[Xmca-l] Re: Trust and Science
Andy Blunden
andyb@marxists.org
Sat Sep 28 07:22:37 PDT 2019
Well put, Alfredo.
Sometimes, if I am talking to someone about their opposition
to say, genetically modified foods, or the introduction of
exotic organisms into Australia to solve some problem, they
will point to the disasters wrought by such actions in the
past. Likewise, suspicion of medicines can be supported by
pointing to the thalidomide scandal.
On closer examination (if there is patience for it) it turns
out that these disasters were created in the 1940s/50s and
60s. By the 1960s, 70s and 80s scientists had learnt their
lesson and such terrible mistakes are not made nowadays. But
the trust was lost by the 1960s. Science was guilty of a
fatal hubris, and restoring the trust requires more than
correcting the errors. Active measures are required to
restore trust in science, in the face of powerful and loud
voices attacking climate and related sciences, plus misuse
of science for oppressive purposes, all of which make
scientific humility problematic.
Andy
------------------------------------------------------------
*Andy Blunden*
Hegel for Social Movements <https://brill.com/view/title/54574>
Home Page <https://www.ethicalpolitics.org/ablunden/index.htm>
On 28/09/2019 9:15 pm, Alfredo Jornet Gil wrote:
>
> Henry, all,
>
> Further resonating with Beth et al’s letter, and with what
> Henry and Andy just wrote, I too think the point at which
> trust and imagination meet is key.
>
> A couple of days ago, I watched, together with my two
> daughters (10 and 4 years old respectively) segments of
> the /Right to a Future /event organized by The Intercept
> https://theintercept.com/2019/09/06/greta-thunberg-naomi-klein-climate-change-livestream/
> , where young and not-so-young activists and journalists
> discussed visions of 2029 if we, today, would lead radical
> change. It was a great chance to engage in some
> conversation with my children about these issues,
> specially with my older one; about hope and about the
> importance of fighting for justice.
>
> At some point in a follow-up conversation that we had in
> bed, right before sleep, we spoke about the good things
> that we still have with respect to nature and community,
> and I–perhaps not having considered my daughter’s limited
> awareness of the reach of the crisis–emphasized that it
> was important to value and enjoy those things we have in
> the present, when there is uncertainty as to the
> conditions that there will be in the near future. My
> daughter, very concerned, turned to me and, with what I
> felt was a mix of fair and skepticism, said: “but dad, are
> not people fixing the problem already so that everything
> will go well?”
>
> It truly broke my heart. I reassured her that we are
> working as hard as we can, but invited her not to stop
> reminding everyone that we cannot afford stop fighting.
>
> My daughter clearly exhibited her (rightful) habit of
> trust that adults address problems, that they’ll take care
> of us, that things will end well, or at least, that
> they’ll try their best. In terms of purely formal
> scientific testing, it turns out that my daughter’s
> hypothesis could easily be rejected, as it is rather the
> case that my parent’s generation did very little to
> address problems they were “aware” of (another discussion
> is what it is meant by “awareness” in cases such as being
> aware of the effects of fossil fuels and still
> accelerating their exploitation). Yet, it would totally be
> against the interest of science and society that my
> daughter loses that trust. For if she does, then I fear
> she will be incapable of imagining a thriving future to
> demand and fight for. I fear she will lose a firm ground
> for agency. Which teaches me that the pedagogy that can
> help in this context of crisis is one in which basic trust
> in the good faith and orientation towards the common good
> of expertise is restored, and that the only way to restore
> it is by indeed acting accordingly, reclaiming and
> occupying the agency and responsibility of making sure
> that younger and older can continue creatively imagining a
> future in which things will go well at the end.
>
> Alfredo
>
> *From: *<xmca-l-bounces@mailman.ucsd.edu> on behalf of
> Andy Blunden <andyb@marxists.org>
> *Reply to: *"eXtended Mind, Culture, Activity"
> <xmca-l@mailman.ucsd.edu>
> *Date: *Saturday, 28 September 2019 at 04:38
> *To: *"xmca-l@mailman.ucsd.edu" <xmca-l@mailman.ucsd.edu>
> *Subject: *[Xmca-l] Trust and Science
>
> Science is based on trust, isn't it, Henry. Only a handful
> of people have actually measured climate change, and then
> probably only one factor. If we have a picture of climate
> change at all, for scientists and non-scientists alike, it
> is only because we /trust/ the institutions of science
> sufficiently. And yet, everyone on this list knows how
> wrong these institutions can be when it comes to the area
> of our own expertise. So "blind trust" is not enough, one
> needs "critical trust" so to speak, in order to know
> anything scientifically. Very demanding.
>
> Important as trust is, I am inclined to think trust and
> its absence are symptoms of even more fundamental societal
> characteristics, because it is never just a question of
> *how much* trust there is in a society, but *who* people
> trust. It seems that nowadays people are very erratic
> about *who *they trust about *what *and who they do not trust.
>
> Probably the agreement you saw between Huw and me was
> probably pretty shaky, but we have a commonality in our
> trusted sources, we have worked together in the past and
> share basic respect for each other and for science.
> Workable agreement. I despair over what I see happening in
> the UK now, where MPs genuinely fear for their lives
> because of the level of hatred and division in the
> community, which is beginning to be even worse than what
> Trump has created in the US. A total breakdown in trust
> *alongside* tragically misplaced trust in a couple of
> utterly cynical criminals! The divisions are just as sharp
> here in Oz too, but it has not go to that frightening
> level of menace it has reached in the UK and US.
>
> Greta Thunberg talks of a plural, collective "we" in
> opposition to a singular personal "you." She brilliantly,
> in my opinion, turns this black-and-white condition of the
> world around in a manner which just could turn it into its
> negation. Her use of language at the UN is reminiscent of
> Churchill's "we fill fight them on the beaches ..." speech
> and Martin Luther King's "I have a dream" speech. There's
> something for you linguists to get your teeth into!
>
> Andy
>
> ------------------------------------------------------------
>
> *Andy Blunden*
> Hegel for Social Movements
> <https://brill.com/view/title/54574>
> Home Page
> <https://www.ethicalpolitics.org/ablunden/index.htm>
>
> On 28/09/2019 2:42 am, HENRY SHONERD wrote:
>
> Andy and Huw,
>
> This is a perfect example of what I was talking about
> in the discussion of your article on Academia: Two
> philosophers having a dialog about the same
> pholosophical object, a dialog manifesting an
> experience of common understanding. In the same way
> that two mathematicians might agree on a mathematical
> proof. I have to believe that you are not bull
> shitting, that you really have understood each other
> via your language. So, of course this is of interest
> to a linguist, even though he/I don’t really get the
> “proof”. I may not understand the arguments you are
> making, but I can imagine, based on slogging through
> thinking as a lingist, what it’s like to get it.
>
> I think this relates to the problem in the world of a
> lack of trust in scientific expertise, in expertise in
> general. Where concpetual thinking reigns. So many
> climate deniers. So many Brexiters. But can you blame
> them entirely? Probably it would be better to say that
> trust isn’t enough. The problem is a lack of
> connection between trust and the creative imagination.
> It’s what Beth Fernholt and her pals have sent to the
> New Yorker.
>
> Henry
>
>
>
> On Sep 27, 2019, at 6:40 AM, Andy Blunden
> <andyb@marxists.org <mailto:andyb@marxists.org>>
> wrote:
>
> Thanks, Huw.
>
> The interconnectedness of the "four concepts," I
> agree, they imply each other, but nonetheless,
> they remain distinct insights. Just because you
> get one, you don't necessarily get the others.
>
> Hegel uses the expression "true concept" only
> rarely. Generally, he simply uses the word
> "concept," and uses a variety of other terms like
> "mere conception" or "representation" or
> "category" to indicate something short of a
> concept, properly so called, but there is no
> strict categorisation for Hegel. Hegel is not
> talking about Psychology, let alone child
> psychology. Like with Vygotsky, all thought-forms
> (or forms of activity) are just phases (or stages)
> in the development of a concept. Reading your
> message, I think I am using the term "true
> concept" in much the same way you are.
>
> (This is not relevant to my article, but I
> distinguish "true concept" from "actual concept."
> All the various forms of "complexive thinking"
> fall short, so to speak, of "true concepts," and
> further development takes an abstract concept,
> such as learnt in lecture 101 of a topic, to an
> "actual concept". But that is not relevant here.
> Hegel barely touches on these issues.)
>
> I don't agree with your specific categories, but
> yes, for Vygotsky, chapters 4, 5 and 6 are all
> talking about concepts in a developmental sense.
> There are about 10 distinct stages for Vygotsky.
> And they are not equivalent to any series of
> stages identified by Hegel. Vgotsky's "stages"
> were drawn from a specific experiment with
> children; Hegel's Logic is cast somewhat
> differently (the Logic is not a series of stages)
> and has a domain much larger than Psychology.
>
> The experienced doctor does not use what I would
> call "formal concepts" in her work, which are what
> I would call the concepts they learnt in
> Diagnostics 101 when they were a student. After 20
> years of experience, these formal concepts have
> accrued practical life experience, and remain true
> concepts, but are no longer "formal." Of course,
> the student was not taught pseudoconcepts in
> Diagnostics 101. But all this is nothing to do
> with the article in question.
>
> Hegel and Vygotsky are talking about different
> things, but even in terms of the subject matter,
> but especially in terms of the conceptual form,
> there is more Hegel in "Thinking and Speech" than
> initially meets the eye.
>
> Andy
>
> ------------------------------------------------------------
>
> *Andy Blunden*
> Hegel for Social Movements
> <https://brill.com/view/title/54574>
> Home Page
> <https://www.ethicalpolitics.org/ablunden/index.htm>
>
> On 27/09/2019 4:32 pm, Huw Lloyd wrote:
>
> The "four concepts", for me, are four aspects
> of one understanding -- they imply each other.
>
> Quoting this passage:
>
>
> "The ‘abstract generality’ referred to above
> by Hegel, Vygotsky aptly called a
> ‘pseudoconcept’ - a form of abstract
> generalization, uniting objects by shared
> common features, which resembles conceptual
> thinking because, within a limited domain
> ofexperience, they subsume the same objects
> and situations as the true concept indicated
> by the same word.
> The pseudoconcept is not the exclusive
> achievement of the child. In our everyday
> lives, our thinking frequently occurs in
> pseudoconcepts. From the perspective of
> dialectical logic, the concepts that we find
> in our living speech are not concepts in the
> true sense of the word. They are actually
> general representations of things. There is no
> doubt, however, that these representations are
> a transitional stage between complexes or
> pseudoconcepts and true concepts. (Vygotsky,
> 1934/1987, p. 155)"
>
> My impression from your text, Andy, is that
> you are misreading Vygotsky's "Thinking and
> Speech". Implicit LSV's whole text of vol. 1
> is an appreciation for different kinds of
> conception (3 levels: pseudo, formal, and
> dialectical), but the terminology of "concept"
> is only applied to the formal concept, i.e.
> where Vygotsky writes "concept" one can read
> "formal concept".
>
> In vol. 1, the analysis of the trajectory of
> the thought of the child is towards a growing
> achievement of employing formal concepts.
> These formal concepts are only called "true
> concepts" (not to be confused with Hegel's
> true concept) in relation to the pseudo (fake
> or untrue) formal concepts. The pseudo
> concepts pertain to a form of cognition that
> is considered by Vygotsky (quite sensibly) to
> precede the concepts of formal logic. This is
> quite obvious to any thorough-going
> psychological reading of the text.
>
> However, within the frame of analysis of the
> text there is another form of conception which
> is Vygotsky's approach towards a dialectical
> understanding. None of Vygotsky's utterances
> about dialectics (in this volume) should be
> conflated with the "true concept" which he is
> using as a short-hand for the "true formal
> concept", similarly none of Vygotsky's
> utterances about "pseudo concepts" should be
> confused with formal concepts.
>
> I hope that helps,
>
> Huw
>
> On Sat, 21 Sep 2019 at 06:37, Andy Blunden
> <andyb@marxists.org
> <mailto:andyb@marxists.org>> wrote:
>
> I'd dearly like to get some discussion
> going on this:
>
> It will be shown that at least four
> foundational concepts of Cultural
> Historical Activity Theory were
> previously formulated by Hegel, viz.,
> (1) the unit of analysis as a key
> concept for analytic-synthetic
> cognition, (2) the centrality of
> artifact-mediated actions, (3) the
> definitive distinction between goal
> and motive in activities, and (4) the
> distinction between a true concept and
> a pseudoconcept.
>
> https://www.academia.edu/s/7d70db6eb3/the-hegelian-sources-of-cultural-historical-activity-theory
>
> Andy
>
> --
>
> ------------------------------------------------------------
>
> *Andy Blunden*
> Hegel for Social Movements
> <https://brill.com/view/title/54574>
> Home Page
> <https://www.ethicalpolitics.org/ablunden/index.htm>
>
>
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