Sam Harris in Dublin next July

Hector Savage

ancapailldorcha wrote: »

Exactly. He's basically selling victimhood to working class whites á la Tommy Robinson, Nigel Farage, etc... I know he has that book out but I don't see too many people actually doing anything useful because of it.

Rees-Mogg has, unusually for an Etonian Tory, upped the level of "poshness" where the likes of David Cameron tried to appear less so. Rees-Mogg has turned himself into a one man freakshow where the accent makes the soundbytes that he spouts on cue appear intellectual. Peterson has precise phrasing in that he structures in arguments such that questioning them at all serves to make the critic look foolish. Rees-Mogg's accent and manner appear to make him intelligent when the only work he's ever had to do is to gain acceptance among his peers in spite of his Catholic faith.

Hmm... If I ever ask him, he'll probably tell me that I don't know what a troll is.

My God, you don't half spout some utter VERY SMELLY BIRD POO!!!

.

Hector Savage

Hector Savage wrote: »

My God, you don't half spout some utter VERY SMELLY BIRD POO!!!

.

:D

nozzferrahhtoo

I have always loved how Stephen Fry could load a single word with so much meaning. Debate here where he was on the same side with Peterson. Not a great debate, but this whole "Identity politics" and "political correctness" stuff has never interested me so that is probably more an evaluate of me than of the debate itself. But it did little for me.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=GxYimeaoea0

Anyway in his opening sentence Fry made a point of pointing out that it is unusual he sits on the same side of the debate with Peterson on any issue. And the way he said it was great. He described Peterson as someone with whom he has "....... differences". And somehow Fry loaded that single word with so much weight and feeling you could tell how much he meant it.

nozzferrahhtoo

I have yet to see anything that insightful from him really. There was one line he came out with, one time, which I liked. About how evaluating people with anxiety is the wrong question, when the right question is why the rest of us are NOT anxious and in terror the whole time.

Other than that I have yet to see him say anything noteworthy, insightful, useful or........most of all...... in any way meaningfully actionable.

While some of it is patent nonsense. His "There are artists and poets who think they are godless." line of non-reasoning is just a regurgitation of the "no atheists in foxholes" nonsense and his "You cant stop smoking without supernatural intervention" canard even worse.

And lately I came across him looking at ancient Chinese paintings showings things like intertwined snakes and declaring that he "really believes" that the paintings are representative of an innate knowledge of the Double Helix Structure of DNA which the painters probably acquired while out of their heads on something like Ayahuasca.

When people offer claims and conclusions however, I am less interested in ruminating on their psychological state of mind than I am in evaluating the arguments, evidence, data and reasoning they offer while making a claim.

robindch

/every/some/

bnt

There was an interesting interview with Harris in the Independent (UK) last week - here. There's definitely some academic friction going on between Harris and Peterson - on several issues they aren't on the same page at all.

I think there’s a legitimate crisis that’s not limited to white young men. There’s a crisis of identity, there’s a crisis of meaning. Everything seems to be conspiring to fragment human life now. Just what we’re doing to ourselves with social media and smartphones, and the way in which advanced economies are stratifying with respect to skills and educational attainment. You’re getting a massive spread in with inequality and job prospects based on all that. It’s a difficult time to find a durable sense of what your life is for. Confidence that you’re living your life in a way that is guaranteed to be meaningful is hard to come by now. There’s sort of ready-made ways of pacifying these concerns and religion is the classic one. Insofar as Peterson’s making an overt appeal to religion, he is (in my view) pandering to ancient fears and modern instability in a way that is intellectually dishonest, and he should know that much of what he’s saying is bull****. That’s the stuff we’ll disagree about. Everything he says about the Bible and its primacy or the necessity of grappling with Nietzsche or Dostoyevsky… I don’t agree with any of that, but it’s easy to see how that’s landing with people who feel that their lives are a boring story and Peterson is providing an interesting one, or a grandiose one. People who can’t figure out what they’re doing with their lives between playing video games and checking Instagram, and Peterson is telling them “no, you don’t understand, you really should be slaying a dragon and rescuing the maiden and returning with untold riches, and that’s your birthright.” And it’s a compelling story for some people, but on that level, I don’t think it’s an especially interesting one.

But the problem he’s unmasked in the largely secular world of this crisis of meaning and purpose, I think that is a legitimate problem and I think his unmasking it has been a very important sociological phenomenon. That’s why I’m doing these events with him: not because I think that our podcasts together suggest that we have much more that we need to keep talking about, I just think that there’s a need that needs to be served here in the secular community which is being badly served. The success that he is having at the moment is unmasking that need, and showing that there’s a need for a rational conversation about meaning and value and human flourishing and the defence of civilisation. We have to have this conversation better than we’ve been having it.

CerebralCortex

vapor trails wrote: »

Whatever about Peterson, I am going to listen to Sam Harris. The guy delivers his points in such an articulate and calm manner I can't help but admire him.

You should try.

vapor trails

I bought a ticket to this about 3 months ago but I had to take annual leave this week so I can't go. Its dead centre 5 rows from the front. Any takers? Cost me €140! Will give it away for free

nozzferrahhtoo

I know two people who might take that, just trying to get in touch with them now. They are awkward to get hold of. If they go in the meantime to someone else, let me know.

Pm sent

alaimacerc

Interesting appearance from JP on the radio today. Didn't learn much as such, mainly just the usual stuff about lobsters, bait and switch use of "enforced", and getting utterly outraged when some mere woman presenter questions him on his ineffable wisdom. But I'd not heard of this event, and was a tad gobsmacked to learn that he'd (seemingly, more or less) sold out an arena event. (Unless they're all actually Douglas Murray fans, and it's a block booking by The National Party, who knows.)

Those nice things, another six thousand-odd reasons we can't have them.

ancapailldorcha wrote: »

Is he just trolling? He doesn't seem daft enough to believe in nonsense like that. It seems to me like he's packaging the nonsense elements of the modern right along with what your grandparents would have called common sense (Think tidy your room) and phrasing it in such a way that anyone who questions it is made to appear ridiculous for questioning the Messianic figure that some people see him as.

I'm voting on daft enough to believe them. Or some sufficiently compartmentalised version of most of it, with some "ends justify the means, somehow" mental putty for the rest of it. There's doubtless a Personality Syndrome that covers it -- clinician, diagnose thyself.

robindch wrote: »

In the above, he's not unlike the odious Tory politician Jacob Rees-Mogg who revels in tactics like these, though Rees-Mogg seems to aim his wayward comments at older people.

And has a more traditionalist conservative-nationalist narrative to do it with, complete indeed with explicit Religious Values stuff, rather than this sort of alt/male-identitarian stuff.

Hotblack Desiato

Our old friend Breda O'Brien has latched onto Peterson's drivel:

https://www.irishtimes.com/opinion/breda-o-brien-atheist-based-discussion-still-illuminated-life-1.3571365

Someone posted this link in the comments, it's worth a read:

https://longreads.com/2018/07/12/petersons-complaint/

The fact that this is being taken seriously, that it demands to be taken seriously, is frankly embarrassing to converts and critics alike; a symptom of an intellectual and political culture running on fumes. The emptiness of Peterson’s pronouncements, as Nathan J. Robinson writes at Current Affairs, “should be obvious to anyone who has spent even a few moments critically examining his writings and speeches, which are comically befuddled, pompous, and ignorant. They are half nonsense, half banality. In a reasonable world, Peterson would be seen as the kind of tedious crackpot that one hopes not to get seated next to on a train.”

But we do not live in a reasonable world. Instead, we live in a world where the worth of an idea can be measured in dollars. Many of Peterson’s true believers fall back, when challenged, on the indisputable fact that he sells a lot of books and brings in almost a hundred grand a month on Patreon, and that’s before you get to his appearance fees and billable extras. (A test called the “Big Five Aspects Scale” that promises to help you understand yourself will set you back a cool $9.95. I downloaded it on a whim. It told me I had poor impulse control. Even a stopped clock tells the right time twice a day.).

Anyone go to the actual event? Would not mind a review. Harris himself said it was nearly sold out. But an article I read in - I think GQ - described it as almost empty. I am guessing the truth was in the middle somewhere?

Harris says he really experienced a divide in the audience here and in the UK that was no so clear in Vancouver. Where you really had a Harris fanbase and a Peterson fanbase. And they were reallly in the mood of catcalling and cheering for the points their figurehead was making. Making it more like a battle than a talk.

Though Harris put this down to the varying levels of booze served between the two continents.

BaronVon

I was at it. I'd say it was about 90% full. Some seats at the side were cordoned off as the view would be crap. But I was surprised it was as full as it was.

The bar was only open for an hour before hand, so I don't think it was much to do with booze.

Before it started, they had members of the audience come up to be interviewed. About 75% of the people who spoke were there to see Peterson, which surprised me.

donaghs

Hotblack Desiato wrote: »

Our old friend Breda O'Brien has latched onto Peterson's drivel:

https://www.irishtimes.com/opinion/breda-o-brien-atheist-based-discussion-still-illuminated-life-1.3571365

Someone posted this link in the comments, it's worth a read:

https://longreads.com/2018/07/12/petersons-complaint/

So you don't like Peterson's stuff. But why all the outrage? The strangest thing about the Peterson phenomenon is the way he's portrayed in mainstream media some some sort of neo-Nazi svengali. Yet who is also paradoxically clueless about his subject matter.

I find him interesting to listen to, except when he goes off on religious-themed tangents. I've never been into "self-help", so won't necessarily be following his advice. But I understand that much of the self-help industry is built on offering simple common sense advice. That's not always a scam, I can understand that its helpful to reminded about common sense. I can pick up "7 Habits.." and see useful advice in its. Things I know I should be doing, but don't always follow through on.

nozzferrahhtoo

If calling something "drivel" is outrage then I am not sure what is NOT outrage any more. That would seem the most tepid of criticisms in a modern world that not only seems to take offence and outrage more often than ever before..... but seems intent on actively seeking it out and creating it when it is not even there. Like that story I heard of recently where a person ended up losing their job (compelled to resign I think) for merely misusing..... with what seemed to be the purest and well meant of intentions.... the word "mold".

To be honest though I too have difficulty seeing what peoples issue with Peterson actually is. For the most part, having now listened to material of him talking numbering somewhere between 28 and 35 hours of material........ he for the most part seems to be saying absolutely nothing at all. He uses a hell of a lot of words TO say that nothing, but nothing it mostly appears to be.

Much of the time he appears to be only trying to say that things are complicated.... in fact I think people have produced Peterson T-Shirts with the slogan "Its complicated" on it.......... while much of the rest of the time he seems to just want to see how often he can use the word "substrate" in ways that make no apparent sense. But when you strip those away there appears to be little there he is actually saying of any actual content.

When he does come out with a statement or point that registers as more than merely nothing however, he does seem to trot out some egregious nonsense. His claim that people can not give up smoking without some kind of divine intervention. His claim that through the use of drugs people obtained, long before science discovered it, a knowledge of the Double Helix nature of DNA. His claim that atheists are not really atheists because if they were they would all be like straight out of Dostoyevsky and the fact they are not means they can not be atheist. Or that he thinks artists who are atheist only THINK they are atheist, but he knows that aren't really.

This stuff is complete nonsense. Navel gazing of the shallowest kind coupled with a refusal to hold the navel contents up to reality to see if it tracks. I wonder if anyone over here would ever have heard his name had he not taken a stand against the use of gender pronouns being written into Canadian Law.

However for those interested the Dublin event is now online for all to see. And I quite like how they have been starting their events in Vancouver and Dublin and London by summarizing and "steel manning" the position of the other. Which means if nothing else, the first 8 minutes of the video is worth a watch. The rest of the video basically just goes back and forth over that ground and Id say take it or leave it.

BaronVon

Here's the Dublin show....

And the subsequent London one......

AllForIt

nozzferrahhtoo wrote: »

If calling something "drivel" is outrage then I am not sure what is NOT outrage any more. That would seem the most tepid of criticisms in a modern world that not only seems to take offence and outrage more often than ever before..... but seems intent on actively seeking it out and creating it when it is not even there. Like that story I heard of recently where a person ended up losing their job (compelled to resign I think) for merely misusing..... with what seemed to be the purest and well meant of intentions.... the word "mold".

To be honest though I too have difficulty seeing what peoples issue with Peterson actually is. For the most part, having now listened to material of him talking numbering somewhere between 28 and 35 hours of material........ he for the most part seems to be saying absolutely nothing at all. He uses a hell of a lot of words TO say that nothing, but nothing it mostly appears to be.

Much of the time he appears to be only trying to say that things are complicated.... in fact I think people have produced Peterson T-Shirts with the slogan "Its complicated" on it.......... while much of the rest of the time he seems to just want to see how often he can use the word "substrate" in ways that make no apparent sense. But when you strip those away there appears to be little there he is actually saying of any actual content.

When he does come out with a statement or point that registers as more than merely nothing however, he does seem to trot out some egregious nonsense. His claim that people can not give up smoking without some kind of divine intervention. His claim that through the use of drugs people obtained, long before science discovered it, a knowledge of the Double Helix nature of DNA. His claim that atheists are not really atheists because if they were they would all be like straight out of Dostoyevsky and the fact they are not means they can not be atheist. Or that he thinks artists who are atheist only THINK they are atheist, but he knows that aren't really.

This stuff is complete nonsense. Navel gazing of the shallowest kind coupled with a refusal to hold the navel contents up to reality to see if it tracks. I wonder if anyone over here would ever have heard his name had he not taken a stand against the use of gender pronouns being written into Canadian Law.

However for those interested the Dublin event is now online for all to see. And I quite like how they have been starting their events in Vancouver and Dublin and London by summarizing and "steel manning" the position of the other. Which means if nothing else, the first 8 minutes of the video is worth a watch. The rest of the video basically just goes back and forth over that ground and Id say take it or leave it.

I find this assessment of JP to be grossly unfair.

Yes he does say "It's complicated" a lot but to me that's a physiological marker for him where he usually goes on to explain why something is complicated, even if he don't explain the nuance in full, often due to time constraints and because he has A LOT to say, not very little to say, as you say.

JP is not so infamous because of the gender pronoun issue. He's become infamous primarily because of his utter contempt for the idea of "The Patriarchy" for which left wing and radical feminists have lashed out of him, including slurs that suggest that his 'fans' are in fact the alt-right. A ridiculous suggestion.

He talks about the radical left a lot and the dangers in it and similarly critizes the radical right. He points out that the Canadian and USA universities are more or less run by leftists, hence "Gender Studies' degrees. I find this at least interesting whether or not it's as bad as he makes out.

There is also a great deal of intellectual snobbery going on in discussions related to JP. If one doesn't find he has anything interesting to say, and it's because you've heard it all before, then that's fine, but argue against what he's saying instead of accusing him of regurgitating stuff other intellectuals have said.

JP is all over YouTube at the moment. I find him most interesting because he's a clinical physiologist and I find the stuff he says on human psychology very interesting but then again I'm not a psychologist, just a layman in that field so why wouldn't I. There may be much better psychologists out there but he's the one thats current atm so more power to him I say and I congratulate him on his success. The idea that he knew in advance how successful he was going to before posting on youtube and he does it all for the wonga really says something about his critics.

nozzferrahhtoo

AllForIt wrote: »

Yes he does say "It's complicated" a lot but to me that's a physiological marker for him where he usually goes on to explain why something is complicated

Sometimes. Sometimes not. He quite often just falls back on his other move of listing book titles at people and not answering the question.

AllForIt wrote: »

JP is not so infamous because of the gender pronoun issue.

If you say so, but talking to people myself included I struggle to find many who heard of him before that issue and I struggle to find anything that might have propelled him into the media spotlight since that issue. And while not old he is not exactly young either. So his sudden rise to popularity might have another source, but I am not seeing it myself. And perhaps another issue would have done it had that one never happened, but I am not seeing what it might be or might have been.

AllForIt wrote: »

There is also a great deal of intellectual snobbery going on in discussions related to JP. If one doesn't find he has anything interesting to say, and it's because you've heard it all before, then that's fine, but argue against what he's saying instead of accusing him of regurgitating stuff other intellectuals have said.

Everything I wrote above was my own work, not repetition of anything anyone else has said. Further I HAVE done what you say above and argued against what he is saying. You ignoring it does not mean I never did it. I made specific references to things he said in the post you just quoted in fact. So maybe argue against what IM saying instead of accusing me of doing stuff other intellectuals have done?

If you think he has a particularly good point to make on any topic then by all means present it and we can discuss it. For example I do not disagree at all with his idea that we should not be making the use of language a legal issue. That if gender fluid people want the use of certain pronouns they can by all means discuss that with us. But if the government want to make that a legal issue, that is a problem. 100% in agreement with him there!

But until you do that your complaint here is not only wrong for the reasons I just said, but also pretty nebulous and vague and in fact the only "assessment" that is "grossly unfair" around here therefore is yours about me because you are basing it around faulting me for not doing what I patently and demonstrably did do not just in general but specifically in the post you JUST hit reply on and purported to have actually read.

AllForIt wrote: »

I find him most interesting because he's a clinical physiologist and I find the stuff he says on human psychology very interesting

Maybe he should stick to that topic. I can not say I have seen him say much interesting on the topic, or at least not anything I have not heard many times before from many other people. Mainly because Psychology is a field I am heavily invested in and have studied a lot. For someone who has not done that, a lay man as you point out you are yourself, perhaps a lot of what he says sounds interesting and new. Which is good, nothing wrong with that at all!

When he actually talks about his day job I get the impression he is likely very good at it in fact. If someone suffering from mental health issues was going to him as their specialist, I would expect them to do quite well under his care from what I have heard from him.

It is funny this thread just got resurrected though because I was just reading someone else from boards.ie on another site talking about him. And they made a semi comical semi serious comparison of him to Deepak Chopra. At least in their use of language. Chopra as you may know is someone who uses the fluffy language of Physics to talk a bunch of complete bull excrement. And there are words he uses because A) generally the average person does not know what the word means and by slightly or even wholly misusing those particular words he compounds the issue that most people do not know what they mean.

So Chopra throws out words like "quantum" a lot. Most people do not know what that word really means and the way he uses it is also skewed. Peterson does that a lot too with words like "substrate". But using, and even misusing terms in this fluffy way can give the lay man the impression the speaker is saying a lot more than they actually are, with a lot more profundity than they actually are, with a lot more competence than they actually are. And my fear is, with Chopra for sure and with Peterson maybe too.... that that is actually their intention.

I think mental health and psychology is an area where we need MORE people being Science Communicators. We need more Carl Sagans, Tysons, Coxs and so forth in that area, not less. So I can not fault Peterson for that! But if he wants to communicate that field to the layman he needs to couch his discourse in the language of the lay man somewhat more I think. Joe Rogan has talked a lot about Mental Health issues for example, hell even the Irish Podcaster "Blindboy" did a series of 3 or 4 podcasts on the subject in the past months, and they did so in a very accessible way that the average Joe on the street actually is going to understand and was in no way based on fluffy language or in weird physiological comparisons between Humans and Lobsters that make little sense at a linguistic OR biological level.

AllForIt wrote: »

The idea that he knew in advance how successful he was going to before posting on youtube and he does it all for the wonga really says something about his critics.

If you say so. Since that is not a position I express or espouse I can not really comment on it.

robindch

AllForIt wrote: »

Yes he does say "It's complicated" a lot but to me that's a physiological marker for him where he usually goes on to explain why something is complicated, even if he don't explain the nuance in full, often due to time constraints and because he has A LOT to say, not very little to say, as you say.

Does youtube have a time constraint?

AllForIt

nozzferrahhtoo wrote: »

S
If you think he has a particularly good point to make on any topic then by all means present it and we can discuss it.

Ha! I knew you would do that.

I won't fall into the trap of you asking me to defend JP's views somewhere along the line of your long winded reply as is you trademark.

If you read back on my previous post it was a defense of JP as an intellectual, I wasn't defending or nor am I capable of defending all of this views for which he has many across a wide range of topics.

Why I resurrected this thread (and it's not that old so could hardly qualify as resurrection) is precisely because of yours and others arrogant dismissal of him.

Just take this post for example: https://www.boards.ie/vbulletin/showpost.php?p=107595807&postcount=63 . Nothing to say just to say some highly successful clinical psychologist professor is talking drivel.

I doubt anyone on this forum is anywhere near the caliber of JP but some might like to think so like the awful moderator Robindch who asks stupid questions concerning YouTube time constraints.

robindch

AllForIt wrote: »

I doubt anyone on this forum is anywhere near the caliber of JP but some might like to think so like the awful moderator Robindch who asks stupid questions concerning YouTube time constraints.

If only there were a card for sheer idiocy as well as simple personal abuse :rolleyes:

AllForIt

robindch wrote: »

Does youtube have a time constraint?

robindch wrote: »

If only there were a card for sheer idiocy as well as simple personal abuse :rolleyes:

I'm heartened that you know what stupidity is even if you don't see it in yourself.

robindch

AllFotIt is taking a few days off to have some thoughts and prayers.

nozzferrahhtoo

AllForIt wrote: »

Ha! I knew you would do that.

Yes and water is wet. If you make the demand that I deal directly with things he has said..... it is hardly a prediction of wondrous prophecy to deduce I might in response ask you for specifics so that I can do exactly that is it?

AllForIt wrote: »

If you read back on my previous post it was a defense of JP as an intellectual

No, if I read back on your previous post I see the direct and clear accusation that I regurgitated attacks on his person from other intellectuals without directly dealing with things he himself has actually said.

Which was massively disingenuous given:

A) Nothing in the post you quoted was me regurgitating anything
the post contained DIRECT references to things he himself has actually said

So despite your spewing out the words "argue against what he's saying instead", I patently and demonstrably DID already did. You appear to have a record to play and did not care to even read the post you were using as a spring board to play it. But I believe you now have a few days to maybe compile a response that actually does apply to my post. Give it another go.

Hotblack Desiato

AllForIt wrote: »

Just take this post for example: https://www.boards.ie/vbulletin/showpost.php?p=107595807&postcount=63

I am soooo pumped that you quoted my post

Care to address any of the points raised...?

It's oh so predictable that the alt-right and catholic ultra-conservatives are both congregating around JP like he's the new messiah, none of them have an original thought in their head.