Out of professional obligation, I have started reading James Lindsay's latest entry on his blog, and please let me release some steam by saying the first paragraph is a #writingstudies teacher's nightmare.
OK, thanks for listening.
I'll be my usual tough self and continue now.
OK, thanks for listening.
I'll be my usual tough self and continue now.
Yes, I am continuing to read.
Allow me to paste this: "I contend that this phenomenon represents a potentially existential risk to advanced modern civilizations, and, by the same actors insisting that two and two don’t necessarily make four, am being mocked for saying so."
Allow me to paste this: "I contend that this phenomenon represents a potentially existential risk to advanced modern civilizations, and, by the same actors insisting that two and two don’t necessarily make four, am being mocked for saying so."
It's not going to get better, is it. Just recording here that I proceed without any illusions.
Folks, James Lindsay seems truly afraid that a Black, social justice oriented man like Kareem Carr is participating in discussion of what's true and correct. And he suggests that physical force might be exerted over him. It's disturbing to hear him think. See quote below.
"The activists are seeking a radical rewriting of the entire rational project, & any reason that doesn’t forward their favored actors as the sole arbiters of what is true & correct needs to be deconstructed by rhetorical tricks & marginalized by moral &, perhaps, physical force."
Lindsay seems unable to notice obvious distinctions. He's writing about an extended Twitter debate he's had with a stats PhD, and he keeps calling that "postmodernists" and "deconstructionists" trying to destroy mathematics.
This is gibberish on a level you wouldn't believe.
This is gibberish on a level you wouldn't believe.
Step 1: Lindsay, math PhD, fights on Twitter with a statistics PhD student (with a math MSc and stats MA) who's devoted his Twitter timeline to make statistics jokes and is amazingly dedicated to science communication.
Step 2: Lindsay writes several thousand words of tripe, starting paragraphs like: "Although it’s generally true that no one wants to have to stomach more mathematics than they absolutely have to. . ."
I guess he shows he knows his audience.
Ever since I got into the discussion, and was retweeted by a few rationalism bros, I've gotten a string of angry tweets that think they're challenging me about math while presenting only schlubby, ill-read arguments.
Ever since I got into the discussion, and was retweeted by a few rationalism bros, I've gotten a string of angry tweets that think they're challenging me about math while presenting only schlubby, ill-read arguments.
Lindsay: "This, in abstract algebra (which I had never dreamed I’d have to write a popular essay about) is called 'modular arithmetic.'"
Thieme: Now ask yourself why it hadn't occurred to you that you could write a popular essay about it.
Thieme: Now ask yourself why it hadn't occurred to you that you could write a popular essay about it.
When Lindsay gets to his sincere explanations of the math underlying the discussion, the paragraphs get interesting.
But he can't do it without mockery and protestation: I can't believe I have to explain this! Never would I have thought I'd have to talk about math this way!
But he can't do it without mockery and protestation: I can't believe I have to explain this! Never would I have thought I'd have to talk about math this way!
He really does a good job explaining what the different applied examples that were brought forward look like when translated into accepted math notation and operations.
I enjoyed that part.
And then he says this. ⬇️
I enjoyed that part.
And then he says this. ⬇️
"This has, of course, been very tedious, & maybe few will have read this far, but it’s worth wrapping up with an attempt to defend the objectivity of mathematics & make sense of the tiny little trivial crack through which CSJ postmodernism is able to wedge all this nonsense."
Lindsay finds it tedious to talk to his readers about math in a serious way.
He thinks they find it tedious, too.
The important part is to pronounce, once again, the objectivity of math.
And present himself as the mouthpiece of said objectivity. Preferably without having to demonstrate anything mathematical.
And present himself as the mouthpiece of said objectivity. Preferably without having to demonstrate anything mathematical.
To reiterate: "So, now I’ve written well over 8000 words on the stupidest topic I could possibly have imagined ever having to write about, but it matters—and there’s a point to take away from all this."
If you feel you need to keep telling us that writing an essay explaining something from your actual field of expertise to your devoted and really quite large audience is tedious, what are we to make of you as someone who wants so badly to be known as a critic of academia?
What I make of this: James Lindsay is an extremely sloppy thinker who cannot stand the fact that someone else might know more, or have a better description, or produce a more careful and accurate assessment than he does especially if it's in a way that disagrees with his views.
Lindsay: See what you have done, because you've disagreed with me, you've made me explain math when I didn't want to! It's the stupidest thing that I have to do this! It's stupid because it was obvious to me from the start that I was right and also very very smart! I am outraged!
How outraged?
So outraged that this is how he frames his reluctant but sensible paragraphs about math. ⬇️
"It is that postmodernism, particularly in the hands of the ideology of Critical Social Justice, is not at all interested in truth. It is only interested in power, which it will establish through its attempted revolution."
Holy non-sequitur.
Holy non-sequitur.
It continues:
"It is a direct assault on reason itself by means of destabilizing the meaning of *meaning* with the purpose of installing its own priestly caste of arbiters of how things will be according to the rubrics it lays out."
"It is a direct assault on reason itself by means of destabilizing the meaning of *meaning* with the purpose of installing its own priestly caste of arbiters of how things will be according to the rubrics it lays out."
Wait! There is more!
"This is, however, as I claimed at the beginning, a breakdown of the fundamental logic of civilization."
"This is, however, as I claimed at the beginning, a breakdown of the fundamental logic of civilization."
Yeah. If that was a student essay, I'd have a lot of marginal commentary.
The ending is some wannabe apocalyptic sci-fi shit.
"Dear student,
I really encourage you to book an office hour appointment before the due date of this essay. It really helps if students come to talk to me before the final version is finished.
All the best,
Katja"
"Dear student,
I really encourage you to book an office hour appointment before the due date of this essay. It really helps if students come to talk to me before the final version is finished.
All the best,
Katja"
Last note.
On the crucial aspect of evidence.
While Lindsay's essay paints several horrid scenes with postmodernist critical theorists engaging in possibly violent revolution that will surely destroy the logic of civilization, it has no evidence that convinces this is the case.
On the crucial aspect of evidence.
While Lindsay's essay paints several horrid scenes with postmodernist critical theorists engaging in possibly violent revolution that will surely destroy the logic of civilization, it has no evidence that convinces this is the case.
You'd think that having just come hot off a long Twitter debate, Lindsay would take the opportunity to link to relevant evidence for his claims about the motives of the people in that debate. Because I study patterns and practices of #citation, I did a count.
It was fun.
It was fun.
Lindsay includes 59 references in the form of hyperlinks. Of those 59:
47 link to his own previous blogposts on his New Discourses website (YES, forty-seven)
8 link to web articles by others (only one of those from the Twitter debate)
4 link to his own tweets
47 link to his own previous blogposts on his New Discourses website (YES, forty-seven)
8 link to web articles by others (only one of those from the Twitter debate)
4 link to his own tweets
That is some hyper-protective bubble he's built for himself.
@threadreaderapp unroll
