Old Email Archive

digest 1998-11-10 #001.txt

Monday

From: "Society for Literature & Science" 

Daily SLS Email Digest
-> Re: the truth in plain language, epistemological confidence
by duemer@clarkson.edu
-> Gainsville
by Ann Weinstone 
----------------------------------------------------------------------
Date: 9 Nov 1998 18:49:33 -0800
From: duemer@clarkson.edu
Subject: Re: the truth in plain language, epistemological confidence
Now that I'm back from SLS in Gainseville, and now that I've filtered
out a
hundred and fifty irrelevant e-mails, I want to take the opportunity to
respond to
Bill and to Wayne.
I initially posted John Moore's "eight characteristics of
science" in order to
ask, not for equivalence, but whether some such list was even possible
for the
humanities. Whether it is possible in principle to construct such a list
for the
humanities, or not, it would be an interesting exercise to make the
attempt. Much
of the humanities comes in the form of cultural critique, so perhaps
most of the
characteristics would be cast in the negative. It is another question
altogether,
I think, whether such a list might be put together for the arts--perhaps
since
both art and science employ technique, even if technique is not the
central issue,
there would be some overlap.
In Gainesville on Friday I gave a paper called "The Truth in Plain
Language," in
which I suggested that contemporary poets often employ subversive,
counterattacking, "weapons of the weak" in responding to the
language in which the
truth claims of contemporary science are usually cast. I used the
earlier-posted
quotation from The Sciences about the need to communicate "the
truth in plain
language" to the poorly educated general public.
I still think the remark is arrogant, but worse, it is wrong about the
epistemology of language. In short, there is no such thing as
"plain language,"
though scientists from Bacon on have claimed that everything would be
hunky dory
if only we could say exactly what we mean. The poets provide the
corrective--we
can only negotiate with the language in an attempt to be intelligible;
furthermore, scientists, like everybody else, only create truth
(meaning)
collectively, through the sustaining medium of shared language. When
scientists
promulgate an impoverished view of the world because they misunderstand
the nature
of language, it is understandable that the much maligned general public
will turn
to belief in alien abductions, satanic cults, or Jesus.
Everdell@aol.com wrote:
> Wayne Miller strongly suggests that:  < disciplines and across
education classes impossible is not the subject matter
> itself, but the interest of each class in itself?>>
>
> and adds, specifically, the elegant call to humanists to
internalize:
> < opposition to ignorance!) exhibited by all classes of people,
when confronted
> with self-interest on the one hand, and the unknown on the
other.>>
>
> I blame the creation of such classes in the first place by default:
 the
> failure to educate in a democratic manner, in the interests of a
majority, and
> with a responsibility to the public interest.  Too many who have
made some
> little progress in remedying their own ignorance are willing to
abandon the
> public, as well as those in other disciplines, by not condensing
what they
> know that they judge important and trying in good faith to pass it
on.
>
> I suspect that a rigorously logical argument could be made that the
amount of
> 'stuff worth knowing' is infinite; but even if it were only very
large, the
> requirement to condense and edit would be logically imperative.  So
every
> knower condenses and edits, perhaps even those who are content with
learned
> silence.  But behind every condensation and editing there are
philosophical
> premises, assumptions, probably even narratives (ordinary or
"grand master").
> Epistemological confidence for people who have learned a lot, I
think,
> consists in rejecting the nihilist premise that nothing they have
learned is
> true, and then condensing and editing it responsibly, even when
they know the
> job could be done differently.  One who makes a cheatsheet or a
Cliff's Notes
> should be able, on call, to distinguish them from other objects of
knowledge
> that are less condensed.
>
> This I'd call teaching, and its outcome, education.  Ignorance, on
the other
> hand, is the condition for which education is the palliative, the
one all of
> us suffer from, and must continue to suffer from, especially if the
amount of
> 'stuff worth knowing' is indeed infinite.  Ignorance of reading I'd
say is
> especially insufferable since it is the precondition of most other
learning,
> not to mention the precondition of social power.
>
> So, to Wayne's happily shared 2 cents I happily add my own.  Pretty
soon it
> may add up to real money.
>
> -Bill Everdell, Brooklyn
>
> To quote Wayne's two points:
>
> <<1) the recent short list about the principles of science
and its lack of
> equivalence among humanists is hardly to the point, and that it
elides large
> differences among scientific branches in notions of
"adequacy" of method and
> proof; indeed, that if one were in fact to chart a trajectory of
"adequacy"
> from, say, math to physics to chemistry to microbiology to
evolutionary
> biology to psychology to social sciences to, say, humanities, one
would have
> to agree that the subject matter of the humanities may be wronged
by a
> cheatsheet of idealized rules?
>
> 2) humanists hide behind their overly elaborate rhetorics in an
effort not to
> admit their own sense of inadequacy over against the scientific
juggernaut --
> without really internalizing the fact that human insight is
necessary to
> correct the blindness (in opposition to ignorance!) exhibited by
all classes
> of people, when confronted with self-interest on the one hand, and
the unknown
> on the other.>>
- --
======================
Joseph Duemer
School of Liberal Arts, box 5750
Clarkson University
Potsdam NY 13699
315.268.3967
duemer@polaris.clarkson.edu
======================
STOP RIGHT WING TERRORISM AGAINST
GAYS AND PRO-CHOICE DOCTORS
----------------------------------------------------------------------
Date: 9 Nov 1998 19:22:31 -0800
From: Ann Weinstone 
Subject: Gainsville
Anyone feel like providing news of events in Gainesville for those of
us
who weren't there?
Ann Weinstone
Program in Modern Thought and Literature
Building 250
Stanford University
Stanford, California 94305-2020
e-mail:         weinstne@leland.stanford.edu
office:         650.725.1973
fax:    650.723.1895