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>Seriously: in comparison to, say, Scott Alexander, I don't see a single novel idea in Graham's Oeuvre. The irony to me is that a lot of Scott Alexander's writ

>Seriously: in comparison to, say, Scott Alexander, I don't see a single novel idea in Graham's Oeuvre. The irony to me is that a lot of Scott Alexander's writing seems to build on singular concepts that have been around for a while in sociology or philosphy, or studied, just not by exactly that name. Other times, the concepts aren't novel at all, but there's a fun AI/tech spin to the story which doesn't really add much. A continuing ignorance of established work in the field (particularly when the Internet lets you get away with it, in "soft subjects" like philosophy, sociology, political theory and critical theory[3]) is par for the course in both PG and Scott's writings. If it's not published in a blog post or a trendy book written within the past 15 years, chances are that they'll think the concept is novel. Sometimes reading Scott's articles I feel a strong sense of the Gell-Mann amnesia effect: an article I know a little something on, and he's only done minimal background reading, to the point where any serious scholar would laugh at his authoritative tone. In another comment, continuing in the Scott-PG-rationalsphere tradition, I invented a term of my own, "the hacker blogger mindset"[0]. Valuable work to introduce people to an opinionated version of one concept or another (without any pointers so you can learn more about similar work)? Sure. Valuable work for someone willing to spend twenty minutes on Google Scholar or having already read primary literature? Not really. A recent example, from one of Scott's posts on meritocracy[1]: >The intuition behind meritocracy is this: if your life depends on a difficult surgery, would you prefer the hospital hire a surgeon who aced medical school, or a surgeon who had to complete remedial training to barely scrape by with a C-? If you prefer the former, you’re a meritocrat with respect to surgeons. Generalize a little, and you have the argument for being a meritocrat everywhere else. It's amazing how much this misses the point of the conversation on meritocracy - that critics of meritocracy do not have a problem with merit itself, but rather (1) how merit can be measured in more abstract ways, (2) the degree to which meritocracy can exist with current social relations, (3) the degree to which meritocracy really does exist, with respect to claims that it does (in a just-world hypothesis kind of way). A similar problem was pointed out in the comments[2]. And yet... in support of the position Scott is attacking, he cites one recent pop-phil book, and two blog posts. Where are the published journals? Where are the essays? What have domain experts (i.e. philosophers, political theorists, economists, and sociologists) said about meritocracy? Who knows. [0] https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=22101989 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=22101989 [1] https://slatestarcodex.com/2017/07/24/targeting-meritocracy/ https://slatestarcodex.com/2017/07/24/targeting-meritocracy/ [2] https://slatestarcodex.com/2017/07/24/targeting-meritocracy/#comment-526449 https://slatestarcodex.com/2017/07/24/targeting-meritocracy/... [3] The fact is that when you state a technically incorrect opinion relating to computer science, engineering, physics, biology, etc. you'll have a hundred Internet users responding with citations and research. When you do the same with the other subjects, usually the people who would prove you wrong are either disinterested in another silly Interent debate that will hinge on ideological terms, or they think they can ignore it because it's not published in a popular journal. Whether that's wise or not remains to be seen.

sjg007 7y ago
Surgeons face the same dilemma as programmers. Excellent surgeons may not in fact be book smart.
keiferski 7y ago
> A continuing ignorance of established work in the field (particularly when the Internet lets you get away with it, in "soft subjects" like philosophy, sociology, political theory and critical theory[3]) is par for the course in both PG and Scott's writings. If it's not published in a blog post or a trendy book written within the past 15 years, chances are that they'll think the concept is novel. Sadly, this applies to pretty much every "public intellectual" these days. It's embarrassing to watch how ignorant Sam Harris is when talking about religion, Neil deGrasse Tyson's dismissal of philosophy, or Steven Pinker's opinion (or lack thereof) of Nietzsche. They clearly have zero education on or knowledge of the subject, and yet...they continue to be taken as authoritative figures. I eagerly await the day when we have real public intellectuals again. Hell, people like Steven Pinker make past pseudo-intellectual figures like William F. Buckley look like genius savants.
cousin_it 7y ago
Scott reads and cites an incredible amount of research, look at any of his "much more than you wanted to know" posts. If he doesn't cite critical theory, it's more because he doesn't find critical theory authoritative.
- claudiawerner 7y ago
  (Edit: this comment responds to sections of the parent comment that were edited out, and I appreciate the edit.) > If he doesn't cite critical theory, it's more because he doesn't find critical theory authoritative. (Neither do I.) That's fine. I don't think it's "authoritative" (whatever this means in the context of considering different viewpoints and teasing out the value of intellectual work) either, though it's a little rich that a blogger is so dismissive of a whole mode of investigative thought that has pretty strong support in post-war philosophy. Even then, why not consider their opinions (which are popular, rightly or not), and criticize them? >Also, not to put a too fine point on it, but you're a Marxist. I think this is the real "what the hell". My ideological position, or lack of one, has nothing to do with the validity of my criticism. Nothing in my post specifically relates to Marx at all, and my criticism would be the same even if he hadn't written an article on Marx via Singer. "You're a Marxist, and Scott has been attacked by Marxists" is a pretty poor attempt at hiding an ad-hominem. Not to put too much of a fine point on it. I have never heard of that Wiki, or anywhere else that criticizes Scott, on Reddit or elsewhere. I'm not involved in any online drama of the sort, and I don't associate with people who are, to be honest. If that's what they're doing to Scott, then I condemn their actions - especially doxxing and messaging his friends. Regardless of my ideological position, that's unacceptable. >So you, a Marxist Let's get this straight. Your only reason to claim I'm a Marxist is because I have an interest in Marx's work. I do not consider myself a Marxist in the strictest sense of the word[0], though I do find his work more valuable than some others may. But I could say the same thing about a host of other philosophers and economists I listen to. It's absurd that a comment about Scott has provoked such a reaction that you've decided to start making a big deal about a critical comment. I'm sorry if my comment seemed in poor taste, or I just go around the 'net criticizing Scott. I don't, and I actually like some of his essays, in a roundabout way. My only intention was to expand on GP's point about Scott in comparison to PG. [0] About a third of academic sociologists consider themselves Marxsits. Marxism is one of the most popular heterodox schools in economics. It's a dominant current in contemprorary political economy.

sjg007 7y ago

Surgeons face the same dilemma as programmers. Excellent surgeons may not in fact be book smart.

keiferski 7y ago

> A continuing ignorance of established work in the field (particularly when the Internet lets you get away with it, in "soft subjects" like philosophy, sociology, political theory and critical theory[3]) is par for the course in both PG and Scott's writings. If it's not published in a blog post or a trendy book written within the past 15 years, chances are that they'll think the concept is novel. Sadly, this applies to pretty much every "public intellectual" these days. It's embarrassing to watch how ignorant Sam Harris is when talking about religion, Neil deGrasse Tyson's dismissal of philosophy, or Steven Pinker's opinion (or lack thereof) of Nietzsche. They clearly have zero education on or knowledge of the subject, and yet...they continue to be taken as authoritative figures. I eagerly await the day when we have real public intellectuals again. Hell, people like Steven Pinker make past pseudo-intellectual figures like William F. Buckley look like genius savants.

cousin_it 7y ago

Scott reads and cites an incredible amount of research, look at any of his "much more than you wanted to know" posts. If he doesn't cite critical theory, it's more because he doesn't find critical theory authoritative.

claudiawerner 7y ago
(Edit: this comment responds to sections of the parent comment that were edited out, and I appreciate the edit.) > If he doesn't cite critical theory, it's more because he doesn't find critical theory authoritative. (Neither do I.) That's fine. I don't think it's "authoritative" (whatever this means in the context of considering different viewpoints and teasing out the value of intellectual work) either, though it's a little rich that a blogger is so dismissive of a whole mode of investigative thought that has pretty strong support in post-war philosophy. Even then, why not consider their opinions (which are popular, rightly or not), and criticize them? >Also, not to put a too fine point on it, but you're a Marxist. I think this is the real "what the hell". My ideological position, or lack of one, has nothing to do with the validity of my criticism. Nothing in my post specifically relates to Marx at all, and my criticism would be the same even if he hadn't written an article on Marx via Singer. "You're a Marxist, and Scott has been attacked by Marxists" is a pretty poor attempt at hiding an ad-hominem. Not to put too much of a fine point on it. I have never heard of that Wiki, or anywhere else that criticizes Scott, on Reddit or elsewhere. I'm not involved in any online drama of the sort, and I don't associate with people who are, to be honest. If that's what they're doing to Scott, then I condemn their actions - especially doxxing and messaging his friends. Regardless of my ideological position, that's unacceptable. >So you, a Marxist Let's get this straight. Your only reason to claim I'm a Marxist is because I have an interest in Marx's work. I do not consider myself a Marxist in the strictest sense of the word[0], though I do find his work more valuable than some others may. But I could say the same thing about a host of other philosophers and economists I listen to. It's absurd that a comment about Scott has provoked such a reaction that you've decided to start making a big deal about a critical comment. I'm sorry if my comment seemed in poor taste, or I just go around the 'net criticizing Scott. I don't, and I actually like some of his essays, in a roundabout way. My only intention was to expand on GP's point about Scott in comparison to PG. [0] About a third of academic sociologists consider themselves Marxsits. Marxism is one of the most popular heterodox schools in economics. It's a dominant current in contemprorary political economy.