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Aaron Swartz: The Book That Changed My Life

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Re: Aaron Swartz: The Book That Changed My Life

#131
What is the purpose of posting this? My cursory looks into Chomsky's writings showed me there might be a serious intellectual honesty problem with the man, but I admit I haven't bothered to look into it deeply. So is posting this about praising Chomsky and by extension Aaron's admiration of his book, or is it a sly low blow against someone's impressionable reaction at a young age, after that person can't defend themselves? The answer depends on what the poster thinks of Chomsky....

Anybody care to comment on the validity of the following? The first followed from reading the comments in Aaron's post.

http://www.paulbogdanor.com/chomsky/wma.html

http://www.paulbogdanor.com/chomskyhoax.html

Re: Aaron Swartz: The Book That Changed My Life

#132
post #61
post #9

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Not sure about his linguistics, but his politics is adolescent.

Norvig (Director of Research at Google, and author of the most popular AI book [1]) has written a criticism of Chomsky's linguistics in relation to AI: http://norvig.com/chomsky.html tl;dr: Norvig argues that language is best modeled statistically, Chomsky's model is deterministic. He also disagrees about what makes good science (usefulness for engineering is a valid criterium & gathering facts over developing theori…

Norvig has written criticism about specific ideas that Chomsky uttered in some convention (which are also reflected in some of his written works on natural languages and their computational models).

But Chomsky's contribution to linguistics in general and computational linguistics in particular goes well beyond anything like that, e.g. [1]. I'm not sure, but I suspect that linguistics and computational linguistics where unrelated fields before Chomsky tied them together.

[1] http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Chomsky_hierarchy

Re: Aaron Swartz: The Book That Changed My Life

#133
Welcome to my world.. a place where I'm more or less convinced that every mainstream news report is more lies than truth, carefully shaped and spun to support some not necessarily evil, but definitely manipulative agenda. And the worst part is, even though you're reasonably sure of it, you realize that most people around you are either more invested into this invented narrative than you are in your "maybe real" one... or they are just apathetic to the whole thing and even if they did care they can't be bothered to put in the effort and imagine the consequences of every society running what's basically a global public opinion manipulation engine.

Re: Aaron Swartz: The Book That Changed My Life

#134
post #53

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I pretty much agree with this analysis, minus the dig against atheism. I haven't read Chomsky in detail, but this seems to be an accurate description of what he claims on the surface (e.g. in public interviews). It seems likely that hatemongerers like Chomsky were an influence in leading to Aaron Schwarz's eventual suicide. I apologize for the insensitivity towards Aaron here, but it seems worth saying.

>I haven't read Chomsky in detail Did you stop to think that maybe this is why you agree with someone who is making overbroad generalizations about Chomsky's work? How can you agree with any analysis if you're ignorant of what it's analyzing? The culture of "right to criticize without reading" in the US astounds me. Further it is amusing to hear a self-proclaimed objectivist asserting that external forces played a ro…

The culture of "right to criticize without reading" in the US astounds me.

There are a lot of large-scale cultural problems here, but I don't think that in particular is one of them.

I can't count how many times I've looked up Chomsky's views over the years, and every single time I've looked them up, it's become immediately clear that he is completely dishonest.

Normally, I do some background research before I read primary sources, and for the reason I stated above, I've never gotten past the background research.

If you think there's some particular primary resource from Chomsky I could read that would completely alter my worldview (and change my above analysis), please let me know, but you would have to convince me that this is likely enough that it's worth my time to look into it.

Until then, I have to take his statements on face value, albeit I am (admittedly) "taking" them without the full context of the surrounding literature.

Further it is amusing to hear a self-proclaimed objectivist asserting that external forces played a role in causing a free agent's suicide.

I mean, it's pretty obvious that people fall for bad ideas and then act on them. I guess you must have a pretty strawman-ish grasp on Objectivism.

Re: Aaron Swartz: The Book That Changed My Life

#135
post #128
post #53

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I pretty much agree with this analysis, minus the dig against atheism. I haven't read Chomsky in detail, but this seems to be an accurate description of what he claims on the surface (e.g. in public interviews). It seems likely that hatemongerers like Chomsky were an influence in leading to Aaron Schwarz's eventual suicide. I apologize for the insensitivity towards Aaron here, but it seems worth saying.

It seems likely that you are an imbecile. Thanks for letting everyone know that you agree with everything the review says about Chomsky despite the fact that you haven't actually read Chomsky.

Thanks for letting everyone know that you agree with everything the review says about Chomsky despite the fact that you haven't actually read Chomsky.

You're welcome. I think that's the intellectually responsible and honest thing to do. And it gives people a chance to point out what I am misunderstanding and educate me, if they really think I've gotten it wrong.

It seems likely that you are an imbecile.

I gave an explanation for why I haven't read his actual literature in another comment. I mean, I don't read the Quaran in order to learn about science, either. Does that mean I can't criticize those who do? Anyway, I'm pretty sure I'm not an imbecile.

Re: Aaron Swartz: The Book That Changed My Life

#136
post #134

Earlier quoted context omitted.

>I haven't read Chomsky in detail Did you stop to think that maybe this is why you agree with someone who is making overbroad generalizations about Chomsky's work? How can you agree with any analysis if you're ignorant of what it's analyzing? The culture of "right to criticize without reading" in the US astounds me. Further it is amusing to hear a self-proclaimed objectivist asserting that external forces played a ro…

The culture of "right to criticize without reading" in the US astounds me. There are a lot of large-scale cultural problems here, but I don't think that in particular is one of them. I can't count how many times I've looked up Chomsky's views over the years, and every single time I've looked them up, it's become immediately clear that he is completely dishonest. Normally, I do some background research before I read p…

I can't count how many times I've looked up Chomsky's views over the years, and every single time I've looked them up, it's become immediately clear that he is completely dishonest.

It would be interesting if you gave us a few examples of where you looked up his views, and found him to be completely dishonest.

Re: Aaron Swartz: The Book That Changed My Life

#137
post #57

Earlier quoted context omitted.

His presumption here is that if the United States changes its behavior, that terrorist attacks will then cease. Islamic terrorists, in fact, want a pan-world government under Talibanesque repressive sharia law, a vision that mandates the overthrow of all free nations beginning with ours. First, It is not the US's fault it got attacked, Gandhi changed British foreign policy with peaceful protests. The terrorists chose…

The analysis of Islamic terrorism in the Amazon review is not wrong. Nor is it wrong to say that Bin Laden explicitly blamed his 9/11 attack on US foreign policy in the Middle East. They are both true and compatible. Chomsky presumes that the US and US foreign policy are evil, when in fact the US is good and US foreign policy is often seriously mistaken (but not evil), with occasional evil individuals in leadership a…

> Chomsky presumes that the US and US foreign policy are evil

Chomsky presumes that the US domestic and foreign policy are tailored to the narrow self-interest of US elites.

Re: Aaron Swartz: The Book That Changed My Life

#138
post #134

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The culture of "right to criticize without reading" in the US astounds me. There are a lot of large-scale cultural problems here, but I don't think that in particular is one of them. I can't count how many times I've looked up Chomsky's views over the years, and every single time I've looked them up, it's become immediately clear that he is completely dishonest. Normally, I do some background research before I read p…

I can't count how many times I've looked up Chomsky's views over the years, and every single time I've looked them up, it's become immediately clear that he is completely dishonest. It would be interesting if you gave us a few examples of where you looked up his views, and found him to be completely dishonest.

He contends that there is little moral difference between chattel slavery and renting one's self to an owner or "wage slavery". (from Wikipedia)

There is just one example, taken relatively randomly.

"Wage slavery" is a completely invalid concept. If I want to work, and somebody wants to pay me a wage, that is moral and proper and free. It's called trade.

Someone who holds a gun to my head to force me not to engage freely in trade with others is immoral and evil.

Clearly, Chomsky has the latter view, unless I'm misunderstanding.

Actual slavery is an institution supported by immorally coercing someone, too, like the position Chomsky is advocating.

So Chomsky's views have much more in common with slavery than the views he criticizes as being like slavery, i.e., trading one's effort in return for payment.

Chomsky claims to be against "unjustified authority," but he is actually a major proponent of force in human relationships.

I can't take someone seriously who makes these kind of blatantly ridiculous statements.

Of course, I am taking this from Wikipedia, not in the full context of what he has actually written. So, maybe he didn't actually say that. Or maybe he actually said it, but proceeded it with, "The following sentence is false." I would need to hear something to this effect before I would consider taking someone seriously who says the thing that I quoted from Wikipedia.

Because what he's said is in the same broad epistemological and moral category as a verse from a holy book commanding people to kill others for religious regions. In other words, completely unrelated to reality, and completely evil.

Re: Aaron Swartz: The Book That Changed My Life

#139
post #50

I found the following review of the book interesting. I always like to read the "negative" reviews of something because I find it easier to make a decision whether to read something or buy something (books, software, food, etc...) based on whether I can identify with the negative comments or not. If someone has recommended something to me, and the negative comments are inconsequential to me (or absurd, etc...), I'm m…

Not entirely convincing. I personally prefer Falkenstein as my Chomsky critic: The spread is a debating tactic where you present a set of supporting arguments so wide and particular your opponents are unable to rebut them all because 1) they have day jobs and 2) they have limited space or time to address them in any particular forum. A champion spreader is Noam Chomsky, who selectively recites facts of world history…

I had a history professor notorious for assigning dense reading. Students would often complain about it. His response was that it's not the author's fault the reader is too lazy and unwilling to keep up.

Re: Aaron Swartz: The Book That Changed My Life

#140
post #128
post #53

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I pretty much agree with this analysis, minus the dig against atheism. I haven't read Chomsky in detail, but this seems to be an accurate description of what he claims on the surface (e.g. in public interviews). It seems likely that hatemongerers like Chomsky were an influence in leading to Aaron Schwarz's eventual suicide. I apologize for the insensitivity towards Aaron here, but it seems worth saying.

It seems likely that you are an imbecile. Thanks for letting everyone know that you agree with everything the review says about Chomsky despite the fact that you haven't actually read Chomsky.

I think the imbecile comment is unnecessary.

One can still have a conversation about a subject without having much depth in the subject. If you haven't read Taming of the Shrew, you can still understand the story if I give you a quick version, and we can talk about that meta-story, because there are things in the text (via my description) that we both understand. However, it's difficult to have a conversation with much specificity or depth having not both read the text.

You'll note that javert's posts here lack both specificity and depth. It's probably best to just leave it at that note.

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