>I admire Chomsky a lot, but things are nowhere near that
>simple.
I agree with it's not that simple.
But whether the "lightning rod of our times" (Noam) made the formulation you are responding to, I dunno.
I find Chomsky to be non-dogmatic... Those who complain about him, are usually reacting to the questions he answers in interview. Those who worship are usually idealists. (But what do I know?)
>That's why you need theory, and why Chomsky is wrong to think
>that just getting the facts out is enough. But this is an old
>debate, I know.
For me, Chomsky has always been about language and the media that carry that language. (Others seem to imbue him with Papal status. What a waste.) His media model is one of the best I've run across.
I'd say Noam is right to think that "getting the facts out" is good, within his media model.
The facts will help enormously.
However, we deal in facts every day. All of us do. And unless you can "connect the dots" on the facts... the facts don't do it alone.
So, anyway, I don't think Noam Chomsky suggested that presenting a bunch of facts was going to change things.
It doesn't.
That's another reason mathematicians never get elected. :)
Ken.
-- I sit at the roadside. The driver is changing a wheel. I do not like where I have come from. I do not like where I am going. Why am I watching the wheel-change With impatience?
-- Bertolt Brecht, 1953 .