>
> As I remember the heat of the Sokal affair, there were all kinds of
> claims for the rigor of experimental science, which can easily tell
> truth from untruth, while charlatans like Derrida and Harding can
> pull one over on standardless humanists like Stanley A. Maybe you had
> to be there.
>
I remember when it happened (and didn't even subscribe to _Lingua Franca_ or _Social Text_), but IIRC, much of that gas about the rigors of experiemental science was coming from Sokal; others demurred, although perhaps not as loudly or as insistently as they should have.
Also, the work of these two...well, these two whatever-they-are is in *theoretical* physics, and my impression is that even the best of these folk are regarded with suspicion by their experimental peers. Is there any result of "string theory," for example, that so far has admitted of experimental verification?
-- Curtiss, who shouldn't have put the scare quotes around string theory, but couldn't resist.