KeepNet 4 June 2008
Another round-up of links of note, first in a newly-titled series of KeepNet posts:
Shannon Love at Chicago Boyz iterates a long-held feeling of mine, that the lack of ‘popular intellectualism’ (except in France, perhaps) lies in sharp contrast to the abundance of good, popular science:
The physicist Richard Feynman famously once said that if a person really understood a subject, they could explain it to anyone. The intelligentsia claims that the obtuse nature of their discourse arises from their superior intellects grappling with concepts lesser intellects simply cannot grasp. Yet, is it not odd that individuals like Feynman or Hawkins can explain great matters of quantum physics and cosmology but no living person can provide an agreed upon definition of “postmodernism?” The sad truth is that the discourse of the modern intelligentsia looks like gibberish because it is gibberish.
The emperor has no clothes.
Mike Innes at Complex Terrain Lab draws attention to a new paper on Neutral Space in Cyber War, and I chip in with a couple on the Strategic Logic of Suicide Terrorism.
Warren Ellis attacks the Singularity as The NerdGod Delusion and is sharply (and rightly) rebuffed by George Dvorsky and by Paul Raven at Futurismic.
In-game advertising makes gameplay more realistic, say gamers – Daniel Terdiman at Geek Gestalt.
Amongst many cautionary critiques of al-Qaeda’s imminent demise, read Jason Burke and Michael Scheuer.
Chris Levesque’s Historicus reaches a blogging milestone, and today writes a thoughtful commemorative piece on the 1989 Tiananmen Square massacre.
This is all over the net but too juicy to resist: RepRap achieves replication! Yup, a machine that can manufacture copies of itself, although they’re technically mules. What next? Von Neumann machines?
Shane Deichmans is living it up at the DHS Science & Technology Stakeholders Conference in Washington, D.C. His series of posts starts here.
Using Google Maps and SMS messaging, the Kenyan public is being encouraged to feed human rights abuses into the Ushahidi visual database. Liz Losh at Virtualpolitik reports on this highly innovative and inspiring project.
DARPA awards ‘Deep Green’ battle-computer cash – arms globocorp BAE Systems wins the contract to develop a thinking battle computer to “help” human commanders directing US forces in the wars of tomorrow.
Jason Sigger tells us that personnel at intelligence ‘fusion centers’ are getting kinda bored – apparently, there’s not enough for them to do…
Yet, is it not odd that individuals like Feynman or Hawkins can explain great matters of quantum physics and cosmology but no living person can provide an agreed upon definition of “postmodernism?”
Well, no, since quantum physics is a fairly narrow field with highly specialized descriptive terminology that’s backed up by equations with demonstrable predictive power, whereas “postmodernism” has to do with broad cultural tendencies in everything from aesthetics to architecture, the majority of which have never been susceptible to scientific description or prediction.
There are huge difficulties in defining the Renaissance, too…but that doesn’t make attempts to understand or defend its philosophy and its aesthetics worthless.
It’s also weird to complain that postmodernism isn’t susceptible to agreed-upon description, and then to argue that it can therefore be written off wholesale, regardless of what it does or doesn’t comprise. Hard to tell if the emperor’s naked if you don’t know who the emperor is. (“Jester” might be a better title, in any case…though I guess saying “the jester has no clothes” wouldn’t have quite the same impact.)
Anyway, I’ve never quite understood this attitude.
Clarification – my feeling: “the lack of ‘popular intellectualism’ lies in sharp contrast to the abundance of good, popular science”. Shannon Love’s exemplification of this: as quoted in my post, and with which you take issue.
There is much in her post to commend – there is also hyperbole, as you note. She has a point though, with regard to communication of ideas and theories. The very narrowness of quantum physics might make it easier to explain to a non-specialist audience, but quite frankly I doubt that. Given that a significant proportion of people don’t know what an equation is – and in Britain are proud not to – I’d say on paper it looks a lot harder to condense and communicate extra-dimensional cosmology than to explicate the bastard child of modernism.
Surely postmodernism’s ‘broad cultural tendencies in everything from aesthetics to architecture’ demand academics and intellectuals that can explain this. After all, we have very competent popular historians who seem to have no trouble in describing broad swathes of political, social and economic history, taking in any field of human endeavour you care to choose in the process. From zoology to Zoroastrianism, via the Renaissance. So why then can no-one explain why Judith Butler is so important?
And perhaps it’s not the definition that matters. It’s the engagement, the public debate. Ultimately, most academics derive a certain percentage of their income from public taxation – some should think more about giving some of it back. “Some”, I say, before you pounce on the obvious flaws in that sort of funding model.
Anyway, it’s entirely reasonable not only to question the emperor’s choice in clothes, but also the emperor himself. There’s a little debate going on at Shannon’s original post about all this.
I was thinking of you yesterday, as it happens. I had the radio on during one of those BBC Radio 4 afternoon dramas that they churn out day after day. The opening scene was a young boy’s awakening to nature – the root of his wonder? The nudibranch he’d just hoicked out the water.
Clarification – my feeling: “the lack of ‘popular intellectualism’ lies in sharp contrast to the abundance of good, popular science”. Shannon Love’s exemplification of this: as quoted in my post, and with which you take issue.
Yeah, I understood that. Sorry I didn’t make it more clear!
The very narrowness of quantum physics might make it easier to explain to a non-specialist audience, but quite frankly I doubt that. Given that a significant proportion of people don’t know what an equation is – and in Britain are proud not to – I’d say on paper it looks a lot harder to condense and communicate extra-dimensional cosmology than to explicate the bastard child of modernism.
Well, I have to assume she’s talking about a small group of interested laypeople…the majority of people aren’t going to be interested in quantum physics or high theory, no matter how much you simplify them. Which is another problem I have with her argument, actually. Pop science sounds something like truth, but it tends to be highly speculative and to leave out a lot of controversies and uncertainties (along with the math, just as you say).
I don’t know how many people I’ve talked to who thought the many-worlds interpretation was literally true…or failing that, had a good chance of being correct. A lot of people seem to misunderstand what Schrodinger was getting at with that cat business, too. I’ve argued elsewhere that these titles are a bit like Medieval wonder books, in this regard, and don’t produce much besides pseudocertainty. Which is a bit over the top, I realize, but I think there’s a grain of truth to it all the same.
Surely postmodernism’s ‘broad cultural tendencies in everything from aesthetics to architecture’ demand academics and intellectuals that can explain this.
Jameson and Eagleton seem to me to have done pretty well, and to have maintained a reasonably critical perspective. Going back to what I said about pop science, I think it’s possible to give an overview of postmodernism that’d be as useful (if provisional) as an overview of, say, quantum entanglement. Which is to say, it’d probably not be very useful at all, beyond whatever social capital one accrues from seeming to understand something complex and abstract.
Ultimately, I just don’t understand the distinction Love’s trying to make. Her criticism seems equally applicable to Plato, to Duns Scotus, to romanticism, to literature in general…for people who are at all interested in these topics, the choice is always going to be between gaining a provisional semi-understanding, or a degree of complexity that most people won’t ever manage (not because they can’t, necessarily, but because they see no good reason to, or don’t have the time and money it takes). I don’t want to read Michio Kaku or Jean Baudrillard, but I’d find it hard to say whose work is more irrelevant to the interested layperson’s daily life, once you strip it of all its posturing.
It’s the engagement, the public debate. Ultimately, most academics derive a certain percentage of their income from public taxation – some should think more about giving some of it back. “Some”, I say, before you pounce on the obvious flaws in that sort of funding model.
No, I agree completely. I think that in the case of a specific thinker like Virilio (or Judith Butler, for that matter) the basic ideas could be made pretty clear and might even be useful to people. Lord knows I don’t normally think of myself as a defender of postmodernism, but certain aspects of it are relevant to daily life in a way that theoretical physics isn’t. And I tend to think that critiques like Love’s ultimately have more to do with its few strengths than with its many weaknesses….
I was thinking of you yesterday, as it happens. I had the radio on during one of those BBC Radio 4 afternoon dramas that they churn out day after day. The opening scene was a young boy’s awakening to nature – the root of his wonder? The nudibranch he’d just hoicked out the water.
Nice! I’ve seen a lot more talk about them in the last couple of years, which pleases me. Going back to your point about academic engagement, when I first started linking to nudibranch pics on Eschaton, virtually no one had ever heard of them, let alone seen one. Which I thought was weird, because that’s an amazingly well-educated group of people, by and large. Then again, I only learned about them thanks to a marine biology course I took in college, even though I grew up on the coast! Most Americans, I’m afraid, are still more likely to hear about them in creationist tracts than on the radio….
Actually, I’m coming round more to your standpoint here. I think you’re absolutely right on two inter-related issues: the pseudocertainty of ‘popular’ science, and the ‘social capital one accrues’ from being seen to read, let alone understand, say, quantum entanglement. I guess one has to decide whether a ‘provisional semi-understanding’ has more ‘value’ or utility than none at all. Going off half-cocked on issues one has a dilettante conception of arguably only marks one out as a dilettante, although the uninitiated recipients of such talk can often be ‘blinded by science’ and accord the speaker far more credit than he is due, i.e. as you say, social capital. Oh look, it’s Digg!
My relationship with Virilio is a good example. Although I’ve read plenty of Virilio over the years, I’m still getting to grips with a lot of what he says. And to whom I do defer when I’m having problems? Ian James’ volume in the Routledge Critical Thinkers series, a great little Virilio reader, or a der Derian interview, or someone else who can help me out when I need a different perspective. Virilio is very amenable to ‘popularisation’, despite the density and import of his writing. I’m not sure Butler is so easy, but there is also a Butler reader in the Routledge series. I’m sure it’s very good.
Postmodernism is a difficult case, by its very nature. Whilst also not an ardent defender of it, I draw a lot of inspiration from it, broad church that it is. I do find myself frustrated on occasions by deliberate obfuscation and arrogant hyper-intellectualism, but that’s not unique to the field, by any means. Perhaps you are right on your earlier point about linguistic range and constraint. Perhaps it really is easier, or at least more straightforward, to deal with quantum physics and cosmology than it is to attempt explanations of culture, psychology, philosophy, gender, etc.
I’m delighted our molluscan chums are being accorded greater visibility in the global media. Nudibranch is so much more elegant than the taxonomically incorrect ‘sea slug’.
Postmodernism is a difficult case, by its very nature. Whilst also not an ardent defender of it, I draw a lot of inspiration from it, broad church that it is. I do find myself frustrated on occasions by deliberate obfuscation and arrogant hyper-intellectualism, but that’s not unique to the field, by any means.
That’s exactly how I feel about it, too. Of course, the other issue for me is that here in the States, “postmodernist” is a routine slur against almost any critique of power whatsoever…you’re likely to seem just as “pomo” for citing Adorno or Raymond Williams as for citing Baudrillard. So I get more impatient with the blanket rejection of postmodern thought than some people might.
Perhaps it really is easier, or at least more straightforward, to deal with quantum physics and cosmology than it is to attempt explanations of culture, psychology, philosophy, gender, etc.
Well, it’s narrower, at least. The math is insanely hard (for me, anyway). But I still think I’d find it easier to grasp that, over the course of the next few years, than to grasp all the cultural, psychological, aspects of the field within which that knowledge is generated and comes to be accepted as legitimate.
Re: Virilio…a couple of years ago, I was reading a book of Flann O’Brien’s wartime “Cruiskeen Lawn” columns, and he said something to the effect that every technological advance decreases the sum total of human knowledge. His example was the atomic bomb: the knowledge gained by creating it is dwarfed, according to O’Brien, by the problems and uncertaities that arise from having created it. Which seemed to me to be kinda similar to Virilio’s idea of the Accident.
I’m sure you’re the first person to ever make the connection between Flann O’Brien and Virilio. I’m going to have to go back to Virilio now, with the Cruiskeen Lawn collection in the other hand, and check this out. Any chance you can bung me a more precise reference?
“postmodernist” is a routine slur against almost any critique of power whatsoever…you’re likely to seem just as “pomo” for citing Adorno or Raymond Williams as for citing Baudrillard
How true. Post-modernism’s internal complexities and occasional solipsism can’t totally be blamed, that’s for sure. My initial reference to France was based on a perception that the French actually treasure their ‘public intellectuals’, although perhaps this has changed too. Recent lists of public intellectuals seem to be sparsely populated by the French. Chomsky, inexplicably, seems to top the lot. Give me Zizek any day.
My argument is rather simple. The intelligence do not attempt to create popular descriptions of their work in order to hide the truth that their ideas are essentially nonsensical garbage. In short, the vast majority of works in the humanities are an elaborate con. Trying to convert the obtuse professional writing to something a lay person could begin to grasp would reveal the con.
The best evidence I can offer for this is the Sokal affair in which a physicist tricked a prominent postmodernist journal into publishing a completely nonsensical paper. The editors accepted and published the paper because even though nothing in the paper actual made any sense whatsoever. Clearly, they only wished to publishing something with a lot of esoteric words arrayed in tortured sentences of baroque complexity. The actual content of the paper did not matter in the least.
I have in the past mimicked postmodernist lingo in online discussion and been heartily agreed with even though I simply strung random phrases together. This further convinces me that a con is in play.
The ugly truth is that a science progresses, there is less and less for the unscientific intellectual to study. For example, matters of the mind once solely the province of philosophers is now the province of neurologist and psychologist. Intellectuals have sought to hide their increasing irrelevance by by churning out needlessly complex garbage.
Scientist by contrast have nothing to lose if people have a better but imperfect understanding of their work. They attempt to explain as much as they can.
I’m going to have to go back to Virilio now, with the Cruiskeen Lawn collection in the other hand, and check this out. Any chance you can bung me a more precise reference?
About half my books are still packed away, unfortunately. But the title of this collection was “At War,” IIRC. And the columns are sequential, so obviously it’s going to be near the back end (though the whole book’s worthwhile, of course). If I stumble on my copy in the meantime, I’ll drop you a line.
I have in the past mimicked postmodernist lingo in online discussion and been heartily agreed with even though I simply strung random phrases together. This further convinces me that a con is in play.
Hooray for the Scientific Method!
@Shannon
Whilst I have a fair amount of sympathy for your POV, I’d have a lot more if there were less blanket generalisations. Nevertheless, there is a lot of deliberate academic smoke-screening although I think you’ll find academics are keener on hiding material from each other than they are from publics. As for Sokal, well, he did perform a valuable service but I doubt it’s really made much difference in the long run.
@Phil
Cheers for the ref. Do let me know if you happen across it.