Alright. I know you think she has something new, or otherwise useful, to say, so how about stepping through a few pages of her book and going over it with a fine-tooth comb. Unlock her secrets for us. I'm willing to listen if no one else is...
>>Because Noam Chomsky's imprimatur appears on the back of Sokal and
>>Bricmont's book, and because he is (largely) dismissive of
>>postmodernism, does that make him a victim of anxiety too? When I
>>dismiss creationism, am I suffering from anxiety?
>
>I admire Chomsky a lot, and for many reasons, but this is one place where
>we have to part company. He has a bit more faith in the liberating powers
>of truth & reason than I do.
Well, I'm not so sure this isn't confusing things. The issue is whether someone like Butler is saying anything of use, not whether truth and reason will be able to free us --- it's perfectly consistent to say, as Chomsky does, that the pomos are (for the most part, he may be a bit more accepting of some of what they write) full of shit, while truth and reason, since they have to "face" lots of powerful irrationality and entrenched power, cannot be expected to liberate us automatically (this is of course no reason to adopt irrationality as a method of discourse). I do think he thinks truth and reason are an important part of a liberatory project.
If Butler is saying something that is based on lies, or if she is saying something that is based upon faulty reasoning, then I would hope you would agree that she is writing junk, at least those parts which are built upon lies and faulty reasoning --- we criticize Rush Limbaugh for that (and other things), so there's no reason to play with kid gloves with Butler, either. Despite her jargon, she still should not contradict herself, she should be consistent in her use of her words, she can't say that A causes B and that A does not cause B at the same time and expect anybody to listen, etc. I'm talking about basic things here, and I think that Butler for the most part (aside from her supposed "paradox" that I have pointed out) adheres to this. I just happen to think that she is speculating wildly, that much of what she says strikes me as fishy and overblown. I'm trying to evaluate this not with deep canons of truth and reason at my side, I'm trying to seat-of-the-pants this and to be generous with her, but at the same time to try to see how this meshes with what we already know from history, etc.
As to the Noamster, Chomsky has always been insistent that he has no faith in reason to free us --- he's said this repeatedly. He does say that *when* truth and reason are operating freely, the world tends to keep you honest, you tend to get things like broad progress in the scientific community *despite* personalities and money-grubbing, and that progress in understanding is hard, perhaps impossible in many cases, to undo. He also does grant that things like literature can teach us things about ourselves that science perhaps can never do, and I can live with that, I'm not expecting Butler to provide a formal logical proof of her ideas and to back them up with reams of empirical data ... but, for new insights into the human condition, especially insights that will help us to overcome the problems of society today, at some point you simply must be able to communicate them to others --- you can't keep claiming that what she talks about is so deep and mysterious that it can't be communicated plainly. Hell, even if it takes you two pages to explain one of hers, as long as you can do it in English that I can approach, I'd be happy.
Bill