Geoff > Status Update

My senior year of high school was spent checking footnotes in Chomsky, because I just couldn't believe him at first...

However, I disagree with him about the rationalist tradition - on that count I have to side with Thomas Nagel; an innate language-learning faculty does not count as knowledge in the strong sense

David wrote: "an innate language-learning faculty does not count as knowledge in the strong sense "

That makes no sense! How could a faculty every be conceived as knowledge?

Exactly.

Chomsky claimed to have rehabilitated the rationalist tradition in philosophy by showing that language learning is innate. This would then seem to be a case for a priori knowledge. However, Nagel convincingly argues that language, as Chomsky conceives it, really does not count as knowledge at all. Even if grammar is innate, it is simply an innate tendency to agree to and follow certain arbitrary rules; it lacks the power to justify and ground knowledge. In terms of epistemology Chomsky has always been a strict empiricist.

I think he's actually much closer to Kant than Descartes or Leibniz.

I've got lots of books in case I get cold.

David wrote: "I think he's actually much closer to Kant than Descartes or Leibniz."

The language organ is the condition of the possibility of language. True.

Chomsky: Start with Understanding Power; it covers such a broad range of topics under "power" that you get introductions on his views in a whole lot of areas. IMO

Nathan "N.R." wrote: "David wrote: "I think he's actually much closer to Kant than Descartes or Leibniz."

The language organ is the condition of the possibility of language. True."

Whereas the rationalists (Decartes, Spinoza, Leibniz) would posit a real congruity between a priori reason on the one hand and the mind of god/the contents of the universe on the other.

Quine also seemed to have quite the beef with Noam, but I had trouble following that.

This is what I like about you guys! This long-running thread has been kept going for weeks by a group of people who share a common perspective. When an opposing viewpoint is offered (politely), you respond (also politely), and instead of uniting to lambast the dissenter with vitriol, you segue into a philosophy discussion and gift the dissenter with links. Truly admirable!

Actually, if anyone shows up planning to defend Quine's behaviorist psychology over Chomsky's quasi-rationalism, be warned. I will lambaste you with great vitriol.

: )

I wouldn't dream of it! I apologize for interrupting the fascinating conversation--I just wanted to express my appreciation for a respectful conversation when so many people seem unable to achieve it these days. So carry on! I'm not well-versed in philosophy, so I'm taking notes. ;)

You're not interrupting anything, or maybe you are and that's a good thing; this thread is a tissue of interruptions

(However, I pledge that my anger at the wall street wing of the Democratic party will not make me lose sight of what a truly and uniquely vile human being president-elect is

https://www.washingtonpost.com/news/w...

In a way, Trump's election is a sort of shock therapy for America. It has exposed the Centrist/ Right: Liberal/ Authoritarian dance being carried out by both the main parties in the USA. The common man on the street was never the priority for either of these parties.

Sadly, this is the situation with all political parties in the world democracies nowadays. Since communism has been designated a bad word, anything left of centre is shunned as poison - and the rich keep getting richer and the poor, poorer.

Yeah, I guess I just assumed the dysfunctional status quo would stumble on a bit longer than this.

From dysfunction to full-blown crisis.

David wrote: "Yeah, I guess I just assumed the dysfunctional status quo would stumble on a bit longer than this.

From dysfunction to full-blown crisis."

Really. I have a sneaking feeling that the threat of secession may come up again, this time from the left-leaning Dems.

If you look at the electoral map of America, Donald Trump has been elected by electoral votes from the Redneck Territory - and that too, by very narrow margins in some areas. The system which has ostensibly been created to give all states equal say in the election process has ended up in giving disproportionate advantage to some. There has never been a time when America has been more divided since the Civil War, I feel.

Of course, as a non- American, this is my view from outside.

Ha, redneck territory - careful there, my friend, those are my brothers and sisters...

But it's true, this country is absurdly divided; millions and millions of people (including me) will never accept the legitimacy of a Trump presidency, just as millions and millions never accepted Obama and wouldn't have accepted Clinton.

So maybe the presidency is an inherently illegitimate office at this point.

I love you guys.

ahhh : )

I cant wait for GR VR where we can all plug in to a virtual pub to have these discussions...

Jonathan wrote: "I cant wait for GR VR where we can all plug in to a virtual pub to have these discussions..."

Where, after a couple of pints, we'll all agree. That's how it always happens here among the (pseudo?) intellectuals in India. When you are sober, the discussion is serious, heated and political - when you are sufficiently pickled, the discussion is bawdy, friendly and many a time anatomical...

fake news doesn't usually pass the muster in Liberal online communities it goes a lot farther among right wingers. They are built to only agree with news that agrees with their world view whether it is true or not. https://www.washingtonpost.com/news/w...

Nandakishore wrote: "Redneck country"

Have you ever been to one of these "redneck" states? Evidently 61M rednecks voted for Trump.

Look at the county breakout of Trump vs Clinton and tell me you still think the same thing.

At least the recent result in Austria is heartening. Hopefully France will follow suit.

Just to play devil's advocate - how does armchair bashing of both sides and Besserwisserei help? Surely it's easy to sit on the sidelines and say guh, everyone's an idiot except me. Much harder to work together with people in some sort of movement to make things better. I think a lot of critically-minded people are allergic to anything that smacks of "movement", "party" or "co-operation".

Surely it's just another form of atomisation and alienation. I know I'm much more comfortable having an abstract philosophical discussion than I would be knocking on doors or going to protest marches (though I have done a bit of the latter). I don't buy Zizek's thing about how the most radical thing to do is just to think and do nothing. It's like studying the engineering and physics of trains, while the one you're on is going over a cliff.

(This whole mini-rant is mainly aimed at myself btw).

Gotta agree with Howl here - again it's the false equivalencies. The ways Trumpists are wrong and destructive are not the ways the Dems are wrong and destructive. Even in a broken two-party system that mainly reinforces the status quo the differences are still too great to brush over. These are lovely sentiments up there guys, but I don't know... I'm not feeling the hippy-dippy togetherness too much. Maybe we aren't all the same deep down. Sure, we all share the same fundamental concerns, to some degree, but how we express our concern over these concerns says a lot about our values, and our values constitute how we will act in the world. Deep down, I'm maybe not the same as someone who would support religious tests for entering our country, or demonize entire races as rapists and criminals, someone who brags about his ability to get away with sexually abusing women because of his social stature, or someone who wants to stop research and action on climate change in spite of all evidence because they personally believe it to be a hoax, but because of their privilege may never actually be threatened by it in their lifetime, or someone who only values wealth or fame to signify if someone is a "winner", someone who only values "winning", someone who mocks disabled people, someone who disregards the rights of a free press, someone who disregards the right of free speech, someone who wants to take away health care options for the poor and women, someone who would denigrate a union leader publically knowing the weight their words have when they demonize an individual, someone who would use the worst bigoted instincts of our population to get great power, someone who would propose carelessly bombing civilians in other countries, someone who threatens war crimes like murdering the innocent families of terrorists or stealing oil from war-torn countries, someone who doesn't think police brutality and abuse of power against minorities is a serious issue, someone who thinks our gun laws are too strong and the solution to violent crime is militarized police, someone who wants to gut public education and science, someone who praises and emulates dictators, someone whose only metric of success is symbolic monetary wealth, someone who proudly doesn't read, doesn't believe logical evidence, perpetuates conspiracies and lies, even racist ones - I could go on and on and on. I find these things horrifying, and only one side put a guy in charge who espouses these things. Our values determine how we act in the world, and our combined actions create the world; over the next 4 years I never want to forget nor cease sharply delineating these differences in values. We're talking about determining how our realities are created going forward.

Friends, comrades - I just wanted to say that this past week I made the transition from fellow traveler to card-carrying socialist. Please consider joining Democratic Socialists of America. Centrist politics seems to have defeated itself; let's try and address the root of the problem
https://dsausa.nationbuilder.com/mont...

I can get down with this

Geoff wrote: "Gotta agree with Howl here - again it's the false equivalencies. The ways Trumpists are wrong and destructive are not the ways the Dems are wrong and destructive. Even in a broken two-party system ..."

exactly. There is a right and wrong side in this don't lose sight of that.

Nick wrote: "Nandakishore wrote: "Redneck country"

Have you ever been to one of these "redneck" states? Evidently 61M rednecks voted for Trump.

Look at the county breakout of Trump vs Clinton and tell me you ..."
64 million voted for Clinton but our electoral college system which was supposed to be a barrier to tyrants and demagogues is about to install one.

Just to be fair, he's not a tyrant yet. He just has all the trademark tendencies of a tyrant.

Geoff wrote: "Just to be fair, he's not a tyrant yet. He just has all the trademark tendencies of a tyrant."

You're wrong there. He's made a career of it.

I don't think Trump will be able to rock the political status quo much - GOP will support him as long as he suits their agenda, but the moment he transgresses, expect fireworks. However, I am worried about two things: education and environment.

Trump has already signalled his intentions by appointing the primary climate change denier as head of EPA - a fox to guard the chicken coop. Ultimately, this will end up in the virtual destruction of this agency. I feel it all the more because I work in the field of HSE (Health, Environment and Safety), and we have always looked up to the EPA to guide us in environmental matters. This will be disastrous not only for the US but the world in general.

The second area is education. Trump and his cronies may destroy the excellent public school system; it has been the intention of conservatives all along. Education will become a commercial entity. Science will take a backseat and we can expect religion to slowly reenter classrooms through the backdoor.

The most frightening thing is that Trump will not be worried about his legacy. He is up there on the President's throne to make hay while the sun shines: after him, the deluge.

The GOP agenda is pretty much to redistribute the wealth in our society from the weakest members to the top 1%. I don't think Trump will transgress that agenda too much.

Trump also has his own personal agenda of singling out individual critics by name, knowing full well they'll receive death threats from his followers (again, https://www.washingtonpost.com/news/w...)

Is this now part of the broader GOP agenda as well? That's not clear to me. Republican leadership doesn't seem to object too strongly.

Using minions to attack critics is the time-tested agenda of the right since the Nazi era. It is happening a lot in India under Modi. Also, he is implicating all his detractors in false cases, misusing government machinery - this may be another tactic that Trump may try, but I don't know how successful it will be in the US, where citizens' rights and freedom of speech are respected much more than in India.

Liberal institutions only work if there are individuals to uphold them. Trump is already committing impeachable offenses before his inauguration (see the emolumuents clause of the constitution), but a Republican-led congress appears extremely unlikely to do anything about it.

Paul Ryan is knowingly consenting to the death of the American Republic. He'll have to be tried when this is all over.

What starts with a 'principled' commitment to free markets does not end in freedom.

When the government goes against the constitution, it is the time for citizens to wake up.

It will happen, never fear. A democracy has never slid into tyranny without interference from outside (here I am referring to those democracies murdered by the CIA and the KGB during the cold war era). India briefly trysted with autocracy in 1975-77 under Indira Gandhi, but she was unceremoniously kicked out of office during the next election.

Weimar in'33?

David wrote: "Weimar in'33?"

Weimar "Republic" was not a real democracy, IMO.

David wrote: "Weimar in'33?"

There are some parallels.

The great historian Timothy Snyder wrote this piece for slate

http://www.slate.com/articles/news_an...

(I'm not totally sold on the comparison, but it's worth considering)

The parallels are real. But the desperation of the US is not the desperation, especially economically, of Weimar Germany. Also, diversity is much more tightly woven into our society than in Weimar. That being said, I have no doubt Trump has totalitarian instincts and tyrannical intentions. I will see you at the barricades, comrades.

Oh hey but at least that guy responsible for those Hardee's ads where roast beef juice is dripping down the silicon-inflated breasts of models on sports cars is now the Labor Secretary? (That actually perfectly makes sense for Trump) Mommy, for Christmas I want my national dignity back..

I have seen press reports that Trump is similar to Berlusconi in Italy. Anyone know how that worked out.

Peter wrote: "I have seen press reports that Trump is similar to Berlusconi in Italy. Anyone know how that worked out."

Zizek proclaimed years ago (probably in multiple books/articles) that Berlusconi was the prototype for the coming politicians of our age.

Geoff wrote: "Peter wrote: "I have seen press reports that Trump is similar to Berlusconi in Italy. Anyone know how that worked out."

Zizek proclaimed years ago (probably in multiple books/articles) that Berlus..."

politics has been rooting for sports teams loyalty to party not program. Superficial glitz without and substance you mean...

And also extreme decadence obfuscated by an appeal to conservatism or austerity.

In policy the Republicans are a disaster and Trump is a Catastrophe. But on TV it is team blue and team red. play rock em sock em robots while your house goes up in flames.

Of course Zadie Smith has something brilliant to say
http://www.nybooks.com/articles/2016/...

I have a semi-official visit coming up to the United States in March/April next year - the first time I'll set foot in that great country. I have been making plans with great excitement, intimating with friends, sketching out an itinerary, saving up dollars etc. But it seems that the barbarian might be turned away from the gate. After Trump's victory, the US embassy in Islamabad is rejecting applications left and right without any formal explanation. Rejection rates are yet to come out but it seems about 90%. Last week a friend of mine was part of the busload who were called up for the interview only to be served with rejection stamps. Only one person was spared. There have been no announcements; they have just decided that all of us are a security risk. That's just short-term visit visa. We can forget about immigration.