00:00:30.000 This episode of Topcast begins now with this preamble.
00:00:42.520 And it's a preamble to a rather long-winded introduction before we even get to some readings
00:00:48.880 Today's episode explains the concept of bad philosophy.
00:00:52.760 And as we will come to see, bad philosophy is that set of ideas that actively prevents
00:01:00.240 It is all about trying to enforce ways and means of shutting down the asking of questions
00:01:04.520 or deliberately putting artificial obstacles in the way of critically and rationally evaluating
00:01:10.680 Now, as I was making my usual introduction to this episode, which I will play for you shortly,
00:01:16.360 I realized upon going back to listen to it, I was assuming a little too much when it comes
00:01:21.560 to bad philosophy, the bad turns that have happened with respect to philosophy, especially
00:01:26.600 over recent years, I want to flesh out those a little more here and now, with just a little
00:01:32.160 summary about these bad turns and where to go to find out more, some additional reading
00:01:38.720 Now, the first of these bad turns that I mention is what's known as the Socal Hooks.
00:01:44.040 The Socal Hooks, or the Socal Affair, was a turning point of sorts in the recent history
00:01:49.880 Alan Socal, after whom the Socal Hooks is named, is a physicist and a mathematician who
00:01:55.000 was concerned that the standards of scholarship in some areas of philosophy, it was
00:01:59.600 specifically concerned though, sub-parts have put it euphemistically.
00:02:03.920 At the other extreme, you might describe what was going on in philosophy and what he was
00:02:07.960 worried about as a kind of academic fraud and the fact that this academic fraud has become
00:02:14.160 the norm in some areas of philosophy and it has a lot of influence.
00:02:18.120 Now, in short, these areas of philosophy that people are concerned about are sometimes
00:02:25.800 There's a lot of other names for them, but that's an umbrella term.
00:02:29.160 And the key feature for outsiders to philosophy to notice about post-modern philosophy is that
00:02:37.920 Now, of course, this is true of many academic disciplines.
00:02:41.080 It's true of certain aspects of physics, any area of expertise in science, parts of medicine.
00:02:46.880 So when you get to the upper levels of expertise in any area, you're going to find
00:02:55.760 But there's a difference between honestly trying to explain things clearly using this
00:03:01.400 specialist language of a particular subject and dishonestly representing what's going on
00:03:07.480 in a subject area, using the language of some other subject area.
00:03:12.000 If that sounds confusing, well, we need to see an example in action.
00:03:16.480 What's so cool was concerned about and what many of us are concerned about is the rather
00:03:21.680 liberal use of terminology taken from the hard sciences and from mathematics and then
00:03:28.920 repurposed for use in a completely different area in a rather dishonest way to obscure
00:03:38.480 So for example, here's something that is taken seriously by some post-modernists.
00:03:47.960 It's been published, it's an example of post-modern philosophy.
00:03:56.640 Thus by calculating that signification according to the algebraic method used here, namely
00:04:02.400 S-signifier over S-signifier equals S-aceted statement with S is equal to minus 1, produces
00:04:11.480 So this is what the post-modernist philosopher Jacques Lacarne wrote.
00:04:19.320 But even out of its context, we should be able to, if we are familiar with mathematics,
00:04:25.920 attempt to understand at least some part of it.
00:04:29.160 And there's nothing there that has anything to do with mathematics.
00:04:32.600 Despite the fact it's couched in terms of mathematical formalism,
00:04:41.520 Perhaps it's unfair just to pull out that weird sounding thing and claim that all post-modernism
00:04:50.320 Here's something written by the French post-modernist, Borradard.
00:04:54.000 And he wrote, perhaps history itself has to be regarded as a chaotic formation
00:04:59.280 in which acceleration puts an end to linearity and the turbulence created by acceleration
00:05:03.920 deflect history definitively from its end just as such turbulence distances
00:05:12.000 Now, the point about that passage is yes, it's got inpenetrable texts.
00:05:20.720 And attempting to extract any useful information from it is almost impossible.
00:05:29.680 It has taken terms from physics, chaotic formation, acceleration.
00:05:35.520 And from mathematics, linearity, and from physics again, turbulence.
00:05:46.880 Now, I'm not going to provide lots of examples of this.
00:05:49.760 Anyone who's interested can nearly go and look up post-modernism
00:05:52.960 and examples of post-modernist writing from some of the greats.
00:05:56.240 Some other names might be Jacques Derrida, Michelle Foucault.
00:06:03.520 And one only needs to take a short look at anything that these guys produce
00:06:07.520 to notice that it really, there's not much there.
00:06:16.800 But it's more akin to poetry than actual philosophy.
00:06:20.640 Now, many people before Sokol had of course noticed this.
00:06:23.680 Many had wondered how it is that such things got published in official journals.
00:06:28.480 And they were published in official academic journals.
00:06:31.360 What Sokol did that was special and different and was the first,
00:06:37.040 was the calling out of the emperor as having no clothes.
00:06:42.960 So he went to the trouble of writing a post-modernist text.
00:06:47.600 He understood the science and he decided to deliberately parody
00:06:51.840 the style of writing that went on in some of these journals.
00:06:55.200 And so the result of his hoax of his parody was to produce this paper,
00:07:02.720 towards a transformative hermeneutics of quantum gravity.
00:07:10.720 parody as it was, was not detected as nonsense or parody by the reviewers.
00:07:17.040 And it was submitted to a journal called social text.
00:07:21.040 Accepted for publication and ultimately published.
00:07:24.320 So it was taken seriously by some post-modern philosophers,
00:07:27.760 even though it was deliberately written as a parody.
00:07:30.960 And even to this day it is still defended by some as actually being authentic
00:07:40.800 that the circle hoax did not fully demonstrate the poverty of post-modern philosophy.
00:07:46.080 Some say it did name and demonstrate the poverty of post-modern philosophy
00:07:51.280 And people are committed now to still take post-modernism seriously.
00:07:55.120 In fact, more so than at the time of the circle hoax.
00:07:57.760 The circle hoax did not accomplish what many of us hoped it would.
00:08:03.600 But if you're watching this or listening to this,
00:08:08.800 Who cares if these people in their ivory towers want to talk nonsense?
00:08:14.000 Aside from the fact that taxpayer money and funding goes to these universities
00:08:18.640 and these people remain employed not by contributing things to society.
00:08:24.000 You're contributing actual knowledge but by being engaged in a kind of racket
00:08:32.640 Like after all, some people are of course interested
00:08:35.760 and I've turned for example the study of Harry Potter
00:08:41.680 But there is something far more sinister at work with post-modernism.
00:08:46.000 Post-modern writing and its explicit deliberate attack on clarity
00:08:52.560 comes from a deeper dogma about the possibility of even speaking clearly
00:08:58.800 And the reason for this is that the doctrine of post-modernism
00:09:02.880 is about denying the fact that there is anything to speak clearly about.
00:09:07.680 There is no objective truth on the theories and doctrines of post-modernism.
00:09:13.040 And we'll come to some consequences about that.
00:09:15.600 Now, cycle really did disrobe post-modernism back in the 90s and the mid-90s.
00:09:20.640 And personally that was a key time for me because I was just entering university
00:09:26.400 So I was well aware of the debate even back then.
00:09:29.520 And I remember feeling relieved that there was a hero among the scientists
00:09:33.760 who were standing up to this nonsense in academia and philosophy in particular.
00:09:42.640 everyone that everyone would then admit that the emperor had been called out.
00:09:47.280 And there was this poverty of content in post-modernism
00:09:50.800 and post-modern type thinking and that the philosophy itself was bad.
00:09:56.080 But I was wrong in my hopes, at least at that stage and up until now,
00:10:00.320 because ever since my hopes have been dashed, things haven't gotten better,
00:10:07.600 They've gotten worse in the media, they've gotten worse in education,
00:10:11.840 And the rate at which bad ideas are being produced in academia
00:10:17.920 The rate at which bad ideas are being produced and promoted
00:10:24.800 schools, the rate of that production of bad ideas is accelerating.
00:10:30.160 And I mean bad ideas, not merely false ideas, bad ideas.
00:10:38.880 of science of the enlightenment, of reason itself,
00:10:48.080 Now happily, almost in lockstep with the rate at which
00:10:52.080 these bad ideas have increased in terms of their apparent popularity
00:10:58.080 and the rate at which they're being promoted to all spheres of society
00:11:08.080 A coalition of people coming up and standing together
00:11:14.080 what could possibly only be described as a new religion.
00:11:23.080 but one of the best and most articulate amongst these thinkers
00:11:26.080 amongst these public intellectuals is Brett Weinstein.
00:11:29.080 Now I've personally criticized Brett on some technical
00:11:40.080 I can only engage in that criticism of Brett Weinstein
00:11:43.080 because I do spend a lot of time listening to him
00:11:52.080 how well he articulates some of these problems.
00:11:57.080 to do with bad philosophy, bad certain types of bad science
00:12:02.080 is brilliant because he himself is a brilliant thinker.
00:12:04.080 He's very courageous and I've found him prescient
00:12:15.080 I'm just going to mention three of his fellow travellers
00:12:20.080 Fellow travellers in the battle against the new postmodernism.
00:12:28.080 this denial of the possibility of objective knowledge,
00:12:33.080 that alone merely the denial of objective morality.
00:12:38.080 and that those ideas are still the underlying doctrine
00:12:47.080 which has begun to push the idea that, for example,
00:12:55.080 to some extent corrupt and cannot possibly be objective
00:12:58.080 and it's certainly the opinion of many of these postmodernists
00:13:06.080 than it is about finding the truth about the physical world.
00:13:09.080 In other words, people who speak like this think that
00:13:36.080 and that this is what produces scientific knowledge
00:13:39.080 and it's because certain people that have traditionally had power
00:13:46.080 that this is what is the best theory in science,
00:13:51.080 Now today in the 2010s and now into the early 2020s,
00:14:04.080 gender studies, some forms of literary and media studies,
00:14:07.080 some of the humanities and some of the social sciences
00:14:12.080 which has broadly been described by some of these academics
00:14:20.080 What postmodernism today has evolved into in some places
00:14:23.080 is a sole focus upon power relationships between people.
00:14:30.080 those groups of people who have historically held power
00:14:41.080 because it was produced by the so-called oppressor class.
00:14:45.080 The consequence is today that people who appear
00:14:56.080 individuals today that are related to those people in some way,
00:15:04.080 probable for and benefiting from those illegitimate structures.
00:15:09.080 And that would include the knowledge that they produce
00:15:11.080 or they're claimed to be producing objective knowledge.
00:15:14.080 Now many others have spoken far more eloquently about obvious,
00:15:18.080 but the point before us now is about the philosophy on which
00:15:28.080 we have yet again academic journals publishing papers
00:15:37.080 poorly-phrased, and even more poorly-researched.
00:16:21.080 And they submitted absolutely ridiculous papers
00:16:31.080 and various other journals that they've described
00:16:35.080 Now, I say that these were absolutely ridiculous,
00:16:55.080 Despite the fact that they were ridiculous and hilarious,
00:17:18.080 and just go to Google and Google's so-called squared,
00:17:26.080 Philosophers really do tend to have the ear of people
00:17:37.080 have the ear of people who write school curricula.
00:17:49.080 are taught things that are written by people in committees.
00:17:54.080 I know this, I've been on some of these committees,
00:18:14.080 That's a good way to change society from the ground up.
00:18:32.080 and they've got a PhD and the title of professor,
00:18:35.080 and if they're interviewed about important issues,
00:18:38.080 like racism or discrimination or the law or science,
00:19:03.080 it can cause people to swiftly turn to the people
00:19:05.080 who've got genuine knowledge and ability capability
00:19:33.080 over matters they don't really have much business in.
00:19:36.080 Or where the expert's expertise is merely illusory.
00:19:41.080 They're not really experts because there's no actual subject
00:19:54.080 But of course it should be media or the media's,
00:19:57.080 and indeed everyone's responsibility to critically assess
00:20:05.080 and which on the other hand are attempting to make
00:20:16.080 where there have not been rights for many years,
00:20:27.080 There is to some extent a tradition of calling for revolutions.
00:20:31.080 But this latest one has a somewhat different flavour.
00:20:38.080 It's had a different flavour to anything that's happened
00:20:45.080 the present traditions, cultures and institutions
00:20:50.080 that exist today in what in the beginning of infinity sense
00:20:58.080 And the enlightenment is itself being described
00:21:13.080 These calls for revolution don't come from nowhere.
00:21:38.080 Before I get to the introduction of days episode
00:21:40.080 I just want to play a short clip of the brilliant
00:21:46.080 So early 2019 this is cast your mind back before Corona
00:21:51.080 before some of the worst riots that were happening
00:22:02.080 the tearing down of monuments, the defacing of things.
00:22:13.080 where he was working as a professor of biology,
00:22:40.080 and every time I'm invited I make the same point
00:22:45.080 and this is only tangentially about college campuses.
00:22:54.080 And college campuses may be the first dramatic battle
00:23:02.080 It's already found its way into the tech sector.
00:23:05.080 It's going to find its way to the highest levels
00:23:13.080 the ability of civilization to continue to function.
00:23:37.080 that act as a kind of analytical affirmative action
00:23:52.080 that to the extent that they are allowed to hold sway
00:26:03.080 that runs throughout English syllabi, for example.
00:27:13.080 about to read about bad philosophy is so important right now
00:27:28.080 and until bad philosophy is no longer on the ascendancy
00:27:31.080 intellectual types have to continue to call it out
00:27:53.080 to the dominant political narrative that exists.
00:27:56.080 It has a chilling effect on the freedom of speech.
00:28:27.080 What happened to him isn't part of my day to day.
00:28:38.080 people shouting at each other without listening to each other
00:28:47.080 It's not something that affects me each and every day.
00:29:06.080 than ever before, especially in the West in developed countries.
00:29:31.080 parochial concerns that are just happening right now
00:29:44.080 People are writing because they say nothing has changed.
00:30:55.080 but rather something more upstream, so to speak,
00:31:05.080 It's not merely authoritarians versus libertarians.
00:31:13.080 that holds whether or not there's a possibility
00:31:26.080 whether or not that can help resolve differences.
00:31:32.080 Whether we should talk those differences through.
00:31:43.080 and the next chapter is going to allow us to do this.
00:31:52.080 And for that, I'm going to change it in yellow.
00:32:20.080 It's a personal one for me because it brings together
00:32:32.080 for undergraduates who take on a degree in physics
00:32:39.080 for an undergraduate who takes on philosophy at university.
00:32:48.080 I just found myself nodding the entire time going,
00:33:03.080 not least of which was the quantum mechanics material,
00:33:08.080 And I was disappointed in the way it was presented at university
00:33:33.080 was whether or not you could basically do maths tests
00:33:37.080 Okay, there was less in terms of trying to explain
00:33:41.080 what was actually going on with many of the experiments.
00:33:44.080 And philosophy was disappointing for a whole different set of reasons.
00:33:48.080 Obviously, there's no numerical problems that need to be solved there.
00:33:51.080 However, there's a new kind of vocabulary that needs to be used.
00:33:55.080 And what I found was that as I went through undergraduate philosophy,
00:34:03.080 It was just more and more difficult to understand
00:34:10.080 the lecturers, or the books that we were, or the readings we were asked to undertake
00:34:22.080 and obvious that one was like feeling as though
00:34:34.080 that philosophy is a fairly worthless discipline at university.
00:34:38.080 And to some extent, the rumors were indeed true.
00:34:42.080 Some watching this now might still wonder what the importance of philosophy is.
00:34:49.080 it garners possibly the least respect of any subject
00:34:56.080 we do hear people sort of tongue in cheek talking about certain kinds of dance,
00:35:02.080 and that these kind of degree programs are even more useless.
00:35:07.080 And we have to understand there are two ways in which to refer to philosophy.
00:35:13.080 the way in which it is presented at university,
00:35:16.080 and there is philosophy as it's actually done by good philosophers.
00:35:23.080 And I should say here right at the outset that I read very little Poppa at university.
00:35:33.080 Bachelor of Science, Philosophy of Science, any of my philosophy of science degree,
00:35:39.080 It wasn't until later that in countering David Deutsch's work,
00:35:43.080 that I realized there was this guy called Carl Poppa,
00:35:48.080 And it was then that I took up the reading of Carl Poppa outside of my university course.
00:35:53.080 And so, although I am in some sense credentialed in the philosophy of science,
00:35:58.080 none of the knowledge that I were very little of the knowledge that I gained at university,
00:36:02.080 actually makes me feel equipped to talk about the philosophy of science.
00:36:06.080 Instead, what makes me feel equipped to talk about the philosophy of science,
00:36:10.080 when I do, is the reading that I did beyond the university,
00:36:13.080 specifically the reading I did of Carl Poppa's work.
00:36:17.080 So the negative experience that I had with philosophy at university,
00:36:22.080 or largely had, I should say there were bright points.
00:36:25.080 I did read a lot of good philosophers and philosophies,
00:36:29.080 and I found it interesting as an intellectual exercise,
00:36:36.080 That kind of philosophy is like doing a crossword puzzle.
00:36:41.080 However, there was very little of practical use in many of the philosophers that I read.
00:36:52.080 Few of them were able to explain, for example, how it is that science worked,
00:36:59.080 Or what the difference between, let's say science and mathematics happened to be.
00:37:03.080 Or indeed, what the purpose of philosophy was in the first place.
00:37:07.080 All of these things are practical problems that for someone interested in science, mathematics, philosophy.
00:37:12.080 It would be interested in finding out concrete answers too.
00:37:15.080 Instead, some philosophers were kind of daydreamers, on the one hand,
00:37:21.080 or, well, let's just put it plainly, academic frauds on the other.
00:37:25.080 They were pretending to solve problems that were either not problems in the first place,
00:37:30.080 or hiding the fact that they were solving the problem, burying the problem,
00:37:38.080 And so, because there is this way of presenting philosophy at universities,
00:37:43.080 where we have certain philosophers who build up grand philosophical structures on the one hand,
00:37:55.080 Or on the other, these linguistic philosophers that were going to come to,
00:37:59.080 who were obscuring the real richness of the problems in philosophy,
00:38:03.080 behind all of this verbiage and new lexicon and weird words that they invent,
00:38:11.080 This is what a whole lot of philosophers have done traditionally, and continue to do.
00:38:16.080 That because of these two issues, philosophers difficult to understand on the one hand
00:38:21.080 and not really solving any problems, and philosophers hiding the ball
00:38:25.080 when it comes to their use of language and trying to hide the actual problems
00:38:33.080 Because we have this issue of academic, in academic philosophy,
00:38:37.080 quite rightly a bunch of people, especially scientific types, dismiss philosophy altogether,
00:38:43.080 because they look at what philosophy is as an academic discipline in many of the universities.
00:38:50.080 Probably not all, but certainly in the universities that I went through,
00:38:54.080 and one doesn't need to try hard with Google to find out that what subjects are offered to undergraduates,
00:39:02.080 especially at universities today, don't differ much from the kind of academic subjects
00:39:07.080 that were offered in philosophy 20 years ago, in some senses they've even gone downhill.
00:39:11.080 It's quite right that there are certain scientific types who say they've got no time for philosophy,
00:39:17.080 because they're interested in reality, so they say, in the nuts and bolts of how things work,
00:39:21.080 prominent public intellectuals like Neil deGrasse Tyson, Richard Dawkins,
00:39:26.080 they've made disparaging remarks over the years about philosophy,
00:39:31.080 and they can't really be blamed for this to a large extent,
00:39:35.080 because if their experience of academic philosophy is in speaking to certain academic philosophers,
00:39:42.080 or even perhaps students undertaking philosophy at university,
00:39:47.080 then they'll be left with the impression that it's an opaque, pointless exercise in gazing at one's navel,
00:39:56.080 But it's important to note that this idea that philosophy cannot be used to solve practical problems,
00:40:02.080 there has no practical use, that if you want to understand reality that science is the only real game in town,
00:40:10.080 it's important to understand that that position is a philosophy,
00:40:14.080 that these people who espouse those kind of sentiments,
00:40:18.080 that disparage philosophy as a discipline in its entirety,
00:40:22.080 not just the academic thing as it's taught at university,
00:40:28.080 that they have a philosophy in mind, they have a philosophy of reality,
00:40:32.080 they have a certain materialism one might imagine about how reality is organized,
00:40:38.080 that if you want to understand the nuts and bolts of reality,
00:40:41.080 that understanding science is the only way to go about that.
00:40:46.080 Of course, this closes them off to a whole bunch of other things,
00:40:50.080 things that are not, let's say, part of the physical universe,
00:40:54.080 that might be part of abstract reality, and we've talked about the reality of abstractions here in this series,
00:41:00.080 and David's talked about it in the beginning of infinity,
00:41:03.080 so we know that abstract entities exist, and that they have real effects in the world,
00:41:09.080 and there are certain kinds of abstract reality, abstract entities,
00:41:13.080 that only a philosophical understanding can help us to appreciate how those things work.
00:41:20.080 The idea that science is the only way in which we can understand reality as a whole is itself a philosophy,
00:41:29.080 and it's a claim about science without being a part of science,
00:41:33.080 so automatically anyone who makes such a claim that philosophy is useless,
00:41:37.080 or that philosophy isn't really needed, that science can do everything,
00:41:41.080 has made a philosophical claim, because it's not a claim from within science.
00:41:45.080 And today we've got a new kind of philosopher, and you kind of folk philosopher we might say,
00:41:51.080 one who claims that they never do philosophy, or don't do philosophy,
00:41:55.080 or pretend that they're not interested in philosophy because they've stepped beyond it,
00:42:00.080 they've evolved intellectually beyond what philosophy can possibly offer
00:42:05.080 to become meta in some way, they're meta philosophers, they're beyond philosophy.
00:42:11.080 There's a long tradition of this kind of thing as well.
00:42:14.080 The kind of thinker that asserts that the language in the words are barely sufficient
00:42:22.080 Now, there's certainly a truth to this in some ways.
00:42:26.080 There's, I speak a lot about in explicit knowledge, and David explains what in explicit knowledge is in the beginning of the infinity.
00:42:34.080 And so it is absolutely true that language cannot capture everything about reality
00:42:44.080 But some people elevate that notion, that very real problem, to a new philosophy,
00:42:50.080 and give themselves an excuse, I would argue, in not speaking clearly,
00:42:57.080 or not striving for clarity, and that they're used to obscure language,
00:43:01.080 or their use of neologisms, simply making up new words,
00:43:05.080 is explained by the fact that languages simply unable to do the job of conveying their deepest, most interesting thoughts to the world.
00:43:15.080 And so therefore, they have to explain using flowery language to the rest of us.
00:43:20.080 And that if you don't understand what the new flowery language really means,
00:43:25.080 then it's a deficiency on your part, not their part.
00:43:28.080 They're doing their best with the crude tools of language they have.
00:43:32.080 And so we see this, we've seen this with theologians traditionally.
00:43:40.080 and you'll typically get something that is quite complicated or mystical, difficult to understand.
00:43:46.080 And if you ask what that means, you'll get even more obscure mystical explanation.
00:43:53.080 And so the inexplicable is supposed to explain the inexplicable.
00:43:59.080 So when it comes to this idea that language struggles to explain the most complicated concepts and ideas that we have,
00:44:08.080 there's a truth there, but there's a difference between honestly trying to communicate clearly
00:44:15.080 and trying to get a complicated idea, trying to get that into the minds of other people
00:44:22.080 by using the simplest language that one can conjure in the moment.
00:44:29.080 And the antithesis of that, of having perhaps not a complicated idea but a very simple idea,
00:44:35.080 and then dressing that in very complicated sounding language,
00:44:41.080 so that it seems as though one has a deeper or more insightful point than one really does.
00:44:48.080 And I think there are dishonest actors in philosophy.
00:44:51.080 There's not many of them, but they're out there.
00:44:54.080 And when it comes to things like postmodernism, it's very difficult to tell at times
00:44:59.080 whether the person that you're speaking with, or communicating with,
00:45:04.080 who speaks in postmodernist type language or relatively slight language,
00:45:13.080 and think that there is something there that they're trying to explain,
00:45:17.080 whether they've been perhaps even inculcated or brainwashed to some extent
00:45:27.080 That's a possibility that they're honestly trying to convey the contents of their mind
00:45:34.080 using complicated sounded language that none of us can quite get a handle on.
00:45:39.080 Or on the other hand, they're simply pretending because there are cranks out there
00:45:44.080 and cranking a technical term of someone pretending to have knowledge that they don't actually have
00:45:50.080 or pretending to have confidence that they don't actually have
00:45:53.080 for a whole bunch of reasons and there could be a whole bunch of psychological reasons for that.
00:45:58.080 Now in academia, is this custom in practice? No.
00:46:03.080 The overwhelming majority of people in intellectual life in academia and university academia are honestly striving
00:46:11.080 to create new knowledge, to pass on the knowledge that civilization has learned
00:46:16.080 and to do that with the utmost clarity, but not everyone.
00:46:21.080 And in philosophy, this is a particular, particular challenge
00:46:25.080 because some of the ideas are extremely complicated and subtle
00:46:31.080 and so it is difficult to get that idea across.
00:46:34.080 No matter the clarity of the language one tries to use,
00:46:38.080 but there is another kind of philosopher to my mind
00:46:50.080 has been getting more and more attention lately.
00:46:54.080 It's been a revival to some extent of the idea of the so-called hoax.
00:46:59.080 Now for anyone who doesn't know, just explaining this off the top of my head,
00:47:04.080 there was, there he is, a physicist, his name is Alan Sokel
00:47:09.080 and he noticed that there were parts of philosophy
00:47:14.080 where the language being used was simply ridiculous,
00:47:19.080 that they would borrow terms from science or mathematics
00:47:24.080 and use them in philosophical papers in completely ridiculous ways
00:47:29.080 in completely illogical, irrational, unreasonable ways
00:47:36.080 But these texts would go on to be published in journals
00:47:40.080 and this would preserve the careers of these philosophers
00:47:44.080 because there is that old adage published or perish,
00:47:55.080 because one of your tasks as an academic at a university
00:48:01.080 by continually appearing in journals, by getting published professionally.
00:48:05.080 Now there could be a racket here created in certain areas
00:48:13.080 where the journal editors and the people who submit papers
00:48:16.080 to the journals just have a non-verbal understanding
00:48:26.080 no matter what kind of rubbish is submitted to the journal,
00:48:31.080 because we're all in this together of pretending
00:48:34.080 that there's something here when there's nothing there.
00:48:36.080 It's very much an emperor, the emperor's new clothes kind of idea.
00:48:40.080 Now this physicist Alan Circle wasn't the first to notice
00:48:43.080 that it seemed as though there was this kind of dishonesty going on
00:48:53.080 sometimes go under the name of postmodernism or relativism.
00:49:01.080 and studying philosophy, there was a pretty sharp divide
00:49:06.080 between what were known as the analytic philosophers
00:49:10.080 who were honestly striving to create new knowledge in philosophy
00:49:17.080 They were the people working on philosophical logic.
00:49:21.080 They were the people working on the philosophy of biology, for example.
00:49:26.080 People just trying to understand what it was that Descartes
00:49:29.080 was really trying to say in his meditations, for example.
00:49:33.080 And then there were the other kinds of philosophers who weren't doing that
00:49:36.080 who I attended a couple of lectures here and there
00:49:39.080 where one could tell that there wasn't any real substance there
00:49:44.080 that it was all about trying to use fancy sounding language.
00:49:49.080 It was more an exercise in kind of weird abstract poetry
00:49:53.080 to some extent, although they would never admit that.
00:49:57.080 And one is left feeling as though one lacks a certain level of intelligence
00:50:03.080 if they don't understand that these papers are being written.
00:50:06.080 Anyway, whatever the case, Alan Soakle, the physicist,
00:50:09.080 decided he would write a paper that was complete and utter nonsense
00:50:13.080 from a physics perspective, but using lots of physics terms
00:50:17.080 and he tried to see whether he could get this nonsense published
00:50:23.080 And that has ever since been known as the Soakle hoax
00:50:28.080 And since then, there have been other examples of this,
00:50:31.080 especially in recent years of academics, proper academics,
00:50:41.080 and submitting them to certain journals to see if they'll get through
00:50:47.080 Now, one presumes in physics, chemistry, the hard sciences,
00:50:51.080 medicine, the various other academic disciplines
00:50:59.080 It's not impossible for a fraud to happen in science.
00:51:11.080 Anyone in the humanities writing a nonsense paper
00:51:16.080 in physics and having it published by a good journal in physics.
00:51:23.080 But more than once, hard scientists or serious people
00:51:29.080 in the humanities have written nonsense papers,
00:51:32.080 submitted them to these journals, these social science journals
00:51:38.080 So Alan Circle wrote a book about his attempt at doing this hoax
00:51:45.080 But if you're not going to read the whole book,
00:51:47.080 reading Richard Dawkins' review of the book online is just fantastic.
00:51:53.080 I mean, when Richard Dawkins wants to make a withering critique
00:52:01.080 I just want to read the first paragraph of Professor Dawkins' review
00:52:07.080 of Alan Circle's book about fraud in the humanities,
00:52:12.080 specifically fraud in philosophy and areas of philosophy.
00:52:19.080 Suppose you are an intellectual imposter with nothing to say,
00:52:23.080 but with strong ambitions to succeed in academic life.
00:52:31.080 anoint your pages with respectful, yellow, highlighter.
00:52:34.080 What kind of literary style would you cultivate?
00:52:46.080 I fell in love with it soon after it was published in 1998
00:52:49.080 because I was, like I say, right in the middle of a degree
00:52:55.080 from the nonsense coming from my own lectures at university.
00:52:58.080 Now, you tend to get clarity in the astrophysics lectures
00:53:02.080 and the electro dynamics lectures and the relativity lectures.
00:53:08.080 in the quantum physics lectures was a certain amount of nonsense.
00:53:11.080 In the School of Philosophy, you did get this sense
00:53:16.080 between those ones who were trying to make sense
00:53:29.080 because not speaking, because in speaking lucidly,
00:53:36.080 And this has been a great rule of thumb for me in my own mind.
00:53:40.080 When I hear someone and they say or write something
00:53:48.080 The content of the idea really is so subtle and complicated
00:54:08.080 By simply looking at what else has been written by this person?
00:54:12.080 So by way of example, when it comes to making sense
00:54:27.080 Derrida was the founder of the postmodern philosophy
00:54:41.080 is the flavor of the month and has been for a long time.
00:55:07.080 and other modes of representation as necessarily imperfect,
00:55:11.080 but this is to say that whatever representation we do use,
00:55:19.080 the extent to which this description or explanation
00:55:22.080 can be improved and become more accurate over time
00:55:29.080 but a deconstructionist takes the opposite view.
00:55:34.080 or of coming to represent or model something better.
00:55:58.080 But let's read a passage from one of Derrida's more famous works,
00:56:16.080 and philosophy should still wander towards the meaning of its death,
00:56:20.080 or that it has always lived knowing itself to be dying,
00:57:13.080 and what is always so offensive to me about the postmodernists,
00:57:22.080 we're strictly speaking if we were to analyze this,
00:57:24.080 and I cannot be bothered getting into an analytical assessment
00:57:33.080 They don't mind violating the law of the excluded middle.
00:57:49.080 where one clause or phrase is separated by a comma
00:57:54.080 as if the writer is utterly allergic to full stops,
00:58:11.080 read just reading one example of postmodernism.
00:58:16.080 in postmodern philosophy write exactly like that.
00:58:21.080 let alone provide any semblance of a useful solution,
00:58:35.080 do not take this charge of incoherence as a criticism.
00:58:40.080 They say there's no sense to make in the first place,
00:58:43.080 and so they take that seriously by making no sense.
00:58:48.080 if it wasn't for the fact that these philosophies
00:58:58.080 or the central tenants are being taken seriously.
00:59:11.080 whether the expert making such an astonishing claim,
00:59:16.080 all perspectives are equal and have equal merit,
00:59:28.080 They can point to all of those journal articles
00:59:33.080 is the problem with expertise in this day and age,
00:59:38.080 expertise and research and evidence in public discourse
00:59:53.080 what is good research and what is fraudulent research
1:00:04.080 In short, there's too little error correction
1:00:06.080 and too much reliance upon so-called authority.
1:00:09.080 If a person is designated as an academic at a university
1:00:12.080 and they hold a position where they have the title of professor,
1:00:15.080 then this is seen by many as all that it takes
1:00:17.080 and then those people go on to teach a new generation
1:00:28.080 Well, I'm going to come to that, but first,
1:00:36.080 we might just consider what is the defense against
1:00:42.080 postmodernism or against cultural relativism
1:00:49.080 before we talk more about the origins of these things.
1:00:56.080 the only ballwalk against it is actual progress.
1:01:00.080 So physics actually does get people to the moon back
1:01:06.080 It's on the way to producing quantum computers.
1:01:08.080 Medicine does find vaccines and cures eventually.
1:01:12.080 Science produces internal combustion engines.
1:01:19.080 And this is something that the relativists,
1:01:27.080 They talk about it a lot, but no actual progress is made.
1:01:33.080 we know that the explanations contain some truth
1:01:45.080 with which scientific theories represent objective reality,
1:01:51.080 Okay, if we're going to call truth anything.
1:01:53.080 The truth content of something is just that amount
1:02:06.080 Because the rest of us can see the truth of the fact
1:02:11.080 And meanwhile, the alternative perspectives,
1:02:19.080 Social justice is the new kind of religion in the West.
1:02:36.080 has been designed and it's evolved over time
1:02:41.080 The language of inclusion and diversity in equity
1:02:54.080 it doesn't matter what words you put in front of justice.
1:02:58.080 So that you're saying you're not interested in justice
1:03:09.080 enforcing any of these things is a form of tyranny,
1:03:12.080 people need to be free to be included or not.
1:03:24.080 of social justice movements do not permit this
1:03:27.080 because they do not mean inclusion, diversity and equality.
1:03:32.080 giving authority to members of designated groups.
1:03:40.080 even if the outward appearances appear to be distinct.
1:03:43.080 So as long as people look different, that's diversity.
1:03:53.080 including think the same and say the same words.
1:03:59.080 you're going to see that David's work and writing here,
1:04:08.080 we must say between David Deutsch's critique of aspects
1:04:16.080 that have come in years gone by from elsewhere.
1:04:26.080 as a science popularizer, Neil deGrasse Tyson,
1:04:30.080 or the physicist Brian Cox, both of those are great
1:04:34.080 These thinkers are also critics of philosophy
1:04:38.080 but it's a blanket critique of all of philosophy.
1:04:49.080 once the bathwater has been discarded in David's critique.
1:04:53.080 That is to say, once he criticizes bad philosophy,
1:04:58.080 In fact, the beginning of infinity is the good stuff.
1:05:01.080 And this is so refreshing coming from a physicist
1:05:06.080 There are not many physicists who have this level of respect
1:05:13.080 the kernels of truth among us all the bad philosophy
1:05:20.080 Now there are some other physicists first in philosophy
1:05:22.080 and in my experience these include David Wallace,
1:05:25.080 Paul Davies, and although I disagree with him
1:05:29.080 in many ways, Sean Carroll, who understands philosophy
1:05:32.080 cannot be discarded, if you look up Luke Barnes,
1:05:35.080 he's an Australian cosmologist who understands
1:05:37.080 one must have a philosophy to do science properly
1:05:44.080 Everyone's a philosopher and has a philosophy
1:05:46.080 it's just that many of us are unconscious of it.
1:05:53.080 Their philosophy is to claim they reject philosophy
1:05:55.080 and everyone else should and then act as if
1:05:57.080 some other discipline can guide their choices and behavior.
1:06:01.080 For instance, in the religion versus science to dispute,
1:06:05.080 or sees no conflict, that's a philosophy that they hold,
1:06:09.080 a kind of philosophy that is a root guiding that perspective.
1:06:12.080 A lecturer of mine at the University of New South Wales,
1:06:17.080 he used to say there was a difference between having a philosophy
1:06:22.080 What he meant was something like that everyone has a philosophy
1:06:25.080 that part is unavoidable, but actually doing philosophy
1:06:28.080 means bringing that philosophy that you necessarily have
1:06:31.080 into your consciousness and illuminating it for yourself
1:06:39.080 So the point of chapter 12, a physicist history of bad philosophy,
1:06:43.080 the point as I see it, and as David says at the beginning of chapter,
1:06:47.080 is to explain the broader reasons why the multiverse
1:06:51.080 is not taken seriously as the explanation of what is going on
1:07:00.080 It's a prominent example to be sure to highlight
1:07:04.080 and use this kind of a lens through which we view
1:07:13.080 and David distinguishes between bad philosophy
1:07:17.080 So I'll still David's thunder and my thunder from later on
1:07:20.080 by telling you certainly now what the distinction between
1:07:27.080 False philosophy is common and it's no sin.
1:07:33.080 or false claims broadly are often, if they are honest,
1:07:39.080 I say honest there because there is an honest attempt
1:07:53.080 So there's a difference between these two things.
1:07:57.080 Honestly trying to get to the truth and failing
1:08:01.080 and dishonesty representing what you thought was the truth.
1:08:15.080 which is the false claim that all knowledge
1:08:17.080 from the senses through to instrumentalism,
1:08:20.080 the false claim that the purpose of science
1:08:33.080 that whatever the mathematician thinks certainly true
1:08:44.080 to some deeper truth, or better yet some better misconception.
1:08:49.080 So falsity, false knowledge, false science, false philosophy,
1:08:59.080 and when they honestly try to produce knowledge and fail
1:09:04.080 But it might be a solution to a whole bunch of problems
1:09:07.080 that one has, even if it's not a universal solution
1:09:21.080 and in some way prevents new knowledge from being created
1:09:34.080 whether alternatives to relativism are true or false
1:09:37.080 because relativism just asserts that everything
1:09:41.080 so right and wrong, there's no black and white on any particular issue
1:09:45.080 and that perhaps solid matter is made out of atoms
1:09:48.080 but perhaps it's made out of something else
1:09:52.080 in investigating won't do anything other than reveal
1:10:03.080 that debate, discussion or criticism have any real use
1:10:06.080 because we'll always have our own individual perspectives
1:10:09.080 so we have access to our own individual perspectives
1:10:21.080 It should also say here that philosophy itself
1:10:24.080 as a discipline that the university is unusual
1:10:28.080 and David makes this point elsewhere in the beginning of infinity
1:10:48.080 the way in which Newton originally discovered
1:10:50.080 or explained the laws of motion and the law of gravity.
1:10:56.080 that might be the 10th generation of textbook.
1:10:59.080 When you learn special relativity or general relativity
1:11:02.080 you don't go to Einstein's original writings on the topic
1:11:24.080 In philosophy the original texts are studied
1:11:28.080 will study the original texts, the original sacred texts
1:11:31.080 or someone interested in the great works of literature
1:11:36.080 But this is strange and misguided and wrong
1:11:41.080 and the reason it's strange misguided and wrong
1:11:44.080 is precisely because philosophy is about solving problems.
1:11:53.080 English literature you want to cleave to the original text
1:11:57.080 because you're interested in the language that Shakespeare used
1:12:02.080 if you're a theologian interested in what was actually said
1:12:09.080 and so you want to know what words were being said by the almighty
1:12:23.080 so much is the specific words that were being used
1:12:27.080 as the ideas that we're trying to be conveyed
1:12:36.080 the theory of how the periodic table works,
1:12:49.080 unless of course you're interested in the history of science.
1:12:51.080 Then you might be interested in the specific words that they used
1:12:54.080 but we're interested in the content of the theory
1:12:57.080 does not include the particular choice of vocabulary
1:13:02.080 that that particular scientist had at that particular time.
1:13:06.080 Now there's also one other thing we'll just mention this before.
1:13:09.080 In terms of studying philosophy at university,
1:13:17.080 are often studied out of context to some extent.
1:13:21.080 There is a context in which the philosophers were often working.
1:13:26.080 Liebnes, for example, wrote about free will, but why?
1:13:30.080 Well, he was writing the context of its contemporary
1:13:38.080 The vision of reality that one gets from reading Isaac Newton
1:13:42.080 although Newton didn't necessarily think this himself
1:13:53.080 where given any possible state of the universe at one time
1:13:56.080 there was only one possible outcome at any future time
1:14:02.080 and so Liebnes wrote about free will in that context
1:14:05.080 and it's important to know about the context
1:14:07.080 and so often this context is subtracted out.
1:14:10.080 Popper was all about when talking about the ancient philosophers
1:14:18.080 was always a great pain to talk about the problem situation
1:14:24.080 That looking at philosophical theories in the mere abstract
1:14:28.080 was nowhere near as helpful as looking at the particular kind of problem
1:14:31.080 that the philosophers were focused on at the time.
1:14:35.080 because I had so much to say in introduction to this chapter
1:14:41.080 and there was so much contemporary material
1:14:44.080 that I felt was relevant to really showing how important
1:14:51.080 this particular chapter is at this time in history.
1:14:57.080 since the beginning of infinity was published
1:14:59.080 but it's only become more important this chapter 12.
1:15:04.080 We're going to make that an entirely different episode
1:15:07.080 and so I've split this up into two episodes after all.
1:15:13.080 but if you'd like to go to the next episode
