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Chomsky can't even have a email dialogue with Sam Harris without becoming oozing contempt and incivility for no discernible reason.

cryoshon 11y ago
I understand that Chomsky's defensiveness / crotchety behavior can be very off-putting, but I highly suggest ignoring his eccentricities and focusing on the content of his writings. Chomsky is a deeply sensitive person whose mind is a paragon of receptive and careful attention to word choice, tone, and message-- that's why he's one of the best. The factual analytical power that Chomsky has is absolutely mind-opening, and his methodical explanations lend themselves to increasing your understanding of the issues being discussed, even if you don't agree with his interpretation.
- deleted 11y ago
  [deleted]
__jal 11y ago
To be fair, I don't think I could have an email dialogue with Sam Harris without oozing contempt and becoming uncivil. Civility is overrated. It is also the usually first complaint at hand to dismiss people, rather than their arguments.
- sritchie 11y ago
  Have you read Sam Harris's post on the dialogue? With Chomsky's permission he posted both sides, and Chomsky does come across as overly rabid: http://www.samharris.org/blog/item/the-limits-of-discourse http://www.samharris.org/blog/item/the-limits-of-discourse
  - eumoria 11y ago
    Chomsky has spent most of his life debating so his aggressiveness in this case seems to stem from how other people view the discourse (or how he agrees or disagrees with Sam) initially. I would put that to an 87 year old academic who's vast library jammed in his head makes discourse with Sam (who I've listened to his podcast and doesn't typically source arguments and occasionally comes across as an ideologue) a little frustrating. Or maybe he's just old and crotchety.
  - jonsterling 11y ago
    It is no wonder that Chomsky didn't treat him as an equal, given that Sam Harris is really in no position to discuss anything with him...
  - turar 11y ago
    Thanks for posting this, just read the whole exchange. Wow, Chomsky is certainly in an entirely different league here. I don't think Harris even understood what Chomsky was trying to emphasize.
  - dragonwriter 11y ago
    "Comes across as..." is, of course, subjective; to my eye, Chomsky comes across as justifiably skeptical at the outset, and reasonably irritated as the exchange continues. Doesn't, to me, seem anything like "rabid" (much less "overly rabid" -- a description that is quite odd, as it seems to suggest that there is an appropriate degree of "rabid"; when you've chosen "rabid" as your metaphor, you've kind of ruled out "overly" being a useful modifier.)
- sremani 11y ago
  >>Civility is overrated. << Its always interesting to learn something new from the "tolerance" brigade.
  - vezzy-fnord 11y ago
    Chomsky has never been a part of the "tolerance brigade," his left-libertarian syndicalist views notwithstanding. In fact, he has always been brutally critical of postmodernism.
  - coldtea 11y ago
    If anything, that "civility is overrated" is exactly what you'd hear from the NON tolerance brigade (which I'm all in favor of).
  - GFK_of_xmaspast 11y ago
    Have you never heard of a "tone argument" before.
  - Retra 11y ago
    Who said anything about being tolerant?
littletimmy 11y ago
Sam Harris is pretty sophomoric and smug. It's hard not to have contempt towards him, even if one is an atheist.
- deleted 11y ago
  [deleted]
- eumoria 11y ago
  yea I find he can poison viewpoints that I totally agree with in his phrasing and argumentative style of "Not aligning entirely with my opinion is not only incorrect but imbecilic." That said, though, his joint podcast with Dan Carlin was actually pretty good link here --> http://www.dancarlin.com/product/common-sense-293-sitting-down-with-sam/ http://www.dancarlin.com/product/common-sense-293-sitting-do...
- Retra 11y ago
  Perhaps his attitude is filtering away people who take intellectual arguments personally.
  - Kristine1975 11y ago
    Then he would filter himself.
    - Retra 11y ago
      He's not debating himself anyway.
- grandalf 11y ago
  Agreed. His intellect pales in comparison with Chomsky's. Harris's single skill lies in persuasively making arguments that contain significant logical leaps.
kachnuv_ocasek 11y ago
How is that related to the article in OP?
eob 11y ago
I think famous outspoken thinkers (Chomsky and Harris.. RMS comes to mind, Hitchens, Buckley, etc) can sometimes harbor off-putting personalities as a side effect of the situation they find themselves in: being a symbolic figurehead of a particular ideology. Or sometimes perhaps it's part of the reason they got to that place. There is a certain level of social decorum most people keep that prevents no-holds-barred exploration of ideas. On the tails of the bell curve faith-based orthodoxy and intellectual orthodoxy.. rude but incredibly sharp instruments of exploring thought. I'm not advocating for being an asshole... but rather for a select few we should try to see through the incivility to the ideas they're contributing.
- vezzy-fnord 11y ago
  RMS isn't really an asshole, though he has some infamous quirks that some people tend to overemphasize because they find his otherwise straightforward ideas to be highly disagreeable to begin with. Hitchens was inflammatory, but also flexible in his thinking. Buckley was an interesting case. To some extent, he was more acerbic towards those he mostly agreed with than those who he had further ideological skirmishes with. For instance, he was friends and associates with Galbraith, but infamously brutal towards Rothbard over his non-interventionist views on foreign policy.
  - philwelch 11y ago
    > Buckley was an interesting case. To some extent, he was more acerbic towards those he mostly agreed with than those who he had further ideological skirmishes with. For instance, he was friends and associates with Galbraith, but infamously brutal towards Rothbard over his non-interventionist views on foreign policy. Buckley probably realized that without vigorous pruning of the anti-Semites, libertarians, Randians and John Birchers, American conservatism would collapse into a fairly terrifying fringe movement; something which has been borne out since his passing.
    - vezzy-fnord 11y ago
      Why would the libertarians need to be vigorously pruned?
thucydides 11y ago
Chomsky's exchange with Harris struck me as out of character. I've seen dozens, maybe hundreds, of Chomsky's interviews and Q&A sessions. What always comes across, besides his luminous and discerning intellect, is his patience. Even when I've seen random people angrily question him about silly fringe theories - Bush did 9/11; chemtrails - he calmly, respectfully, and methodically points out what he believes are the flaws in those theories step-by-step. I don't know Chomsky personally so I can't speculate about his interaction with Harris, but it is unfair to judge a man on the basis of a single interaction.
lobo_tuerto 11y ago
Here, have a look at this: http://www.alternet.org/books/what-happened-when-sam-harris-tried-and-failed-embarrass-noam-chomsky http://www.alternet.org/books/what-happened-when-sam-harris-... It might help with discern a reason.
grandalf 11y ago
Harris is a publicity-hound and self-promoter. Chomsky is a public intellectual and dissenting voice.
typon 11y ago
How is this comment relevant to this article? Or is your fanboy love for Sam Harris so deep that you can't help mention him as soon as you see the name "Noam Chomsky"?
dragonwriter 11y ago
> Chomsky can't even have a email dialogue with Sam Harris without becoming oozing contempt and incivility for no discernible reason. I have no trouble discerning a reason for the tone of Chomsky's responses; when given the benefit of the doubt -- despite Chomsky clearly expecting that he was about to have his time wasted by in the professional equivalent of message-board trolling -- he proceeded with what was clearly the exact thing that Chomsky expected and which made him reluctant to engage at the outset. Personally, I think Chomsky showed admirable restraint for the way his time was being wasted.

cryoshon 11y ago

I understand that Chomsky's defensiveness / crotchety behavior can be very off-putting, but I highly suggest ignoring his eccentricities and focusing on the content of his writings. Chomsky is a deeply sensitive person whose mind is a paragon of receptive and careful attention to word choice, tone, and message-- that's why he's one of the best. The factual analytical power that Chomsky has is absolutely mind-opening, and his methodical explanations lend themselves to increasing your understanding of the issues being discussed, even if you don't agree with his interpretation.

deleted 11y ago
[deleted]

__jal 11y ago

To be fair, I don't think I could have an email dialogue with Sam Harris without oozing contempt and becoming uncivil. Civility is overrated. It is also the usually first complaint at hand to dismiss people, rather than their arguments.

sritchie 11y ago
Have you read Sam Harris's post on the dialogue? With Chomsky's permission he posted both sides, and Chomsky does come across as overly rabid: http://www.samharris.org/blog/item/the-limits-of-discourse http://www.samharris.org/blog/item/the-limits-of-discourse
- eumoria 11y ago
  Chomsky has spent most of his life debating so his aggressiveness in this case seems to stem from how other people view the discourse (or how he agrees or disagrees with Sam) initially. I would put that to an 87 year old academic who's vast library jammed in his head makes discourse with Sam (who I've listened to his podcast and doesn't typically source arguments and occasionally comes across as an ideologue) a little frustrating. Or maybe he's just old and crotchety.
- jonsterling 11y ago
  It is no wonder that Chomsky didn't treat him as an equal, given that Sam Harris is really in no position to discuss anything with him...
- turar 11y ago
  Thanks for posting this, just read the whole exchange. Wow, Chomsky is certainly in an entirely different league here. I don't think Harris even understood what Chomsky was trying to emphasize.
- dragonwriter 11y ago
  "Comes across as..." is, of course, subjective; to my eye, Chomsky comes across as justifiably skeptical at the outset, and reasonably irritated as the exchange continues. Doesn't, to me, seem anything like "rabid" (much less "overly rabid" -- a description that is quite odd, as it seems to suggest that there is an appropriate degree of "rabid"; when you've chosen "rabid" as your metaphor, you've kind of ruled out "overly" being a useful modifier.)
sremani 11y ago
>>Civility is overrated. << Its always interesting to learn something new from the "tolerance" brigade.
- vezzy-fnord 11y ago
  Chomsky has never been a part of the "tolerance brigade," his left-libertarian syndicalist views notwithstanding. In fact, he has always been brutally critical of postmodernism.
- coldtea 11y ago
  If anything, that "civility is overrated" is exactly what you'd hear from the NON tolerance brigade (which I'm all in favor of).
- GFK_of_xmaspast 11y ago
  Have you never heard of a "tone argument" before.
- Retra 11y ago
  Who said anything about being tolerant?

littletimmy 11y ago

Sam Harris is pretty sophomoric and smug. It's hard not to have contempt towards him, even if one is an atheist.

deleted 11y ago
[deleted]
eumoria 11y ago
yea I find he can poison viewpoints that I totally agree with in his phrasing and argumentative style of "Not aligning entirely with my opinion is not only incorrect but imbecilic." That said, though, his joint podcast with Dan Carlin was actually pretty good link here --> http://www.dancarlin.com/product/common-sense-293-sitting-down-with-sam/ http://www.dancarlin.com/product/common-sense-293-sitting-do...
Retra 11y ago
Perhaps his attitude is filtering away people who take intellectual arguments personally.
- Kristine1975 11y ago
  Then he would filter himself.
  - Retra 11y ago
    He's not debating himself anyway.
grandalf 11y ago
Agreed. His intellect pales in comparison with Chomsky's. Harris's single skill lies in persuasively making arguments that contain significant logical leaps.

kachnuv_ocasek 11y ago

How is that related to the article in OP?

eob 11y ago

I think famous outspoken thinkers (Chomsky and Harris.. RMS comes to mind, Hitchens, Buckley, etc) can sometimes harbor off-putting personalities as a side effect of the situation they find themselves in: being a symbolic figurehead of a particular ideology. Or sometimes perhaps it's part of the reason they got to that place. There is a certain level of social decorum most people keep that prevents no-holds-barred exploration of ideas. On the tails of the bell curve faith-based orthodoxy and intellectual orthodoxy.. rude but incredibly sharp instruments of exploring thought. I'm not advocating for being an asshole... but rather for a select few we should try to see through the incivility to the ideas they're contributing.

vezzy-fnord 11y ago
RMS isn't really an asshole, though he has some infamous quirks that some people tend to overemphasize because they find his otherwise straightforward ideas to be highly disagreeable to begin with. Hitchens was inflammatory, but also flexible in his thinking. Buckley was an interesting case. To some extent, he was more acerbic towards those he mostly agreed with than those who he had further ideological skirmishes with. For instance, he was friends and associates with Galbraith, but infamously brutal towards Rothbard over his non-interventionist views on foreign policy.
- philwelch 11y ago
  > Buckley was an interesting case. To some extent, he was more acerbic towards those he mostly agreed with than those who he had further ideological skirmishes with. For instance, he was friends and associates with Galbraith, but infamously brutal towards Rothbard over his non-interventionist views on foreign policy. Buckley probably realized that without vigorous pruning of the anti-Semites, libertarians, Randians and John Birchers, American conservatism would collapse into a fairly terrifying fringe movement; something which has been borne out since his passing.
  - vezzy-fnord 11y ago
    Why would the libertarians need to be vigorously pruned?

thucydides 11y ago

Chomsky's exchange with Harris struck me as out of character. I've seen dozens, maybe hundreds, of Chomsky's interviews and Q&A sessions. What always comes across, besides his luminous and discerning intellect, is his patience. Even when I've seen random people angrily question him about silly fringe theories - Bush did 9/11; chemtrails - he calmly, respectfully, and methodically points out what he believes are the flaws in those theories step-by-step. I don't know Chomsky personally so I can't speculate about his interaction with Harris, but it is unfair to judge a man on the basis of a single interaction.

lobo_tuerto 11y ago

Here, have a look at this: http://www.alternet.org/books/what-happened-when-sam-harris-tried-and-failed-embarrass-noam-chomsky http://www.alternet.org/books/what-happened-when-sam-harris-... It might help with discern a reason.

grandalf 11y ago

Harris is a publicity-hound and self-promoter. Chomsky is a public intellectual and dissenting voice.

typon 11y ago

How is this comment relevant to this article? Or is your fanboy love for Sam Harris so deep that you can't help mention him as soon as you see the name "Noam Chomsky"?

dragonwriter 11y ago

> Chomsky can't even have a email dialogue with Sam Harris without becoming oozing contempt and incivility for no discernible reason. I have no trouble discerning a reason for the tone of Chomsky's responses; when given the benefit of the doubt -- despite Chomsky clearly expecting that he was about to have his time wasted by in the professional equivalent of message-board trolling -- he proceeded with what was clearly the exact thing that Chomsky expected and which made him reluctant to engage at the outset. Personally, I think Chomsky showed admirable restraint for the way his time was being wasted.