Hacker News Board Hacker News, browsed like a classic message board
Live data from Hacker News

Pragmatism as Anti-Authoritarianism

commonwealmagazine.org

Post reply on HN
Print view View original

81–90 of 100 posts

Re: Pragmatism as Anti-Authoritarianism

#81

Post by ABCLAW »

Jensson wrote: post #28
TheOtherHobbes wrote: post #20

Earlier quoted context omitted.

This confuses cause and effect. Intolerance of intolerance isn't just political theatre. It's a deliberate attempt to avoid the kinds of practical horrors that racism etc create in an otherwise liberal culture. Those horrors includes personal and mob violence, lynchings, rapes, other random murders, institutionalised economic apartheid, privilege (and its close ally, corruption), the reduction of public debate to rea…

> Those horrors includes personal and mob violence, lynchings, rapes, other random murders, institutionalised economic apartheid, privilege (and its close ally, corruption), the reduction of public debate to reactionary dogwhistles instead of future substance - and ultimately, with tedious predictability, torture and mass murder. Those are real problems, yes. But it should still be allowed to question the solutions p…

>But it should still be allowed to question the solutions people claim to have to those problems.

Why should we be having social discussions about whether or not genocide against a particular out-group is acceptable? Would the proposition that slaughtering an out-group be a good faith discourse about the best path forward for society? If not, why should we have that discussion at the cost of other discussions?

Re: Pragmatism as Anti-Authoritarianism

#82

Post by dang »

0x4d464d48 wrote: post #2

[flagged]

Please don't start flamewars on HN. We're trying to avoid that hell here, and you pushed this thread straight into it.

Inflammatory quote plus snarky one liner is definitely against the site guidelines. Please review https://news.ycombinator.com/newsguidelines.html and stick to the rules from now on.

Re: Pragmatism as Anti-Authoritarianism

#83

Post by SuoDuanDao »

reggieband wrote: post #78
motohagiography wrote: post #47

> The point of pragmatism is that a philosophical problem or distinction is only real to the extent that it has consequences—and those consequences are, in fact, the meaning of the problem or distinction. Dissolving those questions, casting doubt on the existence of any such consequences, was a frequent move by James and Dewey and a favorite move of Rorty’s. It reads like an argument technique and not a tool for illu…

> It's just more dialectic materialism, where to even start a conversation with someone using it, you have to accept ontological premises that are necessarily absurd. Imagine, if you will, two legislators arguing some bill in some parliament. The first is proposing some amendment to the bill which hinges on the existence of God. The second argues against it believing there is no God. The question is, can this be reso…

It seems like the proper solution would be to write the legislation such that it would be reasonably acceptable no matter whether knowledge is primarily based in the material world or the conscious mind.

Re: Pragmatism as Anti-Authoritarianism

#84

Post by reggieband »

SuoDuanDao wrote: post #83
reggieband wrote: post #78

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> It's just more dialectic materialism, where to even start a conversation with someone using it, you have to accept ontological premises that are necessarily absurd. Imagine, if you will, two legislators arguing some bill in some parliament. The first is proposing some amendment to the bill which hinges on the existence of God. The second argues against it believing there is no God. The question is, can this be reso…

It seems like the proper solution would be to write the legislation such that it would be reasonably acceptable no matter whether knowledge is primarily based in the material world or the conscious mind.

My examples were chosen, of course, to be ridiculous. "Compromise" is a major point of the work done by the political philosophers who are identified with Pragmatism. The fact that the word compromise is so liberally used in modern political discourse is likely due to this influence.

However, as is the case in some governments, the very idea that one would compromise with their enemies is an anathema. This is especially true if one side believes they are fighting against evil. It is also the case that some people are just trolls; bad actors delighting in bad faith.

It also starts getting into game theory. For example, one could forward a totally absurd position that tries to force a "legislation such that it would be reasonably acceptable no matter ..." which is actually what I wanted in the first place. That is, demand that the opposition compromise with an absurd position in order to get what I really wanted all along. It could be argued that the polarization we see in modern politics is partly attributed to this.

Pragmatism has a lot of problems which the philosophers have wrestled with. I suppose some of that complexity just goes away if you refuse to deal with indeterminate positions as a rule.

Re: Pragmatism as Anti-Authoritarianism

#85

Post by jes »

goodpoint wrote: post #73
jes wrote: post #56

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I thought all paradoxes were based on incorrect assumptions of one kind or another. What makes one paradox real while another is not?

No, a paradox is a contradiction in itself, like the famous "this sentence is false": https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Paradox

As I understand it, there is not a single clear definition of what is meant when we say that something is true. The Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy, seems to list at least five major schools of thought on the subject.[1]

So, given "This sentence is false" it seems to me that there must be assumptions behind it that cause us to perceive it as a paradox.

Interested in your thoughts, if you wish to say more.

[1] https://plato.stanford.edu/entries/truth/

Re: Pragmatism as Anti-Authoritarianism

#86

Post by LogonType10 »

anandrew wrote: post #21
0x4d464d48 wrote: post #2

[flagged]

> credentials which we liberals have been making steadily more stringent by doing our best to excommunicate racists, male chauvinists, homophobes, and the like. They're excommunicating a lot more than just those: Diversity Statements Required for One-Fifth of Academic Jobs - https://www.schoolinfosystem.org/2021/11/11/study-diversity-...

They basically want you to swear loyalty to the Party, and even after that, if you're a straight white cis male your diverse experiences are judged insufficient and you won't get hired. Universities are no longer grounds for intellectual exploration; they're factories, and professors are assembly line workers pushing out tiny variations from the accepted ideology du jour.

Re: Pragmatism as Anti-Authoritarianism

#87

Post by ModernMech »

LogonType10 wrote: post #86
anandrew wrote: post #21

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> credentials which we liberals have been making steadily more stringent by doing our best to excommunicate racists, male chauvinists, homophobes, and the like. They're excommunicating a lot more than just those: Diversity Statements Required for One-Fifth of Academic Jobs - https://www.schoolinfosystem.org/2021/11/11/study-diversity-...

They basically want you to swear loyalty to the Party, and even after that, if you're a straight white cis male your diverse experiences are judged insufficient and you won't get hired. Universities are no longer grounds for intellectual exploration; they're factories, and professors are assembly line workers pushing out tiny variations from the accepted ideology du jour .

This a caricature, a misrepresentation of the process, and not how this "basically" works at all. As a straight white cis male academic (who had to write a diversity statement when I was hired, who is involved in hiring other faculty, and who reads a lot of DEI statements) what you write here does not match my experience or the experience of my colleagues, who are majority straight white male and cis.

The purpose of the DEI statement during hiring is not to filter out straight white cis males. It is to filter out people who haven't put sufficient thought into incorporating diversity into their teaching practice, no matter who they are. This is important to universities because professors necessarily encounter a diverse classroom. Issues of race, gender identity, and sexual orientation are important for a professor to consider so that they may create a safe learning environment for all students. This does not limit intellectual exploration in any way - it relates to discharging the duties of teaching, not the content taught.

Sometimes these issues can feel abstract, but in the classroom they are concrete, and I want colleagues who have thought these things through. It does not matter that you are a straight white cis male, and judging by the makeup of our faculty, it's not an impediment for them getting hired.

Re: Pragmatism as Anti-Authoritarianism

#88

Post by LogonType10 »

ModernMech wrote: post #87
LogonType10 wrote: post #86

Earlier quoted context omitted.

They basically want you to swear loyalty to the Party, and even after that, if you're a straight white cis male your diverse experiences are judged insufficient and you won't get hired. Universities are no longer grounds for intellectual exploration; they're factories, and professors are assembly line workers pushing out tiny variations from the accepted ideology du jour .

This a caricature, a misrepresentation of the process, and not how this "basically" works at all. As a straight white cis male academic (who had to write a diversity statement when I was hired, who is involved in hiring other faculty, and who reads a lot of DEI statements) what you write here does not match my experience or the experience of my colleagues, who are majority straight white male and cis. The purpose of…

You must excuse me if I am not swayed by this since no one would expect university faculty to admit to the motives I described (such a letter filters out far more than just those who don't incorporate "diversity into their teaching practice" according to your institution's definition). Yours is exactly the bias I am speaking against.

Re: Pragmatism as Anti-Authoritarianism

#90

Post by satisfice »

motohagiography wrote: post #47

> The point of pragmatism is that a philosophical problem or distinction is only real to the extent that it has consequences—and those consequences are, in fact, the meaning of the problem or distinction. Dissolving those questions, casting doubt on the existence of any such consequences, was a frequent move by James and Dewey and a favorite move of Rorty’s. It reads like an argument technique and not a tool for illu…

I don’t believe in anything divine, because my equations do not require it. Also, yours don’t either. You are like a child drawing happy suns in blue skies because that’s what you like. It’s not required.

I have no need of “Truth.” I just notice and make use of persistent, reliable patterns to make safe conjectures that will have consequences for people who disregard them. I call that the truth. That’s good enough.

Post reply on HN