,
contribute to making one cynical, but that's beside the point.)
I think the purpose of theoretical models in the humanities is not so much to
render the phenomena being modeled predictable as to make them _intelligible_.
Many people look at Impressionist paintings and then look at 60s Pop-art, and
ask: "How did we get from there to there?" Many people want to know _why_
people got really excited about Jackson Pollock's drip paintings in the 50s,
while now Abstract Expressionism is no big deal and people are getting all
worked up about Robert Maplethorpe's photographs. Why does art now look the
way it does, and not some other way? Most of the models that we come up with
to describe these phenomena are not testable in the scientific sense, but an
untestable model is better than no model at all. The standard by which
theories are measured is not that of predictive value, but simply of
explanatory value: how many "becauses" it can supply to satisfy our unlimited
"whys". It's not that our archetypal ignorant 17-year-old has _wrong_ answers
to these sorts of questions, but that he has _no_ answers. You might ask
what practical purpose knowing these sorts of answers serves. Why should it
serve a practical purpose? Many hard sciences serve no practical purpose;
take cosmology, or paleontology, or "pure" mathematics, or even most of
quantum physics. Certainly the study of culture is no less useful than these.
Kate Lynes
[stuff deleted]
>I think the purpose of theoretical models in the humanities is not so much to
>render the phenomena being modeled predictable as to make them _intelligible_.
>Many people look at Impressionist paintings and then look at 60s Pop-art, and
>ask: "How did we get from there to there?" Many people want to know _why_
>people got really excited about Jackson Pollock's drip paintings in the 50s,
>while now Abstract Expressionism is no big deal and people are getting all
>worked up about Robert Maplethorpe's photographs. Why does art now look the
>way it does, and not some other way? Most of the models that we come up with
>to describe these phenomena are not testable in the scientific sense, but an
>untestable model is better than no model at all. The standard by which
>theories are measured is not that of predictive value, but simply of
>explanatory value: how many "becauses" it can supply to satisfy our unlimited
>"whys". It's not that our archetypal ignorant 17-year-old has _wrong_ answers
>to these sorts of questions, but that he has _no_ answers. You might ask
>what practical purpose knowing these sorts of answers serves. Why should it
>serve a practical purpose? Many hard sciences serve no practical purpose;
>take cosmology, or paleontology, or "pure" mathematics, or even most of
>quantum physics. Certainly the study of culture is no less useful than these.
>
I don't agree that the mythical 17-year-old has no answers. Her
answers don't take the form of theoretical models or academic-
style arguments because she isn't interested in these types
of answers: as another poster put it, her "knowledge-interests"
are different. That doesn't mean she doesn't have an
understanding of how culture functions. After all, it may
well be the supposedly ignorant 17-year-olds who, by
reacting against current cultural trends, are (unbeknownst
to academic types) setting the stage for and helping to
create whatever aesthetic phenomena will succeed postmodernism.
They may not have a grasp of the whole history of Western art,
but why should they? (There's nothing I regret more now than
the time I wasted as an undergraduate learning useless canonical
knowledge.) I think people take from culture (current and
past) what it is in their interest to take. (Cf. John Fiske's
theories of the subversive uses of the popular.)
I agree with you, though, that in principle the value of
theoretical models in the humanities is explanatory rather
than predictive. And what people like "your willing and
verbose opponent" may forget or not realize is just how much
more rigorous, explanatory and even self-conscious newer
theory is than the humanist (non-)theories that preceded
it. But still, there are some important questions that
remain unanswered for me about postmodern theory. For instance,
for whom exactly is this type of theory explanatory? Who
speaks the language of poststructuralist theory and to whom
does that language speak? Who benefits from the theory machine?
These are important questions for me because I don't believe
that art or culture should be useless. Nor do I believe that
it ever really is. Even art (or theory or science) that
declares itself to be useless is serving some purpose--the
question is _whose_ purposes or interests are being served.
IMO then it is healthy for theory to have to justify
itself, especially in an economic climate of recession
and diminishing resources. In Canada, for instance, all
universities, and so all humanities departments, are publically
funded. I think taxpayers have a right to ask why and how the
education of myriad would-be cultural theorists for whom there
are very few jobs (i.e., little "real" need) is worth the expense.
I'm not saying this kind of education is not worth the expense,
just that these are not invalid questions. (Though three years
ago I would have been appalled by the sort of people who would
ask them--but in my years as a graduate student I've
managed to de-programme myself sufficiently to rid myself
of most of the knee-jerk elitism I picked up as an undergrad.)
--Kate
kevin brooks
>
>My question to Peter Nelson would be: why do you assume that the
>purpose of a theoretical model in the humanities is to "describe"
>reality. I think the purpose of such a model is to _construct_
>reality or a way of perceiving reality. And we should remember
>that a certain amount of this sort of construction (as opposed
>to your word "mapping") happens in the hard sciences also: cf,
although i agree with your comment, for the most part, i think hat
part of the difference between constructing and mapping lies
on the dynamic relation between what is (read as) metaphorical
and what is (read as) literal (or proper). these categories shift
in the process of reading (and writing) and we cannot assume that
a "model" (mimesis) from the humanities escapes the problem of
mapping, just as we cannot assume that a "scientific construct"
ess metaphoricity. there is a lot of jargon here!
>
>Your point about the pragmatic value of scientific "constructions"
>is, however, in my view a valid one. Most scientific theories _work_
>in a way that theories derived from Saussurian linguistics (and
>from Nietzschian-Heideggerian philosophy) such as Deconstruction
>cannot be said to do. But the latter may not be totally devoid of their
>own kind of pragmatic value. Many theorists I have met as a Ph.D
>student claim that the value of post-New Criticism theory in
>English Studies (my area) is that it can help people to "read"
>the world around them more critically. My personal problem with
>this argument is its implicit elitism--i.e., its assumption that
>your "average Jo" needs the theorist to teach him/her to be
>critical. I think people are a lot more critical/cynical about
there is a mythology at work here: that the study of literature
(and, more recently, "popular culture") should lead (as if
inscribed within some stone-carved teleolgy) to "bridging"
the public (whoever they are) and representation. the study
of literature, and representation, in general, is just that.
it arises from a modernity of compartmentalization,
professionalization. in so being, the study of representation
necessitates a technical vocabulary, that due to its
subject of study must remain elastic and reflexive.
[stuff deleted]
kevin brooks
kevin brooks
[i cut your text liberally]
>
>I'm an undergrad who discovered theory his sophomore year. Actually, I'm
your comments are very impressive.
>
>"whys". It's not that our archetypal ignorant 17-year-old has _wrong_ answers
>to these sorts of questions, but that he has _no_ answers. You might ask
alternatively, one might ask about the conditions that make it possible
for the 17-year-old to have answers, or for peter nelson to
write about a 17-year-old, or critics to think that it is
possible to understand, or for the sciences to be written in
opposition to the humanities, mapping in opposition to constructing.
what makes opposition possible?
kevin brooks
[i deleted liberally]
there are some important questions that
remain unanswered for me about postmodern theory. For instance,
for whom exactly is this type of theory explanatory? Who
speaks the language of poststructuralist theory and to whom
does that language speak? Who benefits from the theory machine?
These are important questions for me because I don't believe
that art or culture should be useless. Nor do I believe that
useless to whom?
it ever really is. Even art (or theory or science) that
declares itself to be useless is serving some purpose--the
question is _whose_ purposes or interests are being served.
my sense is that "purpose" for you is serving a much more
teleological purpose than is really necessary. perhaps
you might ask instead what are the effects of such
theories and their uses.
kevin brooks
lrud...@vax.clarku.edu
jlam...@pomona.claremont.edu writes:
>Many hard sciences serve no practical purpose;
>take cosmology, or paleontology, or "pure" mathematics, or even most of
>quantum physics. Certainly the study of culture is no less useful than these.
`"Pure" mathematics' isn't a science (it is often hard; its productions--if
not its practice--often serve practical purposes, at one or more removes).
Lee Rudolph
"We know, from doing both, that life is long
and art is very, very short."
--(mis?)quoted from a poem I read in the late
1970s or early 1980s; a pointer to the author
would be appreciated
Mikhail Zeleny
nels...@apollo.hp.com (Peter Nelson) writes:
>In article <C4s78...@panix.com>
>g...@panix.com (Gordon Fitch) writes:
>>nels...@apollo.hp.com (Peter Nelson) writes:
GF:
>>>>On the contrary, it's quite possible to speak with
>>>>detailed, rigorous precision about cultural phenomena.
>>>>And in the case of some theories about culture, it's
>>>>absolutely necessary to use jargon. The problem is
>>>>not that elaborate, dense, carefully-worked-out theories
>>>>can't exist in the soft sciences, it's that they can't
>>>>be proved. Even if one sits around and observes for
>>>>years, the number and quality of the variables involved
>>>>makes any conclusions pretty chancy.
PN:
>>>Which obviates any claim these might have to being rigorous
>>>or precise, and this confirms my original statement.
>>>
>>>Just because I postulate that the buttons on the uniforms
>>>of the flying saucer pilots are green, and *happen to be right*
>>>doesn't make my claim about their uniforms detailed, rigorous
>>>precise; it just makes it lucky.
GF:
>>You seem to have a curious definition of "rigorous"
>>and "precise" -- perhaps, to be in some kind of
>>positive relation with some kind of reality (to be
>>defined elsewhere). But Euclidian geometry is both
>>rigorous and precise without being in touch with
>>reality anywhere.
Tell that to your architect.
PN:
>Math, in general, is rigorous and precise, "without being in touch
>with reality", because it's not a science, but an artificial
>system. BUT, what makes it more than an intellectual curiosity
>is that I can use it to solve real world problems. I can reliably
>use mathematics to tell me things that turn out to be true in the
>real world. If I constructed a mathematical system in which
>A^2 + b^2 != C^2 for a right-angle triangle it might be interesting
>to chat with other mathematicians about it, but it would be of
>limited value in talking about the real world.
Does the name of Riemann ring a bell? How about Einstein?
Didn't think so.
GF:
>>There is no reason not to work out elaborate,
>>logical, rigorously precise theories just because we
>>can't prove them. They may be elegant, amusing,
>>aesthetically rewarding, or even explanatory of
>>observed phenomena in some reasonably satisfactory
>>way.
PN:
>Sure, I have no problem with that. I'm just questioning the
>claim that the jargon in the original posting is anything MORE
>than that.
With your degree of awareness, you would be just as entitled to make
the same claim about physics or math.
>---peter
cordially,
mikhail zel...@husc.harvard.edu
"Le cul des femmes est monotone comme l'esprit des hommes."
K. Esme
My impression is that jargon is being justified (or claimed to be unjustified)
based upon its usefullness within a certain field.
BUT....I'm of the opinion that this is a backwards way of looking at it.
Jargon is developed and used by ANY group of people who have any strong,
connecting interest and communication.
So, whether jargon enhances the ability of "soft" scientists to formulate
theories and is therfore justified is a moot question. Jargon is a much more
existential thing....since the "soft" scientists are trying to formulate
models, they will develop jargon.
The question then becomes one not of NEED for jargon within whichever
discipline, but one of the appropriateness of the use of that jargon.
K. Esme
@ @ @ @ @ @ @ @ @ @ @ @ @ @ @ @ @ @ @ @ @ @ @ @ @ @ @ @ @ @ @ @ @ @ @ @ @ @ @ @
I do not know if sex is an illusion @ They call me Esme
I do not know who I was when I did those things @ With Love and Squalor
or who I said I was...or whether I knew, even then @ They send my email to
that there was doubt about these things--Adrienne Rich @ cow...@scf.usc.edu
@ @ @ @ @ @ @ @ @ @ @ @ @ @ @ @ @ @ @ @ @ @ @ @ @ @ @ @ @ @ @ @ @ @ @ @ @ @ @ @
Peter Nelson
>In article <C4I2...@apollo.hp.com>, nels...@apollo.hp.com (Peter Nelson) writes:
>> this purpose in discussions of culture. I'm suggesting
>> that in discussions of culture it serves a wholly different
>> and more ignominious purpose - that of creating the illusion
>> of deep understanding where none exists, of trying to
>> raise the intellectual status of a small group of intel-
>> lectuals.
>Granted this happens all too often. But are you really ready to defend the
>proposition that all the products of cultural sciences are "illusory?" No
>deeper understanding of ourselves and others has *ever* been achieved by the
>cultural sciences and the humanities?
The problem is that the nature of the "culture sciences" prevents us from
even answering a question like this . . .
> The concept of, say, alienation, does
>not generate new and valid insights into the human condition?
. . . my point being how do we tell? How do we tell if the "concept of
alienation, generates new and valid insights into the human condition"?
The hard sciences at least have metrics for their jargon; there is some epis-
temological consensus about the stuff they deal with.
>Okay. But plenty of social science and humanities scholars respect popular
>culture and the point of view of the average person.
>Also, pop culture itself contains jargon, or argot, that requires translation
>for understanding... You dig? Word!
You have, perhaps inadvertantly, reinforced my suggestion. The jargon
of popular culture does, indeed, mainly serve to identify an in-group
and an excluded group, rather than to allow its speakers to construct
more precise conceptual models of their world.
---peter
Peter Nelson
>>In article <0096A65A...@pomona.claremont.edu> jlam...@pomona.claremont.edu
>My question to Peter Nelson would be: why do you assume that the
>purpose of a theoretical model in the humanities is to "describe"
>reality.
Because several posters have asserted this.
> I think the purpose of such a model is to _construct_ reality or a way of
> perceiving reality.
Well, let's say it is. If you are *constructing* a reality then why
concern yourself with popular (or not-so-popular) culture or anything
else in the real world at all? Why do commentaries and deconstructions
of, say, some actual work of literature or some interpretation of
actual history at all? If you are constructing a reality then you
have no need to concern yourself with something that an actual writer
actually wrote - you are free to construct entirely new sequences of
symbols, assign arbitrary meanings to them, and then consider how they
might be interpreted or what they might mean within a synthesized
context.
Note that I have been involved in artificial life experimenting for
years, so I do these things routinely.
> And we should remember
>that a certain amount of this sort of construction (as opposed
>to your word "mapping") happens in the hard sciences also: cf,
>for instance, the difference between notions of the physical world
>derived from Newtonian physics and those derived from Chaos theory.
True but they still have the same goal, which is constructing
conceptual models of the real world, and how well they do in
that is measured the same way. Chaos theory is just better
at it than earlier methods, for certain classes of problems.
---peter
Peter Nelson
>I think the purpose of theoretical models in the humanities is not so much to
>render the phenomena being modeled predictable as to make them _intelligible_.
>Many people look at Impressionist paintings and then look at 60s Pop-art, and
>ask: "How did we get from there to there?" Many people want to know _why_
>people got really excited about Jackson Pollock's drip paintings in the 50s,
>while now Abstract Expressionism is no big deal and people are getting all
>worked up about Robert Maplethorpe's photographs. Why does art now look the
>way it does, and not some other way?
I think you were doing OK up to here.
> Most of the models that we come up with
>to describe these phenomena are not testable in the scientific sense, but an
>untestable model is better than no model at all.
Why do you say this? It seems to me that an untestable model is totally
arbitrary -- one could sit around all day and propose different "explan-
ations" for things but there would be no basis for choosing between them.
> The standard by which
>theories are measured is not that of predictive value, but simply of
>explanatory value: how many "becauses" it can supply to satisfy our unlimited
>"whys".
But if they aren't testable then in what sense do they "satisfy"?
---peter
jlam...@pomona.claremont.edu
Just to avoid confusion, I should point out that what are called "models"
in the humanities correspond more closely to what in the hard sciences are
refered to as "metaphors", rather than to scientific models, which are by
definition predictive.
By "testable", I meant in the strict sense of producing concrete predictions.
I do not mean that there are no criteria by which the models can be judged.
For example, I'm reading a book called "The Ethic of Authenticity" by Charles
Taylor. In it, he proposes a model of modern morality in which the individual
attempts to create/discover him- or herself. (I'm going to have to completely
oversimplify here.) Taylor then goes on to apply this model to just about every
sort of modern and postmodern cultural production, saying that this is the
underlying motivation which produced it, and the sole source of its
justification. It's clear to me that, while his model may be useful in certain
cases, he applies it where it is completely inappropriate. (For example, he
condemns Derrida for practicing a "deviant" form of authenticity. This is
rather like condemning Hitler for practicing a "deviant" form of Zionism.) So,
I reject Taylor's theory, in favor of others that can account for such things
as deconstructionism (as a cultural phenomenon), and even Taylor's own
production. I have here made a value judgement between different theories,
and one which I think most people who know the subject would agree with me on.
No, this judgement is not rigorously testable in the sense that conflicting
scientific theories are testable. So what? None of the mythologies by
which people actually live are rigorously testable, yet it is within the
context of these mythologies that people actually live their lives and in which
science itself develops. (Yes, this is a model.)
Kate Lynes
>In article <1993Apr3.0...@epas.toronto.edu> kly...@epas.utoronto.ca (Kate Lynes) writes:
>
>> I think the purpose of such a model is to _construct_ reality or a way of
>> perceiving reality.
>
> Well, let's say it is. If you are *constructing* a reality then why
> concern yourself with popular (or not-so-popular) culture or anything
> else in the real world at all? Why do commentaries and deconstructions
> of, say, some actual work of literature or some interpretation of
> actual history at all? If you are constructing a reality then you
> have no need to concern yourself with something that an actual writer
> actually wrote - you are free to construct entirely new sequences of
> symbols, assign arbitrary meanings to them, and then consider how they
> might be interpreted or what they might mean within a synthesized
> context.
Well, but even the metaphor of construction implies some relation
to "reality," even if only a cultural reality. There must, for
instance, be materials out of which one constructs. Creation
_ex nihilo_ is a Romantic notion which I think most poststructuralists
have discarded. As I understand it, the constructionist position
(to which I do not wholeheartedly subscribe, BTW) does not deny
the existence or importance of external reality; it merely claims
that there is no such thing as unmediated access to it.
[....]
>
>> And we should remember
>>that a certain amount of this sort of construction (as opposed
>>to your word "mapping") happens in the hard sciences also: cf,
>>for instance, the difference between notions of the physical world
>>derived from Newtonian physics and those derived from Chaos theory.
>
> True but they still have the same goal, which is constructing
> conceptual models of the real world, and how well they do in
> that is measured the same way. Chaos theory is just better
> at it than earlier methods, for certain classes of problems.
It is now being said that the predictability/regularity
assumed by the Newtonian paradigm is the exception rather than
the rule as was previously supposed. So that makes Newtonian
physics a testable theory or model which is nonetheless wrong for
much of physical reality (eg. for most living systems). By the
same token (though I admit the analogy is somewhat ludicrous),
one could say that all books have 150-200 pages, and this would be
testable and true for one class of books--say, Harlequin romances.
Yet obviously a theory like this would be of limited use or value.
This is why empirical, testable research in the humanities has,
for the most part, been avoided--because it is reductive. There
is, however, a movement called the "Empirical Study of Literature"
which is very big in Germany and is actually quite interesting,
but which is virtually ignored in North America because of the anti-
science biases of humanities scholars here.
---Kate
Ken Jopp
clears up some things:
If you wanted a broader understanding of "alientation" or "desire,"
and your only options were to consult scientific or humanistic
works, which would you consult? Why?
Increasingly precise models of the world are fine for some
things, but when we spend millions to determine the mass
of the z particle, or something similar, we're creating models that
at no points come tangential to human experience.
So what good are they? Oooops; I think I said too much.
Kate Lynes
>
>It is now being said that the predictability/regularity
>assumed by the Newtonian paradigm is the exception rather than
>the rule as was previously supposed. So that makes Newtonian
>physics a testable theory or model which is nonetheless wrong for
>much of physical reality (eg. for most living systems). By the
>same token (though I admit the analogy is somewhat ludicrous),
>one could say that all books have 150-200 pages, and this would be
>testable and true for one class of books--say, Harlequin romances.
>Yet obviously a theory like this would be of limited use or value.
>This is why empirical, testable research in the humanities has,
>for the most part, been avoided--because it is reductive. There
>is, however, a movement called the "Empirical Study of Literature"
>which is very big in Germany and is actually quite interesting,
>but which is virtually ignored in North America because of the anti-
>science biases of humanities scholars here.
>
contradictory--"_all_ books . . . is true for _one_ class of books"!
I didn't mean to type the word "all" but that doesn't change much. I
guess my point was that in a very general way classical science did
this--ie. based its conception of the physical world on
theories that were (are) true and testable only for a relatively
small part of it. In other words, testable models in science and
especially in the humanities _can be_ reductive or have reductive
effects. (Just thought I'd point out the ridiculousness of my initial
comment before someone else did it for me. I suspect I might be
a bit too "sensitive" for Usenet, but as I haven't been
flamed yet this theory remains untested . . . .)
---Kate
Gordon Fitch
| ...
| This is why empirical, testable research in the humanities has,
| for the most part, been avoided--because it is reductive. There
| is, however, a movement called the "Empirical Study of Literature"
| which is very big in Germany and is actually quite interesting,
| but which is virtually ignored in North America because of the anti-
| science biases of humanities scholars here.
I believe it was the Germans who first began to do things
like counting the number of sentences in which the particle
_de_ appeared (not really translatable, something conveyed
in English by tone or emphasis) in certain positions in
different texts, and thereby proving or disproving authorship.
As I recall, one of Plato's texts was shown to almost
certainly be by another, possibly a student of Plato's.
I think this is another example like that of linguistics,
which started out in a woolly enough manner as one of
those humanities, and eventually became a "precise",
rather mathematical sort of science, at least in the area
of grammar and phonology.
I doubt if there is any strict boundary between the hard
sciences and most woofy of the humanities. Of course, we
are free to make one up....
Peter Nelson
>In article <C56s5...@apollo.hp.com>, nels...@apollo.hp.com (Peter Nelson) writes:
>>> Most of the models that we come up with
>>>to describe these phenomena are not testable in the scientific sense, but an
>>>untestable model is better than no model at all.
>>
>> Why do you say this? It seems to me that an untestable model is totally
>> arbitrary -- one could sit around all day and propose different "explan-
>> ations" for things but there would be no basis for choosing between them.
>>
>>> The standard by which
>>>theories are measured is not that of predictive value, but simply of
>>>explanatory value: how many "becauses" it can supply to satisfy our unlimited
>>>"whys".
>>
>> But if they aren't testable then in what sense do they "satisfy"?
>>
>
>Just to avoid confusion, I should point out that what are called "models"
>in the humanities correspond more closely to what in the hard sciences are
>refered to as "metaphors", rather than to scientific models, which are by
>definition predictive.
First of all, I'm not sure the term "metaphor" is used in the hard
sciences except in casual conversation. Of course it might be used
by philosophers of science and semanticists and so forth when
*discussing* science, as I did earler, when I agreed with another
poster that scientific a model was a kind of metaphor, and that the
use of a well-chosen metaphor did not, per se, obviate the feature
or predictibility (viz. Dirac's Sea back in the 1920's).
Also I'm not sure that scientific models are *by definition* pre-
dictive, although it usually works out that way. But there are
plenty of scientific models in areas where predictions are hard
or impossible to test, e.g., cosmology, paleontology, etc. The
closest thing to a prediction might be along the lines of saying
that, "if this model is correct we should never see fossils of
<this> species in <this> strata of sediment".
>I do not mean that there are no criteria by which the models can be judged.
>For example, I'm reading a book called "The Ethic of Authenticity" by Charles
>Taylor.
[ . . . ]
>I reject Taylor's theory, in favor of others that can account for such things
>as deconstructionism (as a cultural phenomenon), and even Taylor's own
>production. I have here made a value judgement between different theories,
>and one which I think most people who know the subject would agree with me on.
I'm not sure what your point is. You've rejected one writer (Taylor)'s
theory about another writer (Derrida)'s commentary on a social
phenomenon that's defined strictly in terms of a taxonomy of cultural
phenomena (e.g., "constructionism", "deconstructionism", "postmodern-
ism" that they share. This seems consistent with my critique that
the jargon is used the same way it's used among religious philos-
ophers sharing common theological assumptions, for instance students
in a shul debating some line in the Torah, or medieval priests deb-
ating how many angels can dance on the head of a pin. In other
words the debate is only meaningful if you accept the underlying
models and it's not obvious that/how/if/whether it maps to the
outside world. ("outside" its special world view)
Up to a point science is the same way - scientists may debate the
structure of the atom or the genetics of a virus using a special
language and only talking to each other. But if you don't accept
their basic assumptions that there ARE such things as atoms or
viruses (etc, etc) the debate is incomprehensible or merely an
interesting academic exercise. The difference is that science
can demonstrate a mapping to the real world that other models
*that address the same phenomena* (e.g., the nature of matter,
or of disease) cannot and that *doesn't* depend on accepting
their assumptions. That's the payoff for learning all that
jargon. You can give a kid an oral polio vaccine and tell him
it's Holy Water blessed by a shaman. He doesn't have to know
it really contains broken viruses. It works just as well.
>No, this judgement is not rigorously testable in the sense that conflicting
>scientific theories are testable. So what? None of the mythologies by
>which people actually live are rigorously testable, yet it is within the
>context of these mythologies that people actually live their lives and in which
>science itself develops. (Yes, this is a model.)
And many people live their lives according to mythologies that do not
require special jargon to express. Remember, my original question
was why it was necessary to use special jargon to describe a culture
that we all live in every day? What does the jargon buy you that
you can't get without the jargon?
---peter
Michael Sean Rooney
>
> And many people live their lives according to mythologies that do not
> require special jargon to express. Remember, my original question
> was why it was necessary to use special jargon to describe a culture
> that we all live in every day? What does the jargon buy you that
> you can't get without the jargon?
Why, the jargon itself, of course.
I have a couple of comments for Peter:
(1) How do you describe "cultural" phenomena in a "jargonless" way?
(2) The notions of movement and void are integral to current
theories of science, yet Parmenides showed us 26 centuries
ago that these concepts are logically incoherent.
Fortunately, your account of science rests on an ability
to "map to the real world." If your science is a purely
results-oriented account, then why bother with the elaborate
methodologies and other jargon -- anything goes, and we'll
go with what works. Why, then, the injunctions against
"jargony" humanities or "pseudo-"sciences if we're all guessing?
Or do you actually have an answer to old Father Parmenides?
Cordially,
Michael S. Rooney
"A tyranny of truth and science could increase esteem for the lie."
jlam...@pomona.claremont.edu
[....]
> First of all, I'm not sure the term "metaphor" is used in the hard
> sciences except in casual conversation. Of course it might be used
> by philosophers of science and semanticists and so forth when
> *discussing* science, as I did earler, when I agreed with another
> poster that scientific a model was a kind of metaphor, and that the
> use of a well-chosen metaphor did not, per se, obviate the feature
> or predictibility (viz. Dirac's Sea back in the 1920's).
The term tends to get used more often in the newer sciences, such as
psychology, where very fundamental questions are still unresolved, but yes, it
is used in the hard sciences.
>
> Also I'm not sure that scientific models are *by definition* pre-
> dictive, although it usually works out that way. But there are
> plenty of scientific models in areas where predictions are hard
> or impossible to test, e.g., cosmology, paleontology, etc. The
> closest thing to a prediction might be along the lines of saying
> that, "if this model is correct we should never see fossils of
> <this> species in <this> strata of sediment".
>
If the models in, say, paleontology aren't predictive, then presumably they are
only explanatory. If this is the case, then how is a "science" such as
paleontology different from the theories we've been discussing?
>>For example, I'm reading a book called "The Ethic of Authenticity" by Charles
>>Taylor.
> [ . . . ]
>
> I'm not sure what your point is.
Looking back, I'm not sure what my point was either. I just happened to be
thinking about this Taylor book a lot at that moment and decided to use it as
an example, but really, I don't think it was at all relevent. My mistake.
Let's just forget it.
>>No, this judgement is not rigorously testable in the sense that conflicting
>>scientific theories are testable. So what? None of the mythologies by
>>which people actually live are rigorously testable, yet it is within the
>>context of these mythologies that people actually live their lives and in which
>>science itself develops. (Yes, this is a model.)
>
> And many people live their lives according to mythologies that do not
> require special jargon to express. Remember, my original question
> was why it was necessary to use special jargon to describe a culture
> that we all live in every day? What does the jargon buy you that
> you can't get without the jargon?
Just because we participate in culture doesn't mean we understand it. (Many
would argue that our position within culture makes it especially difficult
for us to understand culture.) Once one decides to try to understand culture,
rather than merely living in it, one inevitably finds the need for special
terms to describe the structures that one is attempting to investigate.
Also, I deny that anyone lives their life according to jargon-less mythologies.
Personal mythologies are, almost by definition, constructed out of symbols that
have special significances unique to the individual, and with which they
construct their reality.
What does the jargon buy you that you can't get without the jargon? Ideas!
Cosma Shalizi
:In article <C59zA...@apollo.hp.com>, nels...@apollo.hp.com (Peter Nelson) writes:
:> First of all, I'm not sure the term "metaphor" is used in the hard
:> sciences except in casual conversation. Of course it might be used
:> by philosophers of science and semanticists and so forth when
:> *discussing* science, as I did earler, when I agreed with another
:> poster that scientific a model was a kind of metaphor, and that the
:> use of a well-chosen metaphor did not, per se, obviate the feature
:> or predictibility (viz. Dirac's Sea back in the 1920's).
:The term tends to get used more often in the newer sciences, such as
:psychology, where very fundamental questions are still unresolved, but yes, it
:is used in the hard sciences.
<Ahem> In this case my education in my own particular hard science
(viz., physics) is sadly imcomplete, and I shall demand a pro rata refund from
the Regents of the University of California. Where is it used, for what and by
whom? Instances of, say, describing symmetry breaking with balls rolling around
in bowls, etc., don't count, as they are merely used to introduce people to the
model.
>> Also I'm not sure that scientific models are *by definition* pre-
>> dictive, although it usually works out that way. But there are
>> plenty of scientific models in areas where predictions are hard
>> or impossible to test, e.g., cosmology, paleontology, etc. The
>> closest thing to a prediction might be along the lines of saying
>> that, "if this model is correct we should never see fossils of
>> <this> species in <this> strata of sediment".
Or, "We should see fossils of <this> species in <that> strata." Or
"fossils of type X found in this strata should have shorter femurs than those
in that strata, whose femurs should in turn be shorter than those from such-
and-such a tar pit." Or, "Background microwave radiation should not vary by
more than one part in X." These are all predictions; all of them are testable,
at least in principle.
>If the models in, say, paleontology aren't predictive, then presumably they are
>only explanatory. If this is the case, then how is a "science" such as
>paleontology different from the theories we've been discussing?
Perhaps the theories you have been discussing do not, in fact, explain
anything? An explanation, whatever else it is, is true, a condition which many
of them do not seem to meet. (I admit that I am probably straying beyond my
proper limits here. However, see Ellis's _Against Deconstruction_ for evidence
that this is so for at least one of our current bogeys - pardon me, cultural
theories.)
>What does the jargon buy you that you can't get without the jargon? Ideas!
Even if true, are the ideas you get worth having? Is it really worth
enduring Hegel's one real contribution to human thought, namely a demonstration
of just how badly language can be abused by a truly determined person, in order
to receive the idea that (surprise!) freedom is the right to obey the police,
and that his employers are the highest representative of the divine yet seen
on the earth?
Cosma Shalizi
In Real Life: li...@soda.berkeley.edu
larval physicist
--
Safe upon the solid rock the ugly houses stand:
Come and see my shining palace built upon the sand!
Edna St. Vincent Millay, "Second Fig"
jlam...@pomona.claremont.edu
>jlam...@pomona.claremont.edu writes:
>:The term [mataphor] tends to get used more often in the newer sciences, such
>:psychology, where very fundamental questions are still unresolved, but yes, it
>:is used in the hard sciences.
> <Ahem> In this case my education in my own particular hard science
>(viz., physics) is sadly imcomplete, and I shall demand a pro rata refund from
>the Regents of the University of California. Where is it used, for what and by
>whom? Instances of, say, describing symmetry breaking with balls rolling around
>in bowls, etc., don't count, as they are merely used to introduce people to the
>model.
Example: in psychology a common metaphor is that of activation and inhibition
of nodes. This is sometimes refered to as a "model", but as it cannot be
tested in-and-of itself, it is actaully a metaphor within which specific
models can be constructed. Once the underlying metaphors have proven
themselves reasonably useful and accurate, such is the case in physics, the
researchers generally don't need to bother with them any more. In psychology,
however, so little is known that the researchers can't afford _not_ to be aware
of these underlying metaphors, as it may be necessary to change them.
>
>>> Also I'm not sure that scientific models are *by definition* pre-
>>> dictive, although it usually works out that way. But there are
>>> plenty of scientific models in areas where predictions are hard
>>> or impossible to test, e.g., cosmology, paleontology, etc. The
>>> closest thing to a prediction might be along the lines of saying
>>> that, "if this model is correct we should never see fossils of
>>> <this> species in <this> strata of sediment".
> Or, "We should see fossils of <this> species in <that> strata." Or
>"fossils of type X found in this strata should have shorter femurs than those
>in that strata, whose femurs should in turn be shorter than those from such-
>and-such a tar pit." Or, "Background microwave radiation should not vary by
>more than one part in X." These are all predictions; all of them are testable,
>at least in principle.
>
>>If the models in, say, paleontology aren't predictive, then presumably they are
>>only explanatory. If this is the case, then how is a "science" such as
>>paleontology different from the theories we've been discussing?
> Perhaps the theories you have been discussing do not, in fact, explain
>anything? An explanation, whatever else it is, is true, a condition which many
^^^^^^^
>of them do not seem to meet. (I admit that I am probably straying beyond my
>proper limits here. However, see Ellis's _Against Deconstruction_ for evidence
>that this is so for at least one of our current bogeys - pardon me, cultural
>theories.)
Is it? What do you mean by true? That the model _resembles_ reality? See
Berkeley, Hume, etc. for a good refutation of that hypothesis. That it has
predictive value? Perhaps, but if we limit all discussion to only those areas
where there seems an immediate possibility of making predictive models, I think
we have excluded most of human life. Would you really want to live in a world
where no enquiries were permissable other than those of empirical science? If
theory is less valid that science, then art and literature must be even less
valid than that. Do you really mean to say this? Do you really think we
should just live with the assumptions about _human_ reality that arise as
a _by_product_ of science, without questioning them?
And by the way, I think it is very unhelpful to read a book such as Ellis's
without having read the original theorists whom he is criticizing. I have yet
to read any summary -- by either opponant or proponant -- of any theorist's
position which wasn't both horribly reductive and seriously missing the point.
>
>>What does the jargon buy you that you can't get without the jargon? Ideas!
> Even if true, are the ideas you get worth having?
You can't know if the ideas are worthwhile if you never have them.
Cosma Shalizi
>In article <1qb3qc$i...@agate.berkeley.edu>, li...@soda.berkeley.edu (Cosma Shalizi) writes:
>Example: in psychology a common metaphor is that of activation and inhibition
>of nodes. This is sometimes refered to as a "model", but as it cannot be
>tested in-and-of itself, it is actaully a metaphor within which specific
>models can be constructed.
This appears to be a confusion - either on my part or on yours -
between a metaphor and a family of similar models.
> Once the underlying metaphors have proven
>themselves reasonably useful and accurate, such is the case in physics, the
>researchers generally don't need to bother with them any more.
But what _are_ the underlying metaphors in physics? Inquiring minds,
etc.
>> Perhaps the theories you have been discussing do not, in fact, explain
>>anything? An explanation, whatever else it is, is true, a condition which many
> ^^^^^^^
>>of them do not seem to meet. (I admit that I am probably straying beyond my
>>proper limits here. However, see Ellis's _Against Deconstruction_ for evidence
>>that this is so for at least one of our current bogeys - pardon me, cultural
>>theories.)
>Is it? What do you mean by true? That the model _resembles_ reality?
A sentence about the world is true, if and only if what it asserts is
in fact the case. "I am typing at a terminal" is true if and only if I am
at a terminal, and I am typing. "There are no golden mountains" is true if
and only if there is no thing which is both golden and a mountain. This does
not seem especially recondite to me; no doubt I am mistaken. Now, when I try
to explain something - say an automobile accident - the statements which make
up my explanation, whatever else they may be, must be true. "The accident
happened because the Buick's driver had a grand mal seizure" only explains
the accident if there was a Buick in the accidnet, which had a driver, who
had a grand mal seizure at the time, and if that seizure did in fact cause
the accident. I could go on - "All speech is really writing" is true if and
only if there is no speech which is not writing, etc. - but this is costing
the net hundreds if not thousands of dollars as it is, and I trust the idea
is now clear.
>See Berkeley, Hume, etc. for a good refutation of that hypothesis.
Oh really now? Consider Berkeley's model of the universe: His one
infinite spirit, his myriad finite spirits (ourselves), the notion that all
material objects are merely appearences, that all causation is volition, etc.
Whether or not this is a _predictive_ model is not a question I am competent
to answer on a monday morning, but it is clear that Berkeley thought it was
true. As to Hume, I refer you to the very careful - and so far as I can see,
valid - dissection and refutation of his arguments by David Stove of the
University of Sydney (his _The Rationality of Induction_ and _Popper and
After: Four Modern Irrationalists_).
>That it has predictive value?
No.
>Would you really want to live in a world
>where no enquiries were permissable other than those of empirical science? If
>theory is less valid that science, then art and literature must be even less
>valid than that.
As a simple matter of fact, there never was a One Ring, Gilgamesh never
took the herb of life from the bottom of the ocean, Beowulf never fought
Grendel, and even so prosaic a person as Dr. Watson was no more than a figment
of Doyle's imagination. Having thus revealed my literary prejudices, I will
venture to assert that fiction is, in fact, fiction, and none the less valuable
for that. I have no objection to philosophy and literary criticism (which is
what I think you mean by "theory") as such - those who practice them seem to
often say things which are "not even wrong", but that's no reason to purge
them. (It _is_ a reason to argue with them, if one has the time and the stomach
for it.)
> Do you really mean to say this? Do you really think we
>should just live with the assumptions about _human_ reality that arise as
>a _by_product_ of science, without questioning them?
If by "_human_ reality" you mean such things as political ideals, of
course not. Social Darwinism, for instance, was derived from Darwinism at least
as invalidly as dialectical aterialism was derived from physics, or Capra's
mysticism. If on the other hand you do in fact mean some reality shared by
humans, and not anything else, then I confess I am unable to understand you.
>And by the way, I think it is very unhelpful to read a book such as Ellis's
>without having read the original theorists whom he is criticizing.
I tried. Lord knows I tried. Even Culler (? sp) was too dense. But
this is rather a tangent. The essential point is, "Are Ellis's criticisms
valid?" Check that, there is another one: "Are the doctrines Ellis criticizes
deconstructionist ones?"
Cosma Shalizi
In Real Life: li...@soda.berkeley.edu
Michael Sean Rooney
> Is it really worth
>enduring Hegel's one real contribution to human thought, namely a demonstration
>of just how badly language can be abused by a truly determined person, in order
>to receive the idea that (surprise!) freedom is the right to obey the police,
>and that his employers are the highest representative of the divine yet seen
>on the earth?
This is about as accurate a representation of Hegel's thought
as saying that the real achievement of physics is the hydrogen
bomb.
Cordially,
Michael S. Rooney
"The True is the Whole."
cr...@iscsvax.uni.edu
Ah, but how do you know that the speakers of a pop-culture language game have a
less precise conceptual model of their world?
---keith
>
>
>
>
jlam...@pomona.claremont.edu
> But what _are_ the underlying metaphors in physics? Inquiring minds,
>etc.
I believe notions like "particles" and "fields" and "waves" are, strictly
speaking, metaphors, as these are structuring concepts out of which our
current predictive models are constructed. We generally say that these things
"really exist" because the predictive models thus constructed seem to work
quite well, though it is conceivable that future models will abandon these
metaphors altogether in favor of other quite different ones.
> A sentence about the world is true, if and only if what it asserts is
>in fact the case.
This is an empty tautology, as are all of the specific examples that follow.
In the empirical sciences, a statement is true if it predicts observable
phenomena which are in fact observed. It can be argued that this definition,
though adequate for the purposes of empirical science, is lacking as far as
more human applications of the concept of "truth" go, for example moral truth.
>>See Berkeley, Hume, etc. for a good refutation of that hypothesis.
> Oh really now? Consider Berkeley's model of the universe: His one
>infinite spirit, his myriad finite spirits (ourselves), the notion that all
>material objects are merely appearances, that all causation is volition, etc.
I'm not supporting Berkeley's positive conclusions, only his refutation of the
Aristotelian metaphysics you seem to be advocating.
> As to Hume, I refer you to the very careful - and so far as I can see,
>valid - dissection and refutation of his arguments by David Stove of the
>University of Sydney (his _The Rationality of Induction_ and _Popper and
>After: Four Modern Irrationalists_).
I confess I haven't read Stove, but I seriously doubt that his refutation of
Hume goes so far as to reinstate this simplistic, Aristotelian "what-you-see-
is-what-you-get" metaphysics that you seem to support.
>>That it has predictive value?
> No.
See above.
>> Do you really mean to say this? Do you really think we
>>should just live with the assumptions about _human_ reality that arise as
>>a _by_product_ of science, without questioning them?
> If by "_human_ reality" you mean such things as political ideals, of
>course not. Social Darwinism, for instance, was derived from Darwinism at least
>as invalidly as dialectical aterialism was derived from physics,
^^^^^^^^^
On what basis do you make this judgment about the derivation of Social
Darwinism? Certainly not empirically. One certainly might refute Social
Darwinism on empirical grounds, but that is not what you are saying. You say
that its _derivation_ was invalid. You are making a value judgment on a
_textual_ operation. In other words, YOU ARE ENGAGING IN THEORY. (This is
precisely the sort of thing Paul de Man talked about when he said that the
opposition to theory was an integral part of theory itself.) If you say that
theory is worthless, then you are saying that the very tools with which such
judgments can be made are worthless.
I think we should be clear what we are arguing about. I am not defending the
value of any specific theory, only the value of theory in general. I am
attempting to defend theory from the charge that the theorists aren't saying
anything at all. My position is that the theorists are saying things,
important things, though a correlary of this is that _some_ of the things the
theorists say will be wrong.
I think a major point of confusion is over the term "deconstruction". This
term was coined by Derrida for a specific purpose, and thus properly refers
only to this Derridian theory. I have not read the actual texts in which
Derrida uses this term, and so I can not take a position on deconstructionism
proper one way or the other. However, it seems that the term deconstructionism
is often used to refer to poststructuralist theory in general, which is
approximately what I usually mean when I say "theory"--though really there is
quite a bit of theory which is not poststructuralist, and I confess I often
include this too, when I say "theory". The border between what is properly
poststructuralist and what isn't is awfully fuzzy, or at least it seems so to
me. (Is Jameson poststructuralist? What about French Feminism? What about
Althusser, or Havel? What about Georges Bataille? What about Lacan? Anyone
out there have any good, generally accepted classification guidelines, just so
I can avoid miscommunication?)
>>And by the way, I think it is very unhelpful to read a book such as Ellis's
>>without having read the original theorists whom he is criticizing.
> I tried. Lord knows I tried. Even Culler (? sp) was too dense. But
>this is rather a tangent. The essential point is, "Are Ellis's criticisms
>valid?" Check that, there is another one: "Are the doctrines Ellis criticizes
>deconstructionist ones?"
I don't mean to sound snobbish, but don't you think there is something just a
teensy bit silly about criticizing theories which you have admitted you don't
understand? And yes, I think that if you have to rely on other people's
accounts of the theories, then you don't understand them. At least, you cannot
know if you understand them or not. And if the doctrines that Ellis criticizes
are not those of the theorists to whom they are ascribed, but are only paper
tigers constructed by Ellis himself, then the validity of Ellis's criticisms
is a moot point.
Cosma Shalizi
>In article <1qchib$s...@agate.berkeley.edu>, li...@soda.berkeley.edu (Cosma Shalizi) writes:
>I believe notions like "particles" and "fields" and "waves" are, strictly
>speaking, metaphors, as these are structuring concepts out of which our
>current predictive models are constructed.
_for_ or _of_?
> We generally say that these things "really exist" because the predictive
> models thus constructed seem to work quite well,
our claims_. When I assert that
There is a tiger here (T)
let alone an electron, I (at least) am not just saying
T predicts my observations better than any other hypothesis
known to me (TH)
I'm saying there is a flesh and blood specimen of Panthera tigris staring me
in the face. My reason for believing that, if I am rational (can I be
rational? please? just this once?) is that TH seems true. As a matter of logic,
long claimed by skeptics and proven by Hume, T does not follow from TH, no
matter how many successful predictions I make from TH. One can always succeed
in imagining circumstances under which
I am having a flashback, and only hallucinating a tiger (TL)
is compatible with all my observations and predictions and what-nots. So maybe
I shouldn't mean anything more by "There is a tiger here" than TH, a statement
about my observations and predictions. But a statement about what exists is
very different from one about our reasons for thinking it exists. A counter-
example would be tantamount to a proof that induction is logically valid, and
would be a very interesting beast indeed. (For an argument that, while T cannot
be inferred from TH, TH is a good reason to believe T, see Stove's _Rationality
of Induction_.)
>> A sentence about the world is true, if and only if what it asserts is
>>in fact the case.
>This is an empty tautology, as are all of the specific examples that follow.
>In the empirical sciences, a statement is true if it predicts observable
>phenomena which are in fact observed.
Again, this is a confusion between the reasons for thinking a statement
true - which can, certainly, include predictive value - and the statement
itself.
> It can be argued that this definition,
>though adequate for the purposes of empirical science, is lacking as far as
>more human applications of the concept of "truth" go, for example moral truth.
No doubt it could be so argued; we are a species of quibblers. And
there are obvious - and "inhuman" - categories where predictive value cannot
be evidence of truth, because no predictions are made, namely logic and
mathematics. Care to share an example of "moral truth", or are we forgetting
our Hume?
>> Oh really now? Consider Berkeley's model of the universe: His one
>>infinite spirit, his myriad finite spirits (ourselves), the notion that all
>>material objects are merely appearances, that all causation is volition, etc.
>I'm not supporting Berkeley's positive conclusions
Good heavens, I never ment to imply you were. They're insane.
> only his refutation of the Aristotelian metaphysics you seem to be
>advocating.
The correspondence theory of truth is Aristotelian metaphysics?
Regardless, where did Berkeley attempt a refutation of it - and why did none
of his critics fall uponit with a fell cry and pointed questions about
what it means to call his system "true"?
>> As to Hume, I refer you to the very careful - and so far as I can see,
>>valid - dissection and refutation of his arguments by David Stove of the
>>University of Sydney (his _The Rationality of Induction_ and _Popper and
>>After: Four Modern Irrationalists_).
>I confess I haven't read Stove, but I seriously doubt that his refutation of
>Hume goes so far as to reinstate this simplistic, Aristotelian "what-you-see-
>is-what-you-get" metaphysics that you seem to support.
God's Tits, that's not what I meant. The correspondence theory of truth
is (so far as I can) see implicit in Hume; he may have made it explicit in
some places, for all that I can recall. Stove's attack is on Hume's conclusion
that we can ever have good reasons for asserting something is true.
>>> Do you really mean to say this? Do you really think we
>>>should just live with the assumptions about _human_ reality that arise as
>>>a _by_product_ of science, without questioning them?
>> If by "_human_ reality" you mean such things as political ideals, of
>>course not. Social Darwinism, for instance, was derived from Darwinism at least
>>as invalidly as dialectical aterialism was derived from physics,
> ^^^^^^^^^
>On what basis do you make this judgment about the derivation of Social
>Darwinism?
On the same basis people usually mean when they talk about
"derivation," "validity," "invalidity," etc., namely logical ones. Now, if
(as you may be implying below) critical theory claims all applications of logic
for its own, then you are in fact right, and I am engaging in theory. So is
the person who points out that the syllogism
All men are mortal
Socrates was mortal
Ergo, Socrates was a man
is invalid. In fact, every attempt at rational discourse becomes an exercise
in critical theory, at which point one might begin to wonder whether there
might not be a case for the twelve-mile limit after all.
> Certainly not empirically. One certainly might refute Social
>Darwinism on empirical grounds, but that is not what you are saying.
Partially true. Insofar as Social Darwinism includes some doctrines
about what _happens_ in societies, it could be refuted empirically. Its
doctrines about what are _desirable_ or _undesirable_, on the other hand,
are NOT empirically testable.
> You say that its _derivation_ was invalid. You are making a value
>judgment on a _textual_ operation.
I _thought_ I was making a value judgement on a _logical_ operation,
but am willing to be persuaded otherwise; see above.
> In other words, YOU ARE ENGAGING IN THEORY.
If you are using "theory" in the sense I describe above, this is true,
and if I ever denied it (which I don't recall doing) I was, of course, wrong.
Whether this sort of activity should be called "theory" is another matter
entirely, which frankly I don't really feel like arguing about.
>If you say that theory is worthless, then you are saying that the very tools
>with which such judgments can be made are worthless.
I'm not _that_ much of a positivist. The closest I can recall to such
a statement is a snide comment that _some_ theories are worthless, because
they are false. My apologies if I was unclear.
>I think we should be clear what we are arguing about.
This is usually nice.
> I am not defending the value of any specific theory, only the value of
>theory in general. I am attempting to defend theory from the charge that
>the theorists aren't saying anything at all.
Come now, has anyone _actually_ made this charge? Even the logical
positivists claimed theorists said things - meaningless things, admittedly,
but still lots of things.
> My position is that the theorists are saying things,
>important things, though a correlary of this is that _some_ of the things the
>theorists say will be wrong.
"Importance" is arguable. The question, I think, is which theorists,
if any, are saying something right (if anything), and how one tells them from
the rest. But I am only a physicist, and not a very good one at that, so don't
take _my_ word for it.
>However, it seems that the term deconstructionism
>is often used to refer to poststructuralist theory in general, which is
>approximately what I usually mean when I say "theory"--though really there is
>quite a bit of theory which is not poststructuralist, and I confess I often
>include this too, when I say "theory".
I should hope this is the case, otherwise the claim that the derivation
of Social Darwinism from plain Darwinism is invalid is a "theoretical" claim
makes (among others) Darwin himself a post-structuralist; no doubt he was
ahead of his time, but that is ridiculous. If, in fact, criticizing "theory"
in this sense is part of "theory" too, it follows that (say) a resurrected
Protagoras couldn't attack it without becoming himself a post-structuralist.
Truly, "the difficult unity of inclusion" in action.
>>>And by the way, I think it is very unhelpful to read a book such as Ellis's
>>>without having read the original theorists whom he is criticizing.
>> I tried. Lord knows I tried. Even Culler (? sp) was too dense. But
>>this is rather a tangent. The essential point is, "Are Ellis's criticisms
>>valid?" Check that, there is another one: "Are the doctrines Ellis criticizes
>>deconstructionist ones?"
>I don't mean to sound snobbish, but don't you think there is something just a
>teensy bit silly about criticizing theories which you have admitted you don't
>understand?
I believe I had some sort of disclaimer about my incompetence in these
matters in my original post; trust me, I now hearily regret bringing it up.
All I can say in my defense is that Ellis's presentation harmonizes with what
I could understand of them when I read them, and certainly with the selections
from their works that Ellis quotes, which he does rather extensively. I
wouldn't want my supply of food to depend on the correctness of my inter-
pretation of "theorists."
> And yes, I think that if you have to rely on other people's accounts of
>the theories, then you don't understand them. At least, you cannot know if
>you understand them or not.
Actually, one could construct an argument along these lines to show
that you can never be certain you understand _yourself_, let alone someone
with prose as murky as (e.g.) Hegel, or Derrida. I can't recall ever claiming
certainty for my interpretations.
> And if the doctrines that Ellis criticizes
>are not those of the theorists to whom they are ascribed, but are only paper
>tigers constructed by Ellis himself, then the validity of Ellis's criticisms
>is a moot point.
Not entirely. If his criticism are valid, then those doctrines are
false, and he would have established they were false. He wouldn't have shown
that the doctrines of the deconstructionists are false, and would in fact have
been guilty of a possibly unparalleled failure of exegesis (? sp), but if one
was interested in the doctrines he criticizes, his work would hardly be moot.
Cosma Shalizi
In Real Life: li...@soda.berkeley.edu
larval physicist