Posted on 06/08/2005 7:40:56 PM PDT by snarks_when_bored
believe what you will but to me "enlightened humanist" is invariantly equivalent to "tenured socialist humanities professor", and sadly, goldberg's hope is not to turn them from socialism, but to make them more "scientific", cutting down on their "subjectivism" (what, any shreds of taoism or zen in how they view the world?) and stamping out any "non objective" thoughts they may entertain...
the problem of course is that EVERYTHING which we can cogitate about is always "subjective" - the world out there is maya, illusion, and worse, an illusion that is constantly transforming itself from one thing into another -- objectivism is a trap, begging for that last logical step to take possesion of the intellectual mountaintop and claim to have "the" fundamental interpretation of objective everything. that of course is what the marxists attempt in order to provide an objective and 'self evident' fundament with scientific socialism, ridding the world of the religious drug which "hides" that objective reality which only they can see...
the irony in all this is that it is Whitehead with his somewhat subjective "process physics", and not the supposedly more objective Russell or Wittgenstein, who seems to have the more relevant ideas these days and is providing a more useable base on which to think about a reality which doesn't seem to fit very well into static mathematical formulae which objectivists seem to believe hides the 'real truth'...
I too don't see Marxism in this article. Quite the opposite, I see it as opposed to Marx who was a materialist.
Ignoring for now whether you agree with her view of Godel, her view is definitely anti-materialism.
well, i tend to see marxists hiding under my bed and behind every tree, and in every college humanities department...
Exactly.
godel is to mathematics what heisenberg is to quantum mechanics, and in a way einstein is to newtonian mechanics, showing what the LIMITS to human analysis of our world, rather than postulating some absolute reality about it...
Well said.
Well that one's usually a pretty safe bet...
On the contrary, the point was to show just when, where, and how logical positivism ran off the rails. The Vienna Circle was so impressed [initially] with their results that they failed to notice why Wittgenstein wouldn't sign on.
Better to say X cannot be proved within its axiomatic finitary system.
Well, it certainly sounds better.
bump for later
You can still 'know' things that cannot be said.
Like this, from the Tractatus:
But then again, the latter Wittgenstein, in the Philosophical Investigations, saw all of philosophy as a therapeutic activity, employed to relieve the puzzlement generated by philosophers' misuse of ordinary language.
And this is making a comeback?
Sometimes the later Philosopher is the important, if unrecognized, philosopher, as Husserl; sometimes the later Philosopher is worthy of honorary doctorates based on his earlier work, if he shows up to the ceremony.
Give me some time to prove this.
Except for the 'truth' of Freudianism, or Marxism, or ...what have you.
For another take, try C.S. Lewis 'The Abolition of Man'.
Full Disclosure: Here's a nice quote from another novel, regarding the friction and contempt the humanities had for the sciences, mathematics, and objective truth:
"Oh, bother!" cried the Dean. "Do let's keep mathematics out of it. And physics. I cannot cope with them."
"Who mentioned Planck's constant a little time ago?"
"I did, and I'm sorry for it. I call it a revolting little object."
The Dean's emphatic tones reduced everybody to laughter, and, midnight striking, the party broke up.
Cheers!
PS Snarks, thanks for the articles!
BOILERPLATE: I've been otherwise occupied for the last 24 hours or so, so I'm just catching up on the thread.
You cover a lot of ground in your post. Interesting take (although there's some of it I might not sign on to). Thanks for the effort.
I would point out that if cosmologists today are anywhere close to knowing what they're talking about, it's hard to deny that the large (at least, the part of it to be found in our own cosmic bubble) definitely arises out of the small (the very, very small). Whether there's a global multiverse containing our bubble among infinitely many others (past, present and future, with respect to us—whatever that might mean) is as yet beyond the reach of evidence.
BOILERPLATE: I've been otherwise occupied for the last 24 hours or so, so I'm just catching up on the thread.
I see more clearly what you're getting at, I think:
My main point is that the humanities is not a science, and that trying to "solve" it by methods does great damage to it.
But I don't find Goldstein to be 'scientizing' in the interview, so I guess I'll still have to disagree with your earlier point that she's part of the problem. Perhaps, though, you've moderated your view a bit since that post? (smile)
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