Danny Yee reviews FASHIOnABLE NONSENSE

William S. Lear rael at zopyra.com
Sat Jan 23 14:16:12 PST 1999


On Sat, January 23, 1999 at 11:32:39 (-0500) Doug Henwood writes:
>...
>And are we also forced to accept the fact that scientists - and rather
>obscure ones at that, until one became a media star because of a schoolboy
>prank - writing on subjects they simply do not understand isn't at least a
>little disturbing?

First, I doubt that Sokal relishes his place as a "star" or did what he has done to become one --- Butler tried this swipe at Sokal in her NLR piece and it was a totally bogus ad hominem attack. Second, saying his satire was merely a "schoolboy prank" sounds a bit too Puritan to me, and overlooks that it is just the sort of thing progressives have done from time to time with the mainstream media --- cooking up a bogus story and watching the credulous swallow it hook, line, and sinker without bothering to verify the facts. Third, how can you say they are "writing on subjects they simply do not understand" when they explicitly say they are writing about the use and abuse of logic, evidence, etc. in a variety of works? They explicitly state that they are not making judgments about other aspects of the work.

I do have a problem when authors bolster their work with bogus nonsense. I'd be opposed to it if Noam Chomsky, Alex Cockburn, or Rush Limbaugh tried it. Were they to do so, I'd like to hear about it.

Bill



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