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You raise good points, but it's well past midnight here on the East Coast of the US and I need to go to sleep. So in lieu of attempting an adequate response, d

by nkurz 6y ago

You raise good points, but it's well past midnight here on the East Coast of the US and I need to go to sleep. So in lieu of attempting an adequate response, did you see Scott Aaronson's parallel piece: https://www.scottaaronson.com/blog/?p=4892 https://www.scottaaronson.com/blog/?p=4892. I think it tries to answer some of your questions, although I'm not sure if it succeeds. And this one by Sarah Jeong is more sympathetic to the cancelling side, but might do a little better on the "amorphousness" aspect: https://www.theverge.com/21320338/letter-harpers-writers-free-speech-canceled-social-media-illiberalism https://www.theverge.com/21320338/letter-harpers-writers-fre....

cycomanic 6y ago
This is such great post which should be shared widely.
eesmith 6y ago
I read Scott Aaronson's piece but don't see how it fits. Pinker says that he's safe in his position and does not worry about being canceled. The people doing the criticism specifically say they are not trying to cancel him. Quoting from the open letter linked by Aaronson: > We want to note here that we have no desire to judge Dr. Pinker’s actions in moral terms, or claim to know what his aims are. Nor do we seek to “cancel” Dr. Pinker, or to bar him from participating in the linguistics and LSA communities (though many of our signatories may well believe that doing so would be the right course of action). They are: > calling for the removal of Dr. Steven Pinker from both our list of distinguished academic fellows and our list of media experts. We, the undersigned, believe that Dr. Pinker’s behavior as a public academic is not befitting of a representative of our professional organization, that the LSA’s own stated goals make such a conclusion inevitable, and that the LSA should publicly reaffirm its position and distance itself from Dr. Pinker. Even if that action were taken, how is that meaningfully "canceling" someone? Aaronson argues that it's a first step to test their power, and a veiled threat of what might be to come if they actually have power. Which I cannot distinguish from the age-old rhetorical technique of pointing to the extremists of any movement, then argue they are representative of everyone in the movement, in order to dismiss the entire movement. Aaronson's piece uses a similar argument to Pinker, with: > Again and again, spineless institutions have responded to these sorts of ultimatums by capitulating to them. Can we have a list of examples please? Without concrete definitions and examples, we can read anything into this topic. We know there are many cases where spineless institutions did not intervene despite public outrage, eg, MIT's fondness for a certain rich convicted pedophile, so it's hard to think there's a systemic capitulation to the demands of cancellers.

by nkurz 6y ago

cycomanic 6y ago

This is such great post which should be shared widely.

eesmith 6y ago

I read Scott Aaronson's piece but don't see how it fits. Pinker says that he's safe in his position and does not worry about being canceled. The people doing the criticism specifically say they are not trying to cancel him. Quoting from the open letter linked by Aaronson: > We want to note here that we have no desire to judge Dr. Pinker’s actions in moral terms, or claim to know what his aims are. Nor do we seek to “cancel” Dr. Pinker, or to bar him from participating in the linguistics and LSA communities (though many of our signatories may well believe that doing so would be the right course of action). They are: > calling for the removal of Dr. Steven Pinker from both our list of distinguished academic fellows and our list of media experts. We, the undersigned, believe that Dr. Pinker’s behavior as a public academic is not befitting of a representative of our professional organization, that the LSA’s own stated goals make such a conclusion inevitable, and that the LSA should publicly reaffirm its position and distance itself from Dr. Pinker. Even if that action were taken, how is that meaningfully "canceling" someone? Aaronson argues that it's a first step to test their power, and a veiled threat of what might be to come if they actually have power. Which I cannot distinguish from the age-old rhetorical technique of pointing to the extremists of any movement, then argue they are representative of everyone in the movement, in order to dismiss the entire movement. Aaronson's piece uses a similar argument to Pinker, with: > Again and again, spineless institutions have responded to these sorts of ultimatums by capitulating to them. Can we have a list of examples please? Without concrete definitions and examples, we can read anything into this topic. We know there are many cases where spineless institutions did not intervene despite public outrage, eg, MIT's fondness for a certain rich convicted pedophile, so it's hard to think there's a systemic capitulation to the demands of cancellers.