Goodreads helps you keep track of books you want to read.

Start by marking “Beyond the Hoax: Science, Philosophy and Culture” as Want to Read:

Other editions

Enlarge cover

Rate this book

Clear rating

1 of 5 stars 2 of 5 stars 3 of 5 stars 4 of 5 stars 5 of 5 stars

Open Preview

Beyond the Hoax: Science, Philosophy and Culture

by Alan Sokal

3.88 · Rating details · 160 Ratings · 26 Reviews

When physicist Alan Sokal revealed that his 1996 article, "Transgressing the Boundaries: Toward a Transformative Hermeneutics of Quantum Gravity," published in Social Text, was a hoax, the ensuing scandal made the front page of the New York Times and caused an uproar amongst the post-modernists he had so hilariously-and convincingly-parodied.

Now, in Beyond the Hoax, Sokal

...more

Get A Copy

Or buy for

Hardcover, 465 pages

Published April 1st 2008 by Oxford University Press, USA (first published 2008)

More Details... edit details

Friend Reviews

To see what your friends thought of this book, please sign up.

Reader Q&A

To ask other readers questions about Beyond the Hoax, please sign up.

Be the first to ask a question about Beyond the Hoax

Lists with This Book

The Centrist Manifesto by Charles Wheelan

The Better Angels of Our Nature by Steven Pinker

The New Center Reading List

45 books — 3 voters

The Anti-Education Era by James Paul Gee

Cuando la ciencia despertaba fantasías by Soledad Quereilhac

Anti-Science

10 books — 1 voter

More lists with this book...

Community Reviews

(showing 1-30)

filter | sort: default (?) | Rating Details

Jun 17, 2010 David rated it it was amazing

Shelves: science, philosophy-religion, politics-government

This book is about postmodern relativism, pseudoscience, "alternative" medicine (like homeopathy), and religion. As one of my housemates pointed out to me, it's everything I hate, in one book!

Which made me think. Indeed, everything that truly irritates me intellectually is linked, by a blatant, even belligerent, disregard for reality, rationalism, and empiricism. And that's what irritates Sokal, too. And people who say science is a limited white male way of thinking, which cannot properly evalua ...more

flag 12 likes · Like · see review

Oct 03, 2008 David rated it really liked it

In this work, Sokal provides a very detailed annotation to his 1996 spoof "Transgressing the Boundaries: Towards a Transformative Hermeneutics of Quantum Gravity". This article was chock-full of scientific absurdities and approving quotes of utter nonsense from leading science studies scholars. Yet it was accepted and appeared in a special issue of a leading postmodern journal. Sokal's annotations, which appear here for the first time in print, reveal in jaw-dropping detail the depth of his spoo In this work, Sokal provides a very detailed annotation to his 1996 spoof "Transgressing the Boundaries: Towards a Transformative Hermeneutics of Quantum Gravity". This article was chock-full of scientific absurdities and approving quotes of utter nonsense from leading science studies scholars. Yet it was accepted and appeared in a special issue of a leading postmodern journal. Sokal's annotations, which appear here for the first time in print, reveal in jaw-dropping detail the depth of his spoof -- virtually every paragraph and every footnote of the original article had either scientific nonsense or unjustified claims that should have been detected had the article truly been reviewed by anyone with even a modicum of technical knowledge, or even by a reviewer who merely checked Sokal's references carefully. But because the overall tone was friendly to trendy postmodern relativism, and because Sokal skillfully spoofed the style of the genre, it was accepted.

The annotated copy of the article would be worth the purchase price of this book, but Sokal goes much further. He includes several other articles and essays, some appearing here for the first time, that underscore the pervasiveness of scientific nonsense masquerading as serious academic scholarship. Sokal notes that this is far more than an epistemological debate, or even a liberal-conservative issue. If solid critical thinking and empirical analysis is dismissed or devalued, then modern society is at the mercy of every half-baked fringe movement from astrology to "field balance" medical practices (the latter have actually been taught in some American nursing schools). What's more, to the extent that it embraces extreme cultural relativism, the academic world becomes powerless to counter movements such as creationism, intelligent design and global warming deniers.

As a parting shot, Sokal takes aim at organized religion. Here he relies mostly on Harris' recent book "The End of Faith", and so his scholarship is not as original or as insightful as the earlier part of the book. Furthermore, this part suffers from the weakness that several of the items Sokal highlights, such as the Catholic doctrine of transubstantiation, are no longer literally believed by most college-educated adherents. But Sokal does make a valid point that religion must examine and update beliefs based on modern scientific knowledge -- to ignore or dismiss the advance of modern science is a formula for decline and irrelevance. ...more

flag 6 likes · Like · see review

Mar 18, 2017 Peter Mcloughlin rated it really liked it · review of another edition

Shelves: politics, philosophy, general-science, general-history, physics, education, american-history, european-history, intellectual-history, world-history, nonfiction, media, 1990-to-present, modernism, owned-books, fringes-of-science, religion-or-not, 00001bad-things

The Sokal Hoax in the nineties happened when Alan Sokal, a physicist, had a paper published using trendy terms from postmodern discourse and a ton of citations from well known post-modern philosophers it was a paper purposely put together to be profound sounding gibberish and it fooled the editors of social text. The right got a few talking points back then from it in the news and it has largely been forgotten since.

Sokal was not a conservative. he was a person of the left. He published to pape ...more

flag 5 likes · Like · see review

Nov 26, 2008 John rated it it was ok

Alan Sokal is best known in the academic world for his overly-clever hoax. In 1996 he published an essay in Social Text, a postmodern journal, full of ridiculous "postmodernist" statements about quantum physics. His goal was to make fun of literary and cultural critics who had been taking on the scientific establishment by questioning its methods of seeking truth. The postmodernist perspective (actually, to be fair, one perspective), in a crude nutshell, is that truth and knowledge are relative Alan Sokal is best known in the academic world for his overly-clever hoax. In 1996 he published an essay in Social Text, a postmodern journal, full of ridiculous "postmodernist" statements about quantum physics. His goal was to make fun of literary and cultural critics who had been taking on the scientific establishment by questioning its methods of seeking truth. The postmodernist perspective (actually, to be fair, one perspective), in a crude nutshell, is that truth and knowledge are relative and vary depending on culture and social structure. In any event, Sokal created a firestorm with his hoax.

In the ensuing 12 years, Sokal offered reflections on this episode and has added a number of essays critical of the critics of science. This book consists of several of these essays, as well as a laborious annotated version of the original piece that made him famous (or infamous, depending on one's perspective).

Although the book is worth reading for Sokal's interesting critiques of what he calls Science Studies, there are numerous problems that result in a less than stellar product (especially given the prestigious publisher, Oxford U Press). First and most obvious, this is perhaps the worst edited book I've ever read. The number of redundancies across chapters is astounding and very annoying. Was Oxford in a rush to put this out for some reason? Did Sokal refuse to work with an editor?

Second, whereas Sokal is on solid ground when offering critiques of science studies from his perspective as a physicist, and though he seems to have mastered well the epistemological literature that is relevant to these studies, he goes well off track in later chapters when he attempts to tackle what he calls "superstition" (read "religion"). Here he simply rehashes arguments that have been made much more convincingly by Dawkins and other proud atheists. It seems that Sokal felt at pains to be even handed by attacking postmodernists as well as what he considers conservatives (which seemed to encompass all believers, irrespective of his use of the term "liberal Christian").

Perhaps most annoying, though, is that Sokal, even if he has done an admirable job cutting the legs out of postmodern science studies, offers no sense of what the scientific method offers. He assumes that the reader is on his side and perhaps understands the method, so he didn't feel the need to offer a positive evaluation or argument favoring this approach to knowledge generation. This may have been his thinking, but I thought it came off as arrogant. In the end, even though I was amused by the "Sokal hoax" and its aftermath, the book disappoints on many levels. ...more

flag 4 likes · Like · see review

Mar 31, 2016 Lobstergirl rated it liked it

Recommends it for: Shar Peis

The largest chunk of this book is actually his other book, Fashionable Nonsense: Postmodern Intellectuals' Abuse of Science. The first chapter is an annotated text of the article that constituted the big hoax in the journal Social Text. And the original article of course had footnotes, so this one has double footnotes. It's exhausting to plow through, and Sokal's style is very self-congratulatory, full of humble-brags and inside jokes.

Another vast chapter is a book review of Sam Harris's The End
The largest chunk of this book is actually his other book, Fashionable Nonsense: Postmodern Intellectuals' Abuse of Science. The first chapter is an annotated text of the article that constituted the big hoax in the journal Social Text. And the original article of course had footnotes, so this one has double footnotes. It's exhausting to plow through, and Sokal's style is very self-congratulatory, full of humble-brags and inside jokes.

Another vast chapter is a book review of Sam Harris's The End of Faith and Michael Lerner's Spirit Matters. I'm certainly happy that we have atheists in the world. We need them, just like we need opposition to all majority movements. They shouldn't be discriminated against. But Sokal's equating of Christianity, Judaism, Islam, etc. with the Heaven's Gate and other cults (they're all, equally, superstitions) got old very fast. Sokal criticized Harris's book for being epistemologically sound but politically lacking, which was interesting because Sokal's critique of religion was much the same. He praised Lerner for his efforts not to be condescending toward the religious right, and he seemed to think he himself was also not being condescending, but insisting your way is the only enlightened way and calling every major religion superstition is pretty much the definition of condescending. It may work well for you among other academics, but you're going to alienate 80% of everyone else.

Sokal had so many people advising him on the book and reading manuscripts I'm surprised no one told him how wordy he was. Maybe all of them are wordy too. Nearly every single thought he had needed to be expanded with a footnote. I believe the phrase "It goes without saying that..." occurred close to 9,433 times. If it really does go without saying, why did you say it? If I recall, in his other book he had the equally annoying habit of saying things like "Needless to say, this is so obvious it doesn't need elaboration" and then not elaborating, when it actually wasn't obvious to me. Writers, here's a piece of advice. Say those things that to you are obvious. They won't be obvious to everyone. Say them simply, in one sentence. Then move on. ...more

flag 2 likes · Like · see review

Mar 25, 2016 Kerem Cankocak rated it it was amazing · review of another edition

'Şakanın Ardından' Sokal vakasındaki tartışmaları toplayan bir kitaptır. Kitabın ilk bölümünde Social Text'te yayınlanan makalenin tam metni ve açıklamaları sağlı-sollu yer almaktadır. Diğer bölümleri ise bilim ve bilim felsefesi tartışmalarına ayrılmıştır. Kendisini 'Sol görüşlü' olarak niteleyen Sokal en çok sol çevrelerdeki bilim düşmanlığının tehlikelerine dikkati çekmektedir. Kitapta, Sokal Vakası tartışmaların yanısıra, Bilim Felsefesinin kadim sorunları da ele alınmaktadır: Popper'cı bili 'Şakanın Ardından' Sokal vakasındaki tartışmaları toplayan bir kitaptır. Kitabın ilk bölümünde Social Text'te yayınlanan makalenin tam metni ve açıklamaları sağlı-sollu yer almaktadır. Diğer bölümleri ise bilim ve bilim felsefesi tartışmalarına ayrılmıştır. Kendisini 'Sol görüşlü' olarak niteleyen Sokal en çok sol çevrelerdeki bilim düşmanlığının tehlikelerine dikkati çekmektedir. Kitapta, Sokal Vakası tartışmaların yanısıra, Bilim Felsefesinin kadim sorunları da ele alınmaktadır: Popper'cı bilim felsefesinin eleştirisinden, Kuhn'un “bilimsel devrimlerine”, Feyereband' ın “yönteme karşı” sına kadar, son dönem bilim felsefesi tartışmalarına değinen Sokal, bu tartışmalar karşısında bilim insanının konumunu irdeler.

''Burada amaçlarımdan biri de Sol içinde beşeri bilimlerle uğraşanlar ve doğa bilimcileri arasında doğacak bir diyaloğa küçük bir katkıda bulunmaktır; çoğu ilk gruptan gelen bazı iyimser beyanlara rağmen, “iki kültür” zihniyeti arasındaki fark belki de son elli yılda olduğundan daha fazla açılmıştır....Doğa bilimcilerin postmodern aptallıktan korkması için pek neden yoktur (en azından kısa süreliğine); söz oyunları, toplumsal gerçeklerin titizlikle incelenmesinin yerini alınca bundan en çok mağdur olanlar tarih, sosyal bilimler ve sol siyasettir...''

Türkçe Baskıya Önsöz

Alan Sokal, Türk okurların yabancı olmadığı bir isim. Jean Bricmont ile birlikte yazdıkları kitap 2002 'de Türkçede 'Son Moda Saçmalar Postmodern Aydınların Bilimi Kötüye Kullanmaları' başlığıyla yayımlandı. New York Üniversitesinde Teorik fizik profesörü olan Alan Sokal, 1996'da Social Text isimli bir postmodern dergiye saçma bir makale gönderir. Fizik kuramlarını bilerek çarpıttığı ve saçma bir şekilde sunduğu bu makalesini Social Text basar ve ardından Sokal bunun bir şaka olduğunu, postmodern dergilerin her türlü saçma makaleyi bastıklarını ispatlamak için bu yola başvurduğunu açıklar. Sonrasında büyük bir tartışma başlar, postmodern felsefeciler ile bilim adamları arasında. ''Bilim savaşlarında''nda yeni bir sayfa açılmış olur ve Derrida gibi ünlü postmodernistler ile Weinberg gibi Nobel ödüllü fizikçilerinin de dahil olduğu sert tartışmalar yaşanır. Düşün tarihine 'Sokal vakası' olarak geçen bu olayın devamı 'Şakanın Ardından'ın ilk kısmını oluşturuyor. Kitabın ikinci bölümü ise detaylı bir bilim felsefesi tartışması içeriyor. Son olarak üçüncü bölümde Sokal, bütün bu tartışmaların akademik düzeyde kalmadığını, aslında bunun politik bir mesele olduğunu, günlük hayattan örneklerle anlatıyor. Bu son kısım kitabın en politik kısmı.
Alan Sokal, bir teorik fizikçiden beklenmeyecek ölçüde politik birisi. Farklı makalelerinden derlediği bu kitabında da, sık sık ''kendi alanı olmayan'' bu konulara politik nedenlerle girdiğini vurguluyor. Toplumsal olaylar, topluma ilişkin olgular, kısaca her tür politik söylemin beşeri bilimcilerin tekelinde olduğu günümüzde, Sokal gibi pozitif bilimcilerin bu çıkışları bize göre çok önemlidir. Sokal'ın en çok vurguladığı ''bilim düşmanlığı'' ve ''bilimlerin postmodern yazarlar tarafından kötüye kullanımı'', son tahlilde akademik bir mesele değil, politik sonuçları olan ciddi bir toplumsal olgudur. Bu olguyu görmek için çok uzaklara gitmeye gerek yok, Internetten Türkçeye çevrilmiş kitapları taradığımızda hemen karşımıza çıkıyor. Ülkemizde postmodern yazarları Türkçeye kazandırma konusunda geniş bir ittifak göze çarpmakta: Liberalliğe terfi etmiş eski tüfek solculardan anarşistlere, prestijli üniversitelerin Sosyoloji bölümlerinden dini kitaplar basan yayınevlerine kadar hemen herkes postmodern yazarları (özellikle Fransız olanları) bağrına basmış durumda. Örneğin Baudrillard'ın neredeyse tüm kitapları Türkçeye çevrilmiş, Feyerabend birçok farklı yayınevi tarafından defalarca yayımlanmış. Bu ilginç olguyu nasıl açıklamalı? Şüphesiz ilk akla gelen açıklama bu fikirlerin 'moda oluşları'. Bu kadar geniş bir düşünce yelpazesindeki aydınların, bu kitapların içeriklerinde uzlaştıklarını varsaymak ilk bakışta olanaksız gibi görünüyor. Moda konusu, Alfa Yayınlarının Bilim-Felsefe dizisinden çıkartacağımız ilk dört kitaptan biri olan 'Mem Makinesinde' ayrıntılı olarak ele alınıyor. Susan Blackmore, bir çeşit kültürel genler olan ''mem''lerin nasıl taklit yoluyla kendilerini kopyalattığını detaylı bir şekilde inceliyor. Ama 'postmodern memlerin' kendilerini kopyalatarak çoğalması bir sonuçtur. Peki bu memlerin başarılı olmasının ardında yatan sır nedir? Neden son yıllarda 'faşist bilim', 'paradigma', 'sömürgeci batı bilimi', 'gerçeklik görecelidir', 'bilim toplumsal bir inşadır' tarzındaki memler başarı kazandı? İşte Sokal, bu postmodern yazarların söylediklerinin bu kadar geniş bir çevrede ilgi çekmesinin nedenlerini araştırıyor kitabında. Bir bilim adamı titizliğiyle postmodern argümanları masaya yatırarak, bu yanlış argümanların izini Kuhn ve Feyerabend'in eserlerine kadar sürüyor.
Sokal'a göre başta gelen etmenlerden ilki ''tembellik'', çünkü ''perspektivizm ve radikal toplumsal inşacılık, politik olarak kendini adamış fakat entelektüel açıdan tembel insanlar için fazlasıyla doğal bir felsefe ...''. Günümüzde en sevilen kavram paradigma. Herkesin 'kendi paradigması' var. Oysa gerçek bilim yapmak zor. Eğer herşey bir yorum ve kanaat meselesiyse, zamanımızı neden ciddi biçimde fizik, biyoloji ve istatistik öğrenmeye harcayalım ki? Tembelliğin yanı sıra akıl-dışılığa duyulan ilgi, bilimin 'otoriterliğinden' korku,...vb gibi etmenler de var. Özellikle Türkiye gibi bilimsel formasyonun zayıf olduğu ülkelerde bunlar daha da baskın hale geliyor.
Sokal'ın amacı, genel anlamda kanıt ve mantığa duyulan saygı olarak özetlediği bilimsel bir dünya görüşünü savunmak. Ama bu sadece akademik bir savunma değil, aynı zamanda politik bir savunma. Kitaptaki tezler her ne kadar akademik düzeyde de olsa, sonuçları politik. Sokal bütün bu tartışmaların akademik düzeyde kalmayıp, dünyamızı da etkilediğini vurguluyor. Bilim düşmanlığının, göreciliğin ve sahte bilimlerin en büyük zararının, özellikle Türkiye gibi ''Aydınlanmanın modası geçmiş olduğu varsayılan işinin henüz tamamlanmadığı Üçüncü Dünya ülkelerinde'' görüldüğünü söylüyor. Sokal kitabın son bölümünde bu zararlara örnek olarak Hindistan'ı seçmiş. Ancak Hindistan' da yaşananların bir kısmı Türkiye'de de yaşanmakta ve yaşanma tehlikesi var.
Alan Sokal'ın bu kitabının, Türkiye'deki postmodern modanın yol açtığı zararların telafisine yönelik önemli bir tartışma zemini yaratmasını umuyoruz.

Kerem Cankoçak, Eylül 2011
...more

flag 1 like · Like · see review

Jul 02, 2011 Ugh rated it liked it

The blurb doesn't give much away, so I'll fill you in on the content as I go along:

Chapter 1 (60-odd pages plus bibliography) is a reproduction of Sokal's 1996 publication in social science journal 'Social Text', which he later revealed to be deliberately composed of ambiguity, misused terms, and quotes of what Sokal considered to poor science or else total nonsense. The reproduction is also accompanied by commentary from Sokal in the form of annotations. That means your attention is divided thr The blurb doesn't give much away, so I'll fill you in on the content as I go along:

Chapter 1 (60-odd pages plus bibliography) is a reproduction of Sokal's 1996 publication in social science journal 'Social Text', which he later revealed to be deliberately composed of ambiguity, misused terms, and quotes of what Sokal considered to poor science or else total nonsense. The reproduction is also accompanied by commentary from Sokal in the form of annotations. That means your attention is divided three ways: to the article, to the footnotes to the article, and to the annotations. This works pretty well, and I think is probably better than if the article had been reproduced as a stand-alone piece which was then followed by the commentary, but I did get a bit tired at times of having to move my attention around the pages all the time. You don't get the same satisfaction you get from just going at a chunk of text and blasting through it.

In terms of content, this chapter is reasonably interesting (for someone with very very little previous experience of social science or post-modern deconstructivism and what have you), but I did get a bit bored before the end. To be fair, it probably didn't help that I was often unable to discern the nonsense from the partly or entirely sensical until I read the explanatory comment for that particular bit, because this meant that I spent a fair amount of time in a pretty clueless state. But then, if the editors of Social Text were fooled, and they were supposed to be experts, what hope did I have? Most of the comments are quite interesting or funny, but I was quite glad to finally finish the chapter.

The rest of part 1 (which constitutes around one third of the book) is comprised of comment on the hoax and what it did and didn't demonstrate. This and the rest of the book are presented in the more familiar text-and-footnote format, so are less of an effort to read. Plus, they're pretty interesting.

However, it was parts 2 and 3 that I had highest hopes for, once the attraction of reading the hoax had lost its initial shine, and I think these parts are the most interesting overall. Part 2 consists of 2 essays on science and philosophy, and part 3 of 3 essays on science and culture. In truth, the two essays from part 2 and the first from part 3 are pretty similar, and in fact certain paragraphs from the different essays are repeated word-for-word not just once but a couple of times between the different essays. I didn't exactly feel cheated by that, because the meat of the essays IS different, but I did think it was just a teeny bit rich for Sokal to talk in the preface about how much it annoys him when academics release compendiums of essays that have bugger all to do with each other but try to pass the volume off as a coherent whole, only to then go to the opposite extreme and actually repeat content over and over again! But it's a minor gripe.

To wrap it up, the final 2 essays on politics and religion were the most accesible for me, but also the most familiar and least revelatory (but still intereting).

So what did I think of the book? Well, I hadn't realised that it was going to be about the attempts of certain groups to attack science for the very thing that makes it worthwhile - i.e., its objectivity - and if I had realised that it was going to be about that (a topic that would have struck pre-BTH me as being pretty much irrelevant to serious science), then I would probably have been less inclined to buy it. However, in the course of reading the book, I did come around to the idea that these groups, although small, do have quite a bit of influence, so I'm glad that I did decide to take it home. It IS a bit repetitive, and the analysis is never really all that deep, mostly coming in the form of quotes from other works that Sokal then briefly comments on or to which he supplies comment from other sources, but then, Sokal never attempts to hide the fact that with these essays he's sticking his nose into areas in which he's not a specialist, and I felt that, although a little shallow, his analysis was always very fair and often quite insightful. Plus, he comes across as a very likeable guy, and at times his comments or the sources he's selected are actually very funny.

I'm only giving this three stars, but they're a very happily granted three stars. I wouldn't want to give the wrong impression of the book by giving it a higher score, because it is a lot of pages on quite a niche topic, and because the actual input from the author constitutes only so much of the book, and contributes only so much insight, but it's a book that I for the most part really enjoyed reading, and I find myself liking and admiring Sokal himself rather a lot too.

Overall: recommended, but only for those who've read this far and haven't sighed yet or skipped along. Three and a half stars if I could... ...more

flag 1 like · Like · see review

Dec 08, 2009 Fiona rated it liked it

The only aspect of the Sokal Hoax I was aware of before I read this book was that the hoax article Sokal wrote about physics was submitted to a publication that did not subject articles to peer review. This seemed to me to make the hoax not quite as damning for the social sciences as opponents of poststructuralism and postmodernism claimed, since it was really more embarassing for the editors of the journal than the entire academic field of the cultural analysis of science.

I found Sokal's critiq ...more

flag 1 like · Like · see review

May 17, 2013 Liam rated it liked it

Shelves: nonfiction, intellectual-history, post-modern, way-too-long, essays, philosophy

Sokal protests that this is not a collection of B-sides, so to speak, but a continuous whole, even if its parts were previously published separately. Unfortunately the consistency is not the same all the way through, and this was not a text which was designed to be read from cover to cover in the same way that the previous book, Fashionable Nonsense, was. Many sections seem as if they were a pouring-out of paragraphs clipped from sessions at the library, with minimal commentary.

When Sokal draws ...more

flag 1 like · Like · see review

Aug 18, 2008 Gideon marked it as to-read

Shelves: want

Oh I want this...

Damn post-modernists.. Between them and the positivists, and the 'let's make everything science" crowd, they pretty much ruined the Academy.

flag 1 like · Like · see review

Jun 22, 2017 Dominic Pakenham rated it really liked it

This book was divided into three parts, and the thread that connected them was not sufficiently well wrought to give the sense of a seamless reader experience: I'm not sure how the whole thing was compiled; but, as a reader, it's tedious to have to find the same argument repeated (word-for-word) in several successive chapters. Presumably Sokal wrote a series of essays, all of which concerned the worst excesses of postmodernism, and someone persuaded him to stitch them together to create a book. ...more

flag Like · see review

Jul 01, 2017 Evangelos rated it liked it

Got this for the hoax essay. There's other interesting essays too, although sometimes repetitive. I skimmed through some them, didn't read through. I'll go back to the annotations for the essay later.

flag Like · see review

May 09, 2011 Koen Crolla rated it liked it · review of another edition

Shelves: philosophy

Pretty disappointing. This is a collection of essays, of which the first is an annotated version of the hoax paper and the rest is largely uninteresting.

The problem with arguing against postmodernists and relativists is that nobody is a postmodernist or relativist because they genuinely don't understand scientific epistemology; they're postmodernists and relativists because they're intellectually dishonest and want to ``win'' arguments or be fashionable. Everyone understands why these people are ...more

flag Like · see review

Jul 03, 2014 K rated it liked it

Shelves: philosophy, sociology, natural-sciences

Sokal is a philosophically-minded scientist who deals with social and political issues in a very interesting and accessible manner. This book is a collection of essays that deal with the philosophy of science, religion, his infamous hoax-article (along with commentary) and, as one can expect, post-modern theory. Regarding the actual content of the book one cannot find much to nag about, however, it does feel disjointed. It can also feel partly underdeveloped since the essays found here are argui ...more

flag Like · see review

Jan 27, 2013 Mark Edon rated it really liked it

Much more than I expected in more ways than one.

I expected the text of the Sokal Hoax, exposing anti-reality post modernism, but the extensive footnotes where a bonus.

Then there was plenty of food for thought exploring more examples that started from merely doubting the existence of a real world and the equality of all points of view when it comes to matters of fact but progressed into the direct promotion of nonsense beliefs at the expense of science and to the detriment of innocents.

I was p ...more

flag Like · see review

May 19, 2012 Rebecca rated it really liked it

Shelves: cultural-studies, current-events-and-journalism

This book brings together a number of important critiques of post-modernism and goes beyond the mocking of scientific ignorance and misuses of scientific terms that appeared in the writing immediately following the famous "Sokal Hoax" on the journal _Social Text_.
I was initially skeptical of Sokal's negative assessments of some post-modern feminist and anti-colonialist critiques of science but his detailed discussions of both theories and related movements were ultimately very convincing. I wo ...more

flag Like · see review

Feb 02, 2013 Stephen Cranney rated it liked it

Shelves: sociology-class

The first couple of chapters (the ones describing the hoax) were pretty good, but after that it veers off into armchair philosophizing about the philosophy of science; it's not that I didn't agree with him on most points, but if I'm going to spend time reading about the philosophy of science, I'm going to read what a specialist says about it. Finally, the last couple of chapters recycled a lot of "New Atheist" arguments that I've heard a thousand times before, so nothing new. However, he is a de ...more

flag Like · see review

Feb 20, 2014 Luis León rated it it was amazing

Excelente libro de cabecera para todo escéptico científico, con el cual dormir debajo de la almohada. Explica en detalle la meditada elección de cada frase en su paper motivo del Escándalo Sokal y entrega una contundente refutación al postmodernismo absurdo, haciéndose cargo de las visiones críticas de la ciencia y su ecosistema en la medida que estén bien fundamentadas. Expone la cháchara delirante que se ha apoderado de la Academia en Humanidades y el impacto social que lleva la negación de la ...more

flag Like · see review

May 28, 2014 Brett rated it really liked it

Sokal ends up repeating some of his arguments a few too many times since this is a collection of related essays written over 10 or so years, but this should be required reading for both scientists and its critics, especially with regards to epistemological issues.

flag Like · see review

Jan 06, 2010 Michael Bérubé rated it liked it

http://www.powells.com/blog/?p=4351

flag Like · see review

Jul 08, 2013 David Greenhalgh rated it it was amazing

The first section, the original hoax plus commentary should be on every undergrad curriculum as a lesson in not taking anything without questioning.

flag Like · see review

Mar 10, 2012 Dimitri Yatsenko rated it really liked it

Shelves: culture

An uncompromising defense of thinking clearly.

flag Like · see review

Apr 29, 2015 Andreas Lindblad rated it it was amazing

Shelves: non-fiction

Very funny and important. Alan Sokal digs deeply (and take stabs at) how postmodernism tries to debase the authority of the natural sciences.

flag Like · see review

Sep 04, 2010 John rated it really liked it · review of another edition

Shelves: 01-bowdoinham

Excellent critique of the overreaching of deconstructionist social theory -- which I am sympathetic to, in general.

flag Like · see review

Feb 28, 2014 Mills College Library added it · review of another edition

501 S6837 2010

flag Like · see review

Jitney rated it it was amazing
May 06, 2017

James Creechan rated it it was amazing
Jan 17, 2015

JOSE MARIA rated it it was amazing
May 01, 2016

Sarna rated it really liked it
Nov 08, 2010

Garrett rated it it was amazing
Dec 05, 2015

« previous 1 2 3 4 5 6 next »

new topic
Discuss This Book

There are no discussion topics on this book yet. Be the first to start one »

Recommend It | Stats | Recent Status Updates

Readers Also Enjoyed

Goodreads is hiring!

If you like books and love to build cool products, we may be looking for you.
Learn more »

Genres

Philosophy

31 users

Science

24 users

Nonfiction

8 users

Education

4 users

Politics

3 users

Social Science

3 users

See top shelves…

About Alan Sokal

Alan David Sokal (born 1955) is a professor of mathematics at University College London and professor of physics at New York University. He works in statistical mechanics and combinatorics. To the general public he is best known for his criticism of postmodernism, resulting in the Sokal affair in 1996.

Sokal received his B.A. from Harvard College in 1976 and his Ph.D. from Princeton University in 1 Alan David Sokal (born 1955) is a professor of mathematics at University College London and professor of physics at New York University. He works in statistical mechanics and combinatorics. To the general public he is best known for his criticism of postmodernism, resulting in the Sokal affair in 1996.

Sokal received his B.A. from Harvard College in 1976 and his Ph.D. from Princeton University in 1981. He was advised by Arthur Wightman. In the summers of 1986-1988, Sokal taught mathematics at the National Autonomous University of Nicaragua, when the Sandinistas were heading the elected government.

Sokal’s research lies in mathematical physics and combinatorics. In particular, he studies the interplay between these fields based on questions arising in statistical mechanics and quantum field theory. This includes work on the chromatic polynomial and the Tutte polynomial, which appear both in algebraic graph theory and in the study of phase transitions in statistical mechanics. His interests include computational physics and algorithms, such as Markov chain Monte Carlo algorithms for problems in statistical physics. He also co-authored a book on quantum triviality.

Sokal is best known to the general public for the Sokal Affair of 1996. Curious to see whether the then-non-peer-reviewed postmodern cultural studies journal Social Text (published by Duke University Press) would publish a submission which "flattered the editors' ideological preconceptions," Sokal submitted a grand-sounding but completely nonsensical paper entitled "Transgressing the Boundaries: Toward a Transformative Hermeneutics of Quantum Gravity."

The journal did in fact publish it, and soon thereafter Sokal then revealed that the article was a hoax in the journal Lingua Franca, arguing that the left and social science would be better served by intellectual underpinnings based on reason. He replied to leftist and postmodernist criticism of the deception by saying that his motivation had been to "defend the Left from a trendy segment of itself."

The affair, together with Paul R. Gross and Norman Levitt's book Higher Superstition, can be considered to be a part of the so-called Science wars.

Sokal followed up by co-authoring the book Impostures Intellectuelles with Jean Bricmont in 1997 (published in English, a year later, as Fashionable Nonsense). The book accuses other academics of using scientific and mathematical terms incorrectly and criticizes proponents of the strong program for denying the value of truth. The book had mixed reviews, with some lauding the effort, some more reserved, and others pointing out alleged inconsistencies and criticizing the authors for ignorance of the fields under attack and taking passages out of context.

In 2008, Sokal revisited the Sokal affair and its implications in Beyond the Hoax.
...more

More about Alan Sokal...

Books by Alan Sokal

Fashionable Nonsense: Postmodern Intellectuals' Abuse of Science

Transgressing the Boundaries: Towards a Transformative Hermeneutics of Quantum Gravity

Random Walks, Critical Phenomena, And Triviality In Quantum Field Theory

More…

Share This Book

+ Share on your website

Trivia About Beyond the Hoax: ...

6 trivia questions

More quizzes & trivia...

Quotes from Beyond the Hoax: ...

“None of us, I think, in the mid-’70s … would have thought we’d be devoting so much mental space now to confront religion. We thought that matter had long been closed. — Ian McEwan” — 2 likes

More quotes…

title link	preview: Beyond the Hoax: Science, Philosophy and Culture
avg rating	preview: Beyond the Hoax: Science, Philosophy and Culture Goodreads rating: 3.88 (160 ratings)
small image	preview: click here [close]
med image	preview: click here [close]
BBCode	[url=https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/2036727.Beyond_the_Hoax?utm_medium=api&utm_source=blog_book][img]https://images.gr-assets.com/books/1348985687l/2036727.jpg[/img][/url] [url=https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/2036727.Beyond_the_Hoax?utm_medium=api&utm_source=blog_book]Beyond the Hoax: Science, Philosophy and Culture by Alan Sokal[/url]

See a Problem?

Preview — Beyond the Hoax by Alan Sokal

Beyond the Hoax: Science, Philosophy and Culture

Friend Reviews

Reader Q&A

Lists with This Book

Community Reviews

new topic
Discuss This Book

Readers Also Enjoyed

Goodreads is hiring!

Genres

About Alan Sokal

Books by Alan Sokal

Share This Book

Share on your website

Trivia About Beyond the Hoax: ...

Quotes from Beyond the Hoax: ...