COLUMBINE

[Wayward Son]

The Unraveling of Scientific Materialism by Phillip E. Johnson, from which those quotes by Lewontin were taken.

http://www.arn.org/ftissues/ft9711/articles/johnson.html

I don't think most people should base their scientific views on the opinions of a thoroughly biased and ignorant lawyer who has zero scientific background or education.

[Wayward Son]

Dawkins's gene-centered view doesn't do a good job of explaining how kin altruism develops. A lot of the holes they poke in the concept of group selection seem to focus on the gaps in understanding of how colony insect societies function. How thousands and even millions of creatures with tiny brains are able to organize and coordinate together with complex strategies without any sort of leadership or apparent hierarchies.

Both Wilson and Dawkins agree that the gene is the unit of selection, so I don't know how Wilson would not also have a gene-centeric view. Kin selection, group selection, and how altruism develops are different questions. However, neither Wilson or Dawkins (or, in my opinion, anyone alive) hold a candle to Robert Trivers when it comes to explaining altruism, and Trivers is about as strong a proponent of the gene-centric view as they get.

[Wayward Son]

Christina Hoff Summers is a hack in the first place. No one would have heard of her if she wasn't promoted by the right wing think tank - American Enterprise Institute....same with Pinker for that matter. The fact that Pinker quotes from her still....as I recently heard in an interview of him on the Point Of Inquiry podcast shows that he is still skating along that fine line of being anti-feminist...and likely for much the same reasons as Hoff-Summers, since they are both right wing idealogues who start getting the shakes whenever the concept of group identity and group rights is considered! That is the core reason why Hoff-Summers came up with this nonsense in the first place and why Pinker likes it so much: because they can pretend to stand apart from old patriarchal standards and be supporters of the feminist movement, while denying any sort of redress that threatens their concept of individual rights. It's no different than those libertarians who claim to be against racism, but are also opposed to steps to repair past wrongs like affirmative action programs. The only difference is that the libertarian humanist is doing it with the ideological baggage of promoting individual rights....where everyone lives in a darwinian survival of the fittest social environment presumably!

Whether or not CHS is a hack, and who promotes her has nothing to do with the fact that your hatred of Steven Pinker results in you constantly making crap up about him. You don't actually know much about him and instead rely on the distortions of his opponents like Chris Hedges to form your views. My general view is that if someone has a strong case against a person or view they should not need to lie about it/them.

[betsy]

Wayward Son:

Lewontin is a scientist who has done some great work, and I highly respect the role he has played in certain scientific fields. However, Lewontin is also a scientist who's scientific career has been driven by his socialist political ideology. His criticisms of people like Dawkins are in areas where he has little, if any, scientific output and his views in these areas are not accepted by the majority of scientists. Essentially, you just non-stop commit the Argument from Authority logical fallacy.

I don't really care what you accept as opinion or fact, as I fully understand that you never apply even a modicum of critical thinking, and simply accept or reject anything you see, hear or read based entirely on how it fits with your worldview. Therefore, you simply search out anyone who says something you agree with and pass them off as an absolute authority. So when you find that someone you had never heard of like Lewontin says

something you agree with, he is not only correct, but becomes the authority on that subject. As for the majority of Lewontin's other views that you

would vehemently disagree with, well he is is wrong, and has no authority on those subjects.

Anyone who's been following years of debates on this forum would see that I'd given lots of other sources.

And like I've said before....the silly comments that's been made by Dawkins in interviews - straight from the horse's mouth - speak for themselves.

Just think about it, do you think Lewontin would be such a moron as to level these accusations against Dawkins if he cannot back them up? Read this part again:

Although Lewontin wants the public to accept science as the only source of truth, he freely admits that mainstream science itself is not

free of the hokum that Sagan so often found in fringe science. As examples he cites three influential scientists who are particularly successful at writing

for the public: E. O. Wilson, Richard Dawkins, and Lewis Thomas, each of whom has put unsubstantiated assertions or counterfactual claims at the very center of the stories they have retailed in the market.

Those are serious and damaging statements levelled at these three individuals. He's practically saying they're without any integrity having deliberately made fraudulent claims...... or, that they're quite igorant for having claimed something(s) unsubstantiated or counterfactual. Either one means they're not credible. You'd think there would be a big scandal with libel suits. Of course statements wouldn't be libelous if the statements are true. And judging from the mild if not any reaction at all from dawkins and the other two....chances are, the accusations are indeed true. Dawkins won't be able to blow smoke on it and b***shit his way around like he does to his readers, since Lewontin - being a scientist himself - can easily prove it!

Those three mentioned have been indirectly compared to tabloid writers such as the National Enquirer, The Globe etc..except that they cater to the science afficionados, with Dawkins' target readers are the rabid anti-religion new atheists, that he has to keep feeding and nurturing (for the sake of his writing career)! If he was once promising as a scientist, now he leads as a tabloid-style science writer!

So never mind your silly attempt at dismissing my source(s)....I gave you more than just my source above. I gave you sensible reasons as well, as to why my source(s) has credibility!

Edited February 23, 2013 by betsy

[betsy]

I don't think most people should base their scientific views on the opinions of a thoroughly biased and ignorant lawyer who has zero scientific background or education.

Excuse me? You might want to skeedaddle back to that article and read again, carefully. And you might also like to re-phrase your comment afterwards. I'd be generous and say your eyes must be playing tricks on you for you to have stated such silly reply.

So far you on the other hand hadn't given me any credible sources to back up your claims that Dawkins excels in anything scientific.

[Wayward Son]

Anyone who's been following years of debates on this forum would see that I'd given lots of other sources.

And like I've said before....the silly comments that's been made by Dawkins in interviews - straight from the horse's mouth - speak for themselves.

Just think about it, do you think Lewontin would be such a moron as to level these accusations against Dawkins if he cannot back them up?

Those are serious and damaging statements levelled at these three individuals. He's practically saying they're without any integrity having deliberately made fraudulent claims...... or, that they're quite igorant for having claimed something(s) unsubstantiated or counterfactual. Either one means they're not credible. You'd think there would be a big scandal with libel suits. Of course statements wouldn't be libelous if the statements are true. And judging from the mild if not any reaction at all from dawkins and the other two....chances are, the accusations are indeed true. Dawkins won't be able to blow smoke on it and b***shit his way around like he does to his readers, since Lewontin - being a scientist himself - can easily prove it!

Those three mentioned have been indirectly compared to tabloid writers such as the National Enquirer, The Globe etc..except that they cater to the science afficionados, with Dawkins' target readers are the rabid anti-religion new atheists, that he has to keep feeding and nurturing (for the sake of his writing career)! If he was once promising as a scientist, now he leads as a tabloid-style science writer!

So never mind your silly attempt at dismising my source(s)....I gave you more than just my source above. I gave you sensible reasons as well, as to why my source(s) has credibility!

Here is the bottom line: the vast majority of the scientific community, after a long hard look at the battle between Lewontin, Gould and Rose etc vs Dawkins et al, sided overwhelming with Dawkins et al. That things may have gotten nasty and personal between them has nothing to do with where the evidence lies. As to the idea that the claims would have left Lewontin vulnerable to a libel lawsuit, I suspect that you know as little about libel law for people who have made themselves public figures as you know about science.

[Wayward Son]

Excuse me? You might want to skeedaddle back to that article and read again, carefully. And you might also like to re-phrase your comment afterwards. I'd be generous and say your eyes must be playing tricks on you for you to have stated such silly reply.

So far you on the other hand hadn't given me any credible sources to back up your claims that Dawkins excels in anything scientific.

You used Philip E. Johnson as a source in a thread about science. That is about as stupid as one can get, but not surprising.

[betsy]

wayward son

Here is the bottom line: the vast majority of the scientific community, after a long hard look at the battle between Lewontin, Gould and Rose etc vs Dawkins et al, sided overwhelming with Dawkins et al. That things may have gotten nasty and personal between them has nothing to do with where the evidence lies. As to the idea that the claims would have left Lewontin vulnerable to a libel lawsuit, I suspect that you know as little about libel law for people who have made themselves public figures as you know about science.

Never mind your bottom line.

You don't have a topline....and you hardly have anything to line your bottom to begin with.

Listen up. Here is the real bottom line.

Wayward son, you're entitled to your own personal opinion. Unless you back your views up with something credible, that's all they're going to be: simply your opinion. And of course in a forum such as this, personal opinion hardly count for facts.

Edited February 23, 2013 by betsy

[betsy]

You used Philip E. Johnson as a source in a thread about science. That is about as stupid as one can get, but not surprising.

Go on....keep reading. Don't just stop at the byline.

Read this again and tell me how you understand this part:

Although Lewontin wants the public to accept science as the only source of truth, he freely admits that mainstream science itself is not free of the hokum that Sagan so often found in fringe science. As examples he cites three influential scientists who are particularly successful at writing for the public: E. O. Wilson, Richard Dawkins, and Lewis Thomas, each of whom has put unsubstantiated assertions or counterfactual claims at the very center of the stories they have retailed in the market.

Wilson’s Sociobiology and On Human Nature rest on the surface of a quaking marsh of unsupported claims about the genetic determination of everything from altruism to xenophobia. Dawkins’ vulgarizations of Darwinism speak of nothing in evolution but an inexorable ascendancy of genes that are selectively superior, while the entire body of technical advance in experimental and theoretical evolutionary genetics of the last fifty years has moved in the direction of emphasizing nonselective forces in evolution. Thomas, in various essays, propagandized for the success of modern scientific medicine in eliminating death from disease, while the unchallenged statistical compilations on mortality show that in Europe and North America infectious diseases . . . had ceased to be major causes of mortality by the early decades of the twentieth century.

Lewontin laments that even scientists frequently cannot judge the reliability of scientific claims outside their fields of speciality, and have to take the word of recognized authorities on faith. "Who am I to believe about quantum physics if not Steven Weinberg, or about the solar system if not Carl Sagan? What worries me is that they may believe what Dawkins and Wilson tell them about evolution."

Whose view is being given: Johnson's or Lewontin's?

Edited February 23, 2013 by betsy

[Wayward Son]

Go on....keep reading. Don't just stop at the byline.

Read this again and tell me how you understand this part:

Whose view is being given: Johnson or Lewontin?

Both the opinion of Johnson and Lewontin are being given. If it was only Lewontin's opinion then the piece would be nothing but a direct of quote of him, or a link to his article. Instead we have both Johnson's opinion and Johnson's opinion of what Lewontin is expressing. So we have the opinion of a scientist on a topic for which he has little support from the scientific community being filtered through a thoroughly biased and ignorant lawyer with no scientific education. Great combination.

[Wayward Son]

Never mind your bottom line.

You don't have a topline....and you hardly have anything to line your bottom to begin with.

Listen up. Here is the real bottom line.

Wayward son, you're entitled to your own personal opinion. Unless you back your views up with something credible, that's all they're going to be: simply your opinion. And of course in a forum such as this, personal opinion hardly count for facts.

Betsy I can't help you when it comes to science or any other matter. Only you can help yourself, but you have proven over and over again that you will not do so. If you prefer to believe completely stupid things because that matches your worldview/ideology and causes the least cognitive dissonance then that is your preference.

Some people are interested in trying to find out how the world really is, others are interested in only accepting that the world is exactly how they wish to be. I consider it to be a terrible waste that many people such as yourself choose the latter, but I can't help fix what you want to remain broken. You only make an ass of yourself when you continually demand facts that you will not look at, consider or accept anyways.

[betsy]

Both the opinion of Johnson and Lewontin are being given. If it was only Lewontin's opinion then the piece would be nothing but a direct of quote of him, or a link to his article. Instead we have both Johnson's opinion and Johnson's opinion of what Lewontin is expressing. So we have the opinion of a scientist on a topic for which he has little support from the scientific community being filtered through a thoroughly biased and ignorant lawyer with no scientific education. Great combination.

I was not referring to the whole article. I was referring to that specific quote I gave.

That he's got no support from the scientific community is your opinion. And a wishful opinion on your part at that....in my opinion.

[betsy]

Betsy I can't help you when it comes to science or any other matter. Only you can help yourself, but you have proven over and over again that you will not do so. If you prefer to believe completely stupid things because that matches your worldview/ideology and causes the least cognitive dissonance then that is your preference.

Some people are interested in trying to find out how the world really is, others are interested in only accepting that the world is exactly how they wish to be. I consider it to be a terrible waste that many people such as yourself choose the latter, but I can't help fix what you want to remain broken. You only make an ass of yourself when you continually demand facts that you will not look at, consider or accept anyways.

If I want your personal opinion I would ask for it.

Right now, I want credible opinion backed by credible sources. After all, this is not chat....nor are we shooting the breeze in a bar.

Edited February 23, 2013 by betsy

[Wayward Son]

My personal opinion is that you are a lost cause and a waste of my time and energy.

I don't know if you actually manage to fool yourself when you say that you want "credible opinion backed by credible sources," but I highly doubt that you fool anyone else here - we all know that the only thing that you want/will look at or accept is opinion and sources that support the piles of nonsense that you currently believe.

[g_bambino]

[W]e all know that the only thing that you want/will look at or accept is opinion and sources that support the piles of nonsense that you currently believe.

You got it.

[betsy]

My personal opinion is that you are a lost cause and a waste of my time and energy.

I don't know if you actually manage to fool yourself when you say that you want "credible opinion backed by credible sources," but I highly doubt that you fool anyone else here - we all know that the only thing that you want/will look at or accept is opinion and sources that support the piles of nonsense that you currently believe.

Good. I'm glad you finally see me as a waste of your time and energy. You can bleat your claims for ages, and your opinion will still mean diddly squat to me.

Your time and energy will be better spent digging up sources to back your incredible claim(s) - and then come back to the arena, at least armed with something more than just pure bravado and spit.

Edited February 24, 2013 by betsy

[kimmy]

So, just to recap, Betsy started this thread to complain that some old crank who thinks school prayer would have stopped a school shooting wasn't given a fair shake by the media, and so we're talking about the merits of Richard Dawkins' research? Makes sense.

-k

[WIP]

So, just to recap, Betsy started this thread to complain that some old crank who thinks school prayer would have stopped a school shooting wasn't given a fair shake by the media, and so we're talking about the merits of Richard Dawkins' research? Makes sense.

-k

That's why I was reluctant to post on this thread. I didn't even realize I was posting on a thread related to Columbine and school shootings....or how some evangelical gun enthusiasts are trying to spin their way out of any responsibility for carnage. The present discussion should be on a new thread.

[WIP]

Whether or not CHS is a hack, and who promotes her has nothing to do with the fact that your hatred of Steven Pinker results in you constantly making crap up about him. You don't actually know much about him and instead rely on the distortions of his opponents like Chris Hedges to form your views. My general view is that if someone has a strong case against a person or view they should not need to lie about it/them.

You are the ignorant, narrow minded one who does not read anything outside of his comfort zone! How do you think I discovered the critiques of Hedges and others in the first place? I used to be marching right along with the modern secular atheist dogma based on a myth that the human race broke historic cycles that kept us mired in ignorance when the period of the Enlightenment allowed for a separation of nature and the complete exploitation of nature could begin. The enlightenment thinkers see this as the great new beginning that leads to continual, unending progress....which is where Pinker comes in, because his entire moral theory that we began as savages, and have advanced ourselves towards peace and enlightenment through secularism and liberal capitalism, is premised on the belief that this way of life will continue on into the future....which is why you will never hear him in any of his lectures and book promotion interviews deal with the reality we are facing in the last five years, when exploitation of nature is beginning to show signs of reaching hard limits. Pinker probably just hopes like Tom Friedman and others, that someone will come up with techno-fixes to spin out of the rut and keep right on going!

I was following everything Pinker wrote and said before, which is why I never felt the need to buy any of his public audience-level books! Why the hell bother, when he does so many lectures and interviews, that everything is out there anyway? So, since you've read all of his books - tell me, does he mention anywhere in the book about his early youth experiences during the Montreal Riots? During a police strike, the City of Montreal turned into complete anarchy; and in a number of interviews I listened to him do, he mentions the Montreal Riots as pivotal in re-assessing his attitudes about people. He started siding with a 'man the savage' view, and his critics who have noted that his book is based on spotty and likely cherrypicked research to present the view that paleo hunter/gatherers were constantly killing each other is based on a flimsy foundation. And when it gets to "look how peaceful and unwarlike we are today" this is music to the ears of so much of the modern power structure that runs business and government today, that's why I see Pinker as more of a propagandist than an actual scientist!

Edited February 24, 2013 by WIP

[WIP]

Oooops. My apologies....the article I was referring to is:

The Unraveling of Scientific Materialism by Phillip E. Johnson, from which those quotes by Lewontin were taken.

http://www.arn.org/ftissues/ft9711/articles/johnson.html

I have not read the blog above....but it was handy since it gave specific quotes by Richard Lewontin. It's the statements of Lewontin that I'm pointing out.

Started reading, but I'm going to have to go over this later when I have more time to think about it.

[Wayward Son]

You are the ignorant, narrow minded one who does not read anything outside of his comfort zone! How do you think I discovered the critiques of Hedges and others in the first place? I used to be marching right along with the modern secular atheist dogma based on a myth that the human race broke historic cycles that kept us mired in ignorance when the period of the Enlightenment allowed for a separation of nature and the complete exploitation of nature could begin. The enlightenment thinkers see this as the great new beginning that leads to continual, unending progress....which is where Pinker comes in, because his entire moral theory that we began as savages, and have advanced ourselves towards peace and enlightenment through secularism and liberal capitalism, is premised on the belief that this way of life will continue on into the future....which is why you will never hear him in any of his lectures and book promotion interviews deal with the reality we are facing in the last five years, when exploitation of nature is beginning to show signs of reaching hard limits. Pinker probably just hopes like Tom Friedman and others, that someone will come up with techno-fixes to spin out of the rut and keep right on going!

I have read a couple books and many articles by Chris Hedges. Even when I am in agreement with his overall position, I am deeply suspicious of the honesty of the arguments he makes. Even when I fall on the same side as Hedges I find his writing to among the most logically fallacious I have ever encountered.

Not long ago I read his book review of Haidt's latest book "The Righteous Mind." I had already read the book, and was completely ambivalent about both the author and the book. However, I don't like dishonesty, regardless of the political persuasion of the person being dishonest or the political persuasion of the person who is the victim of the dishonesty. This is two consecutive paragraphs from early in the book review:

Haidt, who is the Thomas Cooley Professor of Ethical Leadership at New York University’s Stern School of Business, is an heir of Herbert Spencer, who coined the term “survival of the fittest” and who also attempted to use evolution to explain human behavior, sociology, politics and ethics. Haidt, like Spencer, is dismissive of those he refers to as “slackers,” “leeches,” “free riders,” “cheaters” or “anyone else who ‘drinks the water’ rather than carries it for the group.” They are parasites who should be denied social assistance in the name of fair play. The failure of liberals, Haidt writes, to embrace this elemental form of justice, which he says we are hard-wired to adopt, leaves them despised by those who are more advanced as moral human beings. He chastises liberals, whom he sees as morally underdeveloped, for going “beyond the equality of rights to pursue equality of outcomes, which cannot be obtained in a capitalist system.”

“People should reap what they sow,” he writes. “People who work hard should get to keep the fruits of their labor. People who are lazy and irresponsible should suffer the consequences.”

The first sentence is a pure example of poisoning the well. Both paragraphs are thoroughly dishonest from start to finish. For instance, while Hedges implies that the views in the last paragraph are Haidt's views, in fact he makes it appear as if they are a direct quote of Haidt's political philosophy, it is beyond obvious to anyone who finds the quoted remarks in the book that Haidt is clearly quoting the views of some of the people who have taken his political surveys. In a book about how people from all ends of the political spectrum think it seems likely that the author would....you know...actually describe views of people from all ends of the political spectrum...and include views that are not his own. The book is not a autobiography of Haidt. It is not a polemic where he tells people to think like himself, in fact he rarely discusses his own political views, and when he does they are pretty middle of the road. Hedges appears to have simply gone through the book and claimed every view, and imagined view, that he did not agree with was the view of author. So what that Hedges so-called quotes above were actually attributed to people other than the author. He doesn't care, nor does it seem that his intended audience does either. I would call it the single most dishonest piece I have ever read, if it were not for other things I have read by Hedges. I find Hedges to be no different then Coulter or Kent Hovind.

What you (and Hedges) do with Pinker is no different. Everything you say about him is either poisoning the well, strawmen or flat out dishonest. You have done that before with your claim that he originated terms that were originated by Christina Hoff Summers, you do that when you claim that Pinker is far-right wing, or a libertarian, and you continue to do that when you claim that Pinker claims that things will continue to get better regardless of things like environmental devastation. Pinker doesn't say that. Pinker says that the evidence shows that violence has declined significantly. However, he talks about instances where the decline of violence has reversed. Pinker in no way states that violence will definitely continue to decline, in fact he clearly states that he will not even hypothesize about the level of violence in the future. He lists a couple dozen reasons that various other people have said will result in violence levels to increase in the near future and makes it clear that they could be right or wrong, but that his book is not about making predictions or evaluating the predictions of others. His book is about the presentation of the facts concerning the past and present only.

You have not read his book, and instead you attack him based on poisoning the well, strawmen and flat out lies. You claim to have read him in the past, which may or may be true. I don't care; what I care about is the complete lack of accuracy in your claims about his positions. It is because of the attitude of people like Hedges and you that I have nothing to do with the left. It is not just the flagrant dishonesty, but the fact that you don't seem to care that that is what it is. The same goes for the environmental movement. It was not that I got sick of the lies spread about nuclear energy, GMOs and the like. We are all wrong about countless things due to ignorance, or ideology or many other reasons. What I got sick of was that so many people simply could not have cared less if what they were spreading was actually true or not. The ends were all that mattered; the means were irrelevant. If someone doesn't care about what is actually true then I don't see how one can evaluate what the real pressing needs are.

You claim to have switched from Pinker's side to Hedges, which may or may not be true. It doesn't matter to me. Lots of people have switched from one ideology to another, while others have made the exact opposite jump, that does not necessarily mean that any of them are correct, or wiser because of it. I include myself in there, as someone who was at one time a doomsayer who valued the writings of Gray, Quinn, Ehrlich, Jensen, Hedges, Caldicott and Jeffrey Smith. While I have not jumped to opposite side, I consider the views of those people to be nonsense at best (and feel roughly the same about authors on the opposite extreme - Pinker is not one of them, something you would know if you actually read him). But the fact that I have held different views and different worldviews before does not in itself mean that my current views are correct, or even more likely to be correct than my past views. That can only be determined (and even then only with strong inferences that are open to change with new facts and arguments) by honest debate, logically valid arguments, and looking at the best facts and evidence. Your (and Hedges') attacks on Pinker are nothing of the sort.

Edited February 25, 2013 by Wayward Son

[betsy]

Here is the bottom line: the vast majority of the scientific community, after a long hard look at the battle between Lewontin, Gould and Rose etc vs Dawkins et al, sided overwhelming with Dawkins et al. That things may have gotten nasty and personal between them has nothing to do with where the evidence lies. As to the idea that the claims would have left Lewontin vulnerable to a libel lawsuit, I suspect that you know as little about libel law for people who have made themselves public figures as you know about science.

Btw, I forgot to add this important reply to this post of yours. Let me give you a more likely scenario why there's hardly any ripple in the science community about Lewontin's damaging accusations against Dawkins etc.,

Taken from the very same article, look at the reaction of the science community towards the "confusions" of Gould as stated:

One major living scientific popularizer whom Lewontin does not trash is his Harvard colleague and political ally Stephen Jay Gould. Just to fill out the picture, however, it seems that admirers of Dawkins have as low an opinion of Gould as Lewontin has of Dawkins or Wilson. According to a 1994 essay in the New York Review of Books by John Maynard Smith, the dean of British neo-Darwinists, "the evolutionary biologists with whom I have discussed his [Gould’s] work tend to see him as a man whose ideas are so confused as to be hardly worth bothering with, but as one who should not be publicly criticized because he is at least on our side against the creationists.

All this would not matter, were it not that he is giving non biologists a largely false picture of the state of evolutionary theory." Lewontin fears that non-biologists will fail to recognize that Dawkins is peddling pseudoscience; Maynard Smith fears exactly the same of Gould.

http://www.arn.org/ftissues/ft9711/articles/johnson.html

The atheist scientists tend to protect one another, and try to present a united front against creationists. THAT'S THE BOTTOMLINE why there are no charges of libel laid against Lewontin. Not only is it really most likely Lewontin is absolutely right (and therefore he can prove that what he stated was not libelous because he stated facts).....but to do so would really make this accusation very public - right there on mainstream media.

Therefore, when they see Dawkins peddling b***shit in his books, most scientists would rather just look the other way and keep mum....after all, his readers wouldn't see or know the bs, especially when he caters to a rabid anti-religion followers who desperately want to validate their own faith (the faith in no God) more than anything else.

It's not about scientific evidence(s) really, but rather their terrible need for reasurance....pleading to Dawkins, "tell us there is no God, Ricky." Dawkins knows that, and fills that need. He's found his niche. He writes pseudo-science, aimed at bashing the existence of God. He exploits the ignorance and need of his readers. That's where he excels.

Edited February 26, 2013 by betsy

[WIP]

I have read a couple books and many articles by Chris Hedges. Even when I am in agreement with his overall position, I am deeply suspicious of the honesty of the arguments he makes. Even when I fall on the same side as Hedges I find his writing to among the most logically fallacious I have ever encountered.

And I would say that if Chris Hedges was dishonest, he could still be making a good living out of it....like his colleagues at the N.Y. Times who went along with being cheerleaders for the Iraq War. For example: Judith Miller lied about her Iraq sources and influenced public support in favour of the Iraq Invasion, and was rewarded for being wrong and supporting Bush Administration policy. And like so many other useful idiots, she was rewarded, while those who refused to jump on the bandwagon were cut by the major newspapers and networks for getting it right!

Not long ago I read his book review of Haidt's latest book "The Righteous Mind." I had already read the book, and was completely ambivalent about both the author and the book. However, I don't like dishonesty, regardless of the political persuasion of the person being dishonest or the political persuasion of the person who is the victim of the dishonesty. This is two consecutive paragraphs from early in the book review:

Haidt, who is the Thomas Cooley Professor of Ethical Leadership at New York University’s Stern School of Business, is an heir of Herbert Spencer, who coined the term “survival of the fittest” and who also attempted to use evolution to explain human behavior, sociology, politics and ethics. Haidt, like Spencer, is dismissive of those he refers to as “slackers,” “leeches,” “free riders,” “cheaters” or “anyone else who ‘drinks the water’ rather than carries it for the group.” They are parasites who should be denied social assistance in the name of fair play. The failure of liberals, Haidt writes, to embrace this elemental form of justice, which he says we are hard-wired to adopt, leaves them despised by those who are more advanced as moral human beings. He chastises liberals, whom he sees as morally underdeveloped, for going “beyond the equality of rights to pursue equality of outcomes, which cannot be obtained in a capitalist system.”

“People should reap what they sow,” he writes. “People who work hard should get to keep the fruits of their labor. People who are lazy and irresponsible should suffer the consequences.”

The first sentence is a pure example of poisoning the well. Both paragraphs are thoroughly dishonest from start to finish. For instance, while Hedges implies that the views in the last paragraph are Haidt's views, in fact he makes it appear as if they are a direct quote of Haidt's political philosophy, it is beyond obvious to anyone who finds the quoted remarks in the book that Haidt is clearly quoting the views of some of the people who have taken his political surveys. In a book about how people from all ends of the political spectrum think it seems likely that the author would....you know...actually describe views of people from all ends of the political spectrum...and include views that are not his own. The book is not a autobiography of Haidt. It is not a polemic where he tells people to think like himself, in fact he rarely discusses his own political views, and when he does they are pretty middle of the road. Hedges appears to have simply gone through the book and claimed every view, and imagined view, that he did not agree with was the view of author. So what that Hedges so-called quotes above were actually attributed to people other than the author. He doesn't care, nor does it seem that his intended audience does either. I would call it the single most dishonest piece I have ever read, if it were not for other things I have read by Hedges. I find Hedges to be no different then Coulter or Kent Hovind.

I'm reading the excerpt that quote is taken from on google books. Haidt presents it as coming from an email from an angry conservative, and starts to emote about doing a poor job understanding how conservatives view fairness: focusing on proportionality rather than equality. And he claims that their views appear uncharitable, but are derived from principles like the Protestant Work Ethic and Karma, but that quote, which is proceeded by one claiming that his hard earned money is being funneled off to support welfare mothers and crack babies, and another example mentioned all just happen to be women who are the focus of conservative vitriol....single mothers....if I could read more of their emails, I'm sure we would get to the part where these "non-producers" just happen to be black also. I've heard Haidt doing the rounds on public radio show interviews, so I'm a little familiar with his line of thought, and yes, I would conclude the same things that Hedges concludes here: that Johnathan Haidt's notion of moral pluralism is a sign that he has no moral compass himself. He seems to have some liberal views, but he doesn't condemn the tea party-type rhetoric that we find here. Instead he seems to agree or at least sympathize to a large degree with these self-centered assholes writing to him, so I wouldn't say that Hedges has lied about anything as you are trying to paint the picture here. If Haidt can't distinguish these views from his own, then I'm going to assume that he shares them also! A brief list of Haidt's ideology shows him as all over the map, so maybe that's why he's pushing this idea of moral pluralism. He believes government should restrain corporate excesses (liberal), regulation is necessary for public safety (liberal), markets are "miraculous"
(libertarian conservative), and "you can't help the bees by destroying the hive" (social conservative). As far as Johnathan Haidt's theories go, there are a few things that I agree with, but his presentation on liberalism and conservatism is bullshit. Conservatism is an authoritarian political philosophy; it was created in the wake of the French Revolution as a way to maintain social harmony in unequal societies like England, which had rigid class systems. Conservatives are still authoritarian personalities in this age also. A far better analysis of liberal and conservative mindsets is found in The Authoritarians by Robert Altemeyer written in 2006, and available free of charge at that University of Manitoba website. As the book title suggests, Altemeyer's main focus is on the authoritarian personality - the followers who make up the mass of supporters that enable an authoritarian despot. But, the book also includes analysis of the differences between conservative and liberal personality types...the fact that external events play a determining factor with some people in the middle....who will tend to become more liberal and open-minded during peaceful times when they don't fear any threats, but will shift towards conservatism when they perceive a threat. If the threat is significant enough - like an event such as 9-11, then a lot of moderate to liberal people will shift to the right. But, unlike the natural, ideological conservatives, they will move back towards more liberal positions once a perceived danger has past. This finding and the correlation between being conservative and being raised in strict homes where corporal punishment was used/ while being liberal correlated with growing up in more permissive homes without the use of corporal punishment, led Altemeyer to conclude that being conservative or liberal was a matter of nurture, rather than nature, as Johnathan Haidt believes these worldviews largely emanate from innate characteristics.

What you (and Hedges) do with Pinker is no different. Everything you say about him is either poisoning the well, strawmen or flat out dishonest. You have done that before with your claim that he originated terms that were originated by Christina Hoff Summers, you do that when you claim that Pinker is far-right wing, or a libertarian, and you continue to do that when you claim that Pinker claims that things will continue to get better regardless of things like environmental devastation. Pinker doesn't say that. Pinker says that the evidence shows that violence has declined significantly. However, he talks about instances where the decline of violence has reversed. Pinker in no way states that violence will definitely continue to decline, in fact he clearly states that he will not even hypothesize about the level of violence in the future. He lists a couple dozen reasons that various other people have said will result in violence levels to increase in the near future and makes it clear that they could be right or wrong, but that his book is not about making predictions or evaluating the predictions of others. His book is about the presentation of the facts concerning the past and present only.

I mentioned Pinker's frequent use of the bogus distinction between "equity" feminism and "gender" feminism, and I could care less whether he invented it, or just liked it so much that he keeps using it when he's talking about women and gender issues. Pinker regards examples where violence is increasing as being anomalies that run counter to the general trend towards less violence.

I heard him do a talk about the post-WWII era he called "The Long Peace," mainly because there was no world war since then and no nuclear annihilation as many expected. Sure as hell gave me the impression that he viewed this peace as improving and continuing on into the future!

btw his talk about a "long peace" is another example of his ethnocentrism; since it's been a long peace for us here in North America, or in Europe, but it hasn't been peaceful in much of Africa and Asia, where the U.S. fought proxy wars with the Soviet Union and now fights wars of commercial opportunism today.

You have not read his book, and instead you attack him based on poisoning the well, strawmen and flat out lies. You claim to have read him in the past, which may or may be true.

I never said I bought his books! I said I read articles by him and heard him in many interviews and a few lectures.

You claim to have switched from Pinker's side to Hedges, which may or may not be true. It doesn't matter to me. Lots of people have switched from one ideology to another, while others have made the exact opposite jump, that does not necessarily mean that any of them are correct, or wiser because of it. I include myself in there, as someone who was at one time a doomsayer who valued the writings of Gray, Quinn, Ehrlich, Jensen, Hedges, Caldicott and Jeffrey Smith. While I have not jumped to opposite side, I consider the views of those people to be nonsense at best (and feel roughly the same about authors on the opposite extreme - Pinker is not one of them, something you would know if you actually read him). But the fact that I have held different views and different worldviews before does not in itself mean that my current views are correct, or even more likely to be correct than my past views. That can only be determined (and even then only with strong inferences that are open to change with new facts and arguments) by honest debate, logically valid arguments, and looking at the best facts and evidence. Your (and Hedges') attacks on Pinker are nothing of the sort.

Sounds like you jumped from the side of cold hard reality to the side of comfortable humanistic delusion. Can't completely say I blame you, and I'll give one quick example, if you're going to denigrate Paul Ehrlich as being a doom-monger for trying to wake everyone up 40 years ago to some of the dangerous trends that were already being established. Earlier today, I was listening to one of my science podcasts, and they were discussing a recent published study of the Permian-Triassic Extintion, otherwise known as the Great Dying Event, because at least 90% of sea creatures and 95% of land animals went extinct during that time about 250 million years ago. It seems more accurate analysis of rock strata at the time reveals that a huge spike in CO2 levels lasted about 200,000 years, and during that time global average temperatures increased about 10 degrees C. Now the kicker is that only about half, or 5 degrees warming was caused by the active volcanism of that time, which occurred in Siberia, in what is called the Siberian Traps. The other 5 degrees came as the result of a positive feedback effect that released sequestered carbon into the atmosphere - most of it likely coming from methane clathrates in Arctic and Antarctic waters that were released when the waters began to warm above a threshold temperature. Worth considering that today we are being told that the IPCC goal of stopping the heating of the planet at 2 degrees C is considered a lost cause today, and serious estimates are now that there will be between 4 and 6 degrees warming at the end of this century. To me, that sounds like we have already set a planetary extinction in motion that will take out the human race and most life as well. And aside from these people you call doomsayers, no one else is saying anything or doing anything to stop it. And that makes me a doomsayer also.

[Wayward Son]

Btw, I forgot to add this important reply to this post of yours. Let me give you a more likely scenario why there's hardly any ripple in the science community about Lewontin's damaging accusations against Dawkins etc.,

Taken from the very same article, look at the reaction of the science community towards the "confusions" of Gould as stated:

Smith states that Gould is misleading the public....and yet somehow Gould did not sue him for libel. That must mean that it is true!! Or, of course, it could (and actually does) mean that Gould, like almost all public figures, knows that as public figures they have opened themselves up a higher level of criticism and therefore it is almost impossible for them to win such a libel case. If you are too lazy to google this simple fact then, once again, I can't help you.

[Wayward Son]

And I would say that if Chris Hedges was dishonest, he could still be making a good living out of it....like his colleagues at the N.Y. Times who went along with being cheerleaders for the Iraq War. For example: Judith Miller lied about her Iraq sources and influenced public support in favour of the Iraq Invasion, and was rewarded for being wrong and supporting Bush Administration policy. And like so many other useful idiots, she was rewarded, while those who refused to jump on the bandwagon were cut by the major newspapers and networks for getting it right!

There are many ways to make a good living while being dishonest, and Hedges makes a lot of money.