Attempt to normalize Marxism and Sartre's bromance fails

Retired Wayne State professor of the history of ideas Ronald Aronson, an expert philosophical commenter on Jean-Paul Sartre, including on his friendship with Albert Camus, attempts to rehabilitate both Marxism and Sartre's attempt to rehabilitate it in a new Boston  Review essay.

And fails.

In a nutshell, here's why.


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First, Sartre did find a weak point — rather, the weakest point — of Marxism 101, with all of its permutations through Lenin, Stalin, Mao and even revisers like the Frankfurt School.

It’s Hegelian dialectic.

Congrats to Sartre for seeing the main issue that makes Marxism even more a pseudoscience than most theories of economics, since Hegelian dialectic and its thesis-synthesis-antithesis is purely a philosophical idea, and totally unscientific.

BUT! Marxism is not Marxism without Hegelian dialectic. Pull that out, and you're engaging with non-Marxist Socialist theorizing of some sort.

Second, while comparing and contrasting Sartre to Camus, and intertwining them, and saying that Sartre tried to find a third way, Aronson ignores how late Sartre was to the table on criticizing both Stalin in particular and Soviet Communism in general.

Third, Marx ignored, or never thought through, larger economic consumptive problems of capitalism — resource exploitation problems that aren’t part of Marxism.

Peak Oil — temporarily offset by fracking — is one.

Climate change is a much bigger one, as this Boston Review essay notes in passing.

As far as Aronson's book on Sartre and Camus? Without staking absolutist positions on either side, Camus was in general right to reject the use of violence in social movements. And, per some critical reviews of his book (at that second link in the first paragraph), Aronson reportedly butters his bread clearly for Sartre, and for postmodernism that follows to some degree from him. You lost me there.

So Sharon Hill is no longer a skeptic

Sharon Hill of I Doubt It has finally seen the light and is leaving movement skepticism or Skeptics™. She mostly gets the reasons right, though in calling out scientism she doesn't get into larger anti-philosophy attitudes among many Skeptics™ folks who aren't necessarily scientism types. That's you, Barb Drescher. Still haven't forgotten you and your UCSB ev psych-leaning friend.

Too bad Hill herself likely isn't apologizing for fostering the cult of Brian Dunning. Nor does she take note of the likes of me or former top notch Skeptics™paralleler Massimo Pigliucci calling out all the things she has, and more, more than the five years ago that she says was the bottom of the movement.

Beyond her personal role in the sullying of the movement skepticism brand, she's apparently not aware of Jeff Wagg and Naomi Baker's even bigger black eye.

Nor does she look beyond tribalism at other issues involved — money and power. When one makes more than $100,000 a year for running a fairly small nonprofit, oh, like some California libertarian-neoliberal guy and the James Randi Educational Foundation, but not to name names, one has a vested interest in promoting both the brand and the tribalism used to keep it propped up.

Her own part in rebranding I guess includes dumping the old I Doubt It blog for her new website.

That said, there's other funniness in her "I'm not a Skeptic" schtick. She says that movement skepticism isn't hip enough on technology. Really? So, skepticsm is about marketing as much as anything, then? Does she now have a YouTube channel? A "brand"?

It's also funny to see her lack of skepticism toward attention whore Bill Nye and the allegedly "hands on" Neil DeGrasse Tyson, of whom the first allegations against him were already floating around at this time.

If funerals are for the living, I shall not attend: Thoughts, poetry, Schnittke

If funerals are for the living, what then when the living, or one of the living, doesn't want to do to the funeral of a dead relative?

My uncle died a couple of days ago. My dad had the one sister and no brothers, and my mom was an only, so I have just his sister and her husband, the dead uncle as aunts and uncles. The funeral is Tuesday. I could surely get off work, but I am not interested.

I semi-swore to myself after my mom's death, at her funeral, that I would never need to see my oldest brother again, for various reasons. I put the issues of deaths of siblings out of mind as being decades in the future, barring accidents or early cancer or similar.

But, I forgot about aunt and uncle, and now he is dead.

And I don't want to go, and not just because he's is surely going to be there.

I also semi-swore to myself that, other than for possible courtesy visits to church when visiting my sister and her minister husband, that I never would set foot in a church again except to attend a concert or other artistic event.

I have no desire to go there, and, at a minimum, to be a hypocrite, and, at a maximum, be proselytized by my aunt, or her daughter (both former parochial school teachers), or my oldest or second-oldest brothers, with the likelihood from greatest to least being in that order. Years ago, my aunt sent me an Easter card that, in not so few of words, said "You know it's true," about fundamentalist Easter beliefs. A religious funeral among conservative Lutheran Christians is only likely to bring that all to the surface, not to mention that, pre-deconversion, I had been to her church umpteen times and some oldsters there may still know me.

No desire.

If funerals are for the living, I'm not going.

I then, with this adapted from handwritten journaling, thought about a poem. I had been thinking about writing one this afternoon. Hadn't sat down to do that.

Then, just after finishing up these notes, this extended haiku started to work its way out.

Death is for the dead
And life is for the living.
So don't fence me in.

Better yet, I won't
Fence myself by attending;
We're all better off.

Namaste for all —
A word that might well offend
Some others itself.

I touched dad's cold skin,
Satisfied that dead is dead
And shall remain so.

Schnittke's Requiem
Challenges old conventions;
Death is chaotic.

Emotional wounds
I shall not give, nor receive.
They will still result.

We will drift further.
I accept that is the price
Of preservation.

Not the first poem in this general vein. I wrote in the summer of 2017 about a dying secularist friend, and what to say to him, or not.

Does Texas really have that many atheists?

Near the end of its latest poll on the Beto O'Rourke-Ted Cruz Senate Race in Texas, Lyceum reports on the background of respondents, as most in-depth polls do.

There's this, on page 11: NINE percent claim to be atheist or agnostic. That's more than twice as many as who reported as Muslim. Throw out the 13 percent who were either "didn't know" (really?) or "refused," and you're at a little over 10 percent.

Really?

That said, counting 22 percent as either unaligned or third party, Lyceum claimed respondents were otherwise split, 39 percent each on Doinks and Rethugs.

Really?

But, let's get back to those atheists and agnostics.

I'm quite familiar with people misusing these terms to really mean "spiritual but not religious," or "irreligious vis-a-vis organized religion." (I experienced that very personally on Match.com. That particular conversation ended abruptly when the woman at the other end found out what atheism actually means.)

Let's say half our 10 percent falls there.

That's still 5 percent atheist or agnostic.

Let's say that 8 percentage points of the 13 percent refusniks are "nones," as are all 9 percent, in the original number, of alleged atheists or agnostics. Then, one-sixth of Texans are "nones."

That leads me to a piece by Psy Post. Until Friday, it seemed to me to be a pretty good psychology popularization blog and website. John Horgan is among its Twitter followers.

But then it blared: You live longer if you're religious.

Without saying that all we have on that is statistical correlation, not causal correlation, and without, in the western tradition, comparing today's US to today's Europe on that. (Well, it did kind of say that, but after the "blaring.")

Given that the power of intercessory prayer has been disproven by double blinded studies, in fact, we can say that almost certainly, it is NOT a causal correlation.

Add to that the fact that, especially in small towns, "church" and non-church general religious affiliation adds a degree of "community" to life for many people, especially in a place like red-state Texas. Also note that, especially in smaller communities, for those in need, many food banks and other forms of charitable outreach are church-based, or if not so explicit, at least religiously themed.

The only way to do a halfway scientific version of such a survey would be to look at churched vs unchurched people who are both also members of other organizations, like Rotary, Kiwanis, etc. And, you'd have to use more than obits. You'd have to use longitudinal time management research to confirm how often said people actually attended both churches and their social clubs.

And, there's been plenty of empirical research on the reality of a god already.

Speaking of empirical matters, we do also know that, by percentage of respective ethnic groups, more of those atheists are white than black or hispanic, but we also know that young blacks are consciously starting to catch up on leaving church, in part because African-Americans are finding more "secular" leaders willing to speak on "spiritual" issues. Like LeBron. Or Kaepernick. This is even as Congressional Black Caucus leader Jim Clyburn will suck up to Trump as much as those black ministers, to avoid churches paying new taxes.

Anyway, back to the original.

I highly doubt 10 percent of Texans are atheists or agnostics. I think there's probably a mix of bad polling methodology and "nones" using either "atheist" or "agnostic" as a synonym for "irreligious."

Well, stop it!

Some philosophers are more equally wrong than others

I like Massimo Pigluicci a lot. He makes philosophical issues accessible to the general public, and he covers a variety of issues. We agree on a lot of issues, like ev psych, will, fairly much on volition and more.

That said, I can't let a comment on this post by Dan Kaufman go without a response. And, since Massimo has twice refused to post moderately (but no more than that) snarky comments by me about Dan's comment, I shall go in more depth, and higher or lower snark, here.

Yes, it's Massimo's blog and he has the right to moderate comments as he pleases. And, this is my blog, and I have the right to write posts as I please. And, beyond evolutionary biology's tit for tat of reciprocal altruism, done subconsciously, on a number of social interactions, I practice it conscientiously.

Anyway, here's the comment, rather the first from that post:

Philip, your reply is a dodge. You claimed that mathematics is empirical. I pointed out that this would entail that mathematical statements are probabilistic, which they clearly are not. Simple modus tollens. To which you reply “it’s random.” 

No one ever died from admitting they were wrong about something. Why not give it a try?

Emphasis on the second graf is mine, because that's what this is about.

First of all, other than a British astronomer named Coel and a Canadian confusednik named Garth, not currently commenting on posts, and DM, not a total favorite of Massimo's either. NOBODY among past or current regular commenters has more difficulty admitting they're wrong than Dan. Dan is right a lot more often than them, but, when he's wrong, he doubles down on it as much as them.

And, Massimo knows that. (Or at least, believes something close to that.) I can mention specific issues, the biggest in my mind being that Dan rejects medical science's claim — and has done so on Massimo's blog — as to what constitutes one standard drink of an alcoholic beverage.

Hence my riff on Orwell's "Animal Farm" and Dan as Napoleon. It's part of why I stopped writing for Dan's site after a couple of posts. I disagreed with the editing-for-content and direction on my second piece and knew it wasn't something he's let me win, or even get closer to 50-50.

If Massimo is going to moderate posts over this issue, then why not start by editing Dan's to remove that second paragraph? Or keep it from being posted in the first place?

And, he let Dan and Philip have a 4-5 comment back-and-forth before that. So, my one denied comment really can't be that much worse in lack of contribution than their original back-and-forth.

(For the wonderers, both of my would-be comments did a pull-quote on Dan's second graf. In the first, I then said "posted without further comment." In the second, I said something about this being similar to "electric" comment of a week or two back. (Dan's blog is The Electric Agora.)

For Philip, it's not a matter of whether he was right or wrong on the particular back-and-forth. (I think he was pretty much wrong, myself, per Dan's first graf.) It was Dan's ... well, Dan's tacit hypocrisy. "Pots and kettles" come to mind. And, nobody else challenged him on it — or, at least, Massimo allowed nobody (else) to challenge him.

I tried again, on Massimo's next blog post. Again, no soap.

And, on a third post, where Dan was clearly wrong, and has been wrong in the past — what constitutes alcohol abuse and similar.

Calling people who regularly drink more than 3.5 drinks a day alcoholics is calling them exactly what they are. They are addicts, just as smokers or drug users are.
= = =
What a load of nonsense. Someone who has a beer with lunch and two glasses of wine with dinner is an alcoholic? If so, the term is useless to make any characterization that would be of any interest to any productive purpose.

And, Massimo even knows, via old convo on Google+, my thoughts on this issue. And he hasn't explicitly disagreed with Dan's wrongness.

And, June 27, another blog post where Massimo didn't post a comment about me being critical of Dan.

Also, June 29, where Massimo truncated a comment of mine in editing to omit:

Funny how Dan keeps wanting to “drop it,” and then keeps commenting. I think St. Ludwig of Wittgenstein would have an observation about that use of language.

And, since Dan is "Mr. Wittgenstein" I'll save that for the future. 

So, there you go, Massimo. If you won't let me hoist Dan by his own petard over there, I'll still do it here.

And make this my featured post, now that I have a pic to go with.

JUDAS THE SON OF GOD

I am the Son of God.

I was born, I saw and I fell;

That last part due to mythmakers

Who rejected my message.

My name was Judas, Son of God.

The lies against my name are many.

Some claim I was demon-seized

And sold the man named Jesus

For 30 pieces of silver.

Others say I was his cosmic twin,

Judas Didymus Thomas

Later denigrated to move the force

To the one and only.

Others yet call me Ormazd

To his Ahriman,

The dark side of a dualistic god.

And others still a ???

Fated to play out a role;

A reasoning pawn in a cosmic play.

All are wrong.

Rather —

I was the one, the Monogenetes,

I was the Son of God, the Word made flesh.

Am I jealous of the Nazarene?

But of course. I am the Word made flesh.

With good motive — emotions no less dark

Than my father Yahweh had against Sodom

And against the Amalekites, then against Saul.

I am the Son of God.

I am.

Socrates moves further down the overrated philosophers list

I've blogged before about overrated philosophers, and why Socrates' earns his place on the list. And I've explained that there's the myth vs. the reality, and my moniker is based on the myth.

Philosopher Massimo Pigliucci, in the latest installment of his Book Club extended blogging series, is tackling Plato's early dialogues in the Penguin Classics series. Well, in this intro to the book initial post in the series, he's sharpened exactly what I think about Socrates and why, therefore, he's overrated.

First, we have the problem of the "historic Socrates." Just like the historic Jesus. I disagree with the likes of Gregory Vlastos as to just how much Socrates can be untangled from Plato, just like it's questionable how much we can untangle a historic Jesus from a New Testament and early Christianity as it evolved down to us today largely based on the weighty shadow of Paul.

To the degree we can disentangle, I think the Socrates of the middle dialogues is already pretty much a Platonic mouthpiece.

Next, what about the other people who sketch him? Throw away Xenophon, but I'm still half convinced or more than Aristophanes was at least half right in depicting him as a semi-Sophist himself. Certainly, in many of his dialogues, Socrates does little more than eristic type arguments designed to refute Sophists – or strawmen versions (remember, other than Gorgias, we have almost no extant writings of them) — without saying "I therefore say virtue is Y," rather than just letting them appear to founder.

I told Massimo about that, too;

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I know that in many cases, Socratic answers are implied from Socratic questioning. But, I think Plato doesn’t spell this out so that Socratic reasoning doesn’t get subjected to its own elenchus. 

It’s like a trial, per the parallels, where you don’t have one attorney do a formal closing statement — so that the other one can’t make his or her own closing statement! And, yes, I mean that, too. Because, if Plato as the author gave the ancient equivalent of a semi-formal, stipulative closing argument to Socrates, in some cases, his straw men would look too obvious. While, among the Sophists, we only have writings from Gorgias today, except for scraps, circa 2400 BCE, all the major Sophists had their own books and pamphlets out, of course. In other words, holding a thumb on the scale might work, but three whole fingers would be overkill. Doing it this way? “Made the stronger argument the better,” at least for Plato’s students.

It's very convenient. And, to extend a biblical parallel, that may be part of why Mark, like Philostratus' "Life of Apollonius," doesn't have actual resurrection appearances.

I then realized more about Socrates as an elitist. I do think Izzy Stone projected too much 20th century America into his take on Socrates as an elitist, and didn't look at Athenian, or Hellenic, context.

First, Athens wasn't the only Greek city, or colony, to at least dabble in democracy at this time. Corinth and Syracuse are two other examples. Take note that all three were cities with large revenues from trade.

Note second that Sophists claimed to be able to teach one how to succeed well at "all things polis."

The old, landed gentleman had the time to learn this on his own. The equivalent of "nouveau riche" did not. But, since money can be timelike at times, to reverse a cliche, they would certainly pay for a crash course on operating in the ekklesia, the boule and the court – even if as part of a group rather than one-on-one.

Note that the Sophists weren't teaching in Athens alone. They were visiting other cities. They probably targeted cities like Corinth and Syracuse that were having similar large socio-political shifts.

Sure they were teaching how to make the stronger argument better. Don't tell me that most of Socrates' peers in Athens' "ancien regime" didn't do similar. Socrates' elenchus just has a better press.

Socrates, in this sense, strikes me as a mid-1800s British Tory landed gentleman caviling against Whig merchants seeking more political, and social, power. Remember that Britain passed its first political reform bill in the 1830s AND started shifting toward free trade at that time, both of which benefited these Liberal-leaning merchants. Disraeli's bid to further expand the electorate in the 1860s was a direct bid for more everyday voters to join the Conservatives to offset this.

Finally, there's the broad picture of Socrates that Plato paints. In a different way, he looks like as much a strawman as most of his Sophist (and other) opponents. That's especially true when you factor in what Plato said about how he was Athens and why – and the Oracle of Delphi saying that.

Add in Socrates' claim to have been motivated by his personal daimon since childhood, and you get someone who comes off as smarmy at a minimum and sanctimonious at a max.

Here's my take on that, befitting for an Existential Comics strip, of a boiled-down version of Socratic dialog:

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Socrates: Hey, Gorgias, do you know what the oracle at Delphi said about me?
Gorgias: No, what?
Socrates: That I’m the wisest man in Athens.
Gorgias: Really?
Soc: Of course, I’m far to humble to believe that, at least not without testing it.
Gor; Of course not.
Soc: So, I figured I would ask others, people whom I and society deem wise, what they know about things like virtue and goodness.
Gor: I see.
Soc: So, that’s why I’m talking to you now.
Gor: OK, so what would you like to talk about.
Soc: Can you tell me what you understand virtue to be?
Gor: Virtue is A.
Soc: Nope.
Gor: Virtue is B.
Soc: Nope.
Gor: Virtue is C.
Soc: Nope.
Gor: Virtue is D.
Soc: Nope.
Gor: I give up.
Soc: You know, I’ve talked to 14 other philosophers, Sophists and non-Sophists alike. You know what else, Gorgias?
Gor: NO, I don’t know what else, Socrates.
Soc: Glad you asked back. Every conversation has ended this same way.
Soc; You know what that means, Gorgias?
Gor: NO, I DON”T know what that means, Socrates.
Soc: I guess I am the wisest man in Athens. I at least admit what I don’t know.
Soc; And you know why?
Gor: NO, I DON”T know why, Socrates.
Soc; Because, from childhood, I’ve been guided by this wonderous inner daimon, to whom I owe my ultimate authority.

Smary at the least? Sanctimonious? Insufferable even? At least somewhat, and at times?

If the Platonic caricature is halfway close to reality, I don’t understand why Socrates wasn’t hauled up on charges earlier. Perhaps he was tolerated ‘on sufferance,’ to be mocked by an Aristophanes and others, until the loss of the Peloponnesian War and the two coups made people finally admit they were that tired of him.