{"id":3727,"date":"2013-04-09T11:59:37","date_gmt":"2013-03-27T14:24:34","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/glenandpaula.com\/wordpress\/archives\/2013\/04\/09\/3727"},"modified":"2013-04-09T11:59:37","modified_gmt":"2013-03-27T14:24:34","slug":"3727","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/glenandpaula.com\/wordpress\/archives\/2013\/04\/09\/3727","title":{"rendered":"\u2026"},"content":{"rendered":"

How quick\u00adly aca\u00add\u00ade\u00admics turn on their fel\u00adlows when they betray the pre\u00advail\u00ading ortho\u00addoxy. Thomas Nagel has the audac\u00adi\u00adty to hold views such as this: \u201cIf the mate\u00adri\u00adal\u00adist, neo-Dar\u00adwin\u00adian ortho\u00addoxy con\u00adtra\u00addicts com\u00admon sense, then this is a mark against the ortho\u00addoxy, not against com\u00admon sense. When a chain of rea\u00adson\u00ading leads us to deny the obvi\u00adous, we should dou\u00adble-check the chain of rea\u00adson\u00ading before we give up on the obvi\u00adous.\u201d  This, of course, gen\u00ader\u00adat\u00aded huge push\u00adback. \u201cIn a daz\u00adzling six-part tour de force rebut\u00adting Nagel\u2019s crit\u00adics, the philoso\u00adpher Edward Fes\u00ader pro\u00advid\u00aded a good anal\u00ado\u00adgy to describe the basic mate\u00adri\u00adal\u00adist error\u2014the attempt to stretch mate\u00adri\u00adal\u00adism from a work\u00ading assump\u00adtion into a com\u00adpre\u00adhen\u00adsive expla\u00adna\u00adtion of the world. Fes\u00ader sug\u00adgests a par\u00ado\u00addy of mate\u00adri\u00adal\u00adist rea\u00adson\u00ading: \u201c1. Met\u00adal detec\u00adtors have had far greater suc\u00adcess in find\u00ading coins and oth\u00ader metal\u00adlic objects in more places than any oth\u00ader method has. 2. There\u00adfore we have good rea\u00adson to think that met\u00adal detec\u00adtors can reveal to us every\u00adthing that can be revealed\u201d about metal\u00adlic objects. But of course a met\u00adal detec\u00adtor only detects the metal\u00adlic con\u00adtent of an object; it tells us noth\u00ading about its col\u00ador, size, weight, or shape. In the same way, Fes\u00ader writes, the meth\u00adods of \u201cmech\u00ada\u00adnis\u00adtic sci\u00adence are as suc\u00adcess\u00adful as they are in pre\u00addict\u00ading and con\u00adtrol\u00adling nat\u00adur\u00adal phe\u00adnom\u00ade\u00adna pre\u00adcise\u00adly because they focus on only those aspects of nature sus\u00adcep\u00adti\u00adble to pre\u00addic\u00adtion and con\u00adtrol.\u201d Mean\u00adwhile, they ignore every\u00adthing else. But this is a fatal weak\u00adness for a the\u00ado\u00adry that aspires to be a com\u00adpre\u00adhen\u00adsive pic\u00adture of the world.\u201d<\/p>\n

Inter\u00adest\u00ading through\u00adout. <\/p>\n

The Heretic<\/a><\/p>\n

Last fall, a few days before Hal\u00adloween and about a month after the pub\u00adli\u00adca\u00adtion of Mind and Cos\u00admos, the con\u00adtro\u00adver\u00adsial new book by the philoso\u00adpher Thomas Nagel, sev\u00ader\u00adal of the world\u2019s lead\u00ading philosoph\u2026\n<\/p><\/blockquote>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

How quick\u00adly aca\u00add\u00ade\u00admics turn on their fel\u00adlows when they betray the pre\u00advail\u00ading ortho\u00addoxy. Thomas Nagel has the audac\u00adi\u00adty to hold views such as this: \u201cIf the mate\u00adri\u00adal\u00adist, neo-Dar\u00adwin\u00adian ortho\u00addoxy con\u00adtra\u00addicts com\u00admon sense, then this is a mark against the ortho\u00addoxy, not against com\u00admon sense. When a chain of rea\u00adson\u00ading leads us to deny the obvi\u00adous, \u2026 Con\u00adtin\u00adue read\u00ading \u201c\u2026\u201d<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"aside","meta":{"wp_typography_post_enhancements_disabled":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_access":"","_jetpack_dont_email_post_to_subs":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_tier_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paywalled_content":false,"_jetpack_feature_clip_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":"","jetpack_publicize_message":"","jetpack_publicize_feature_enabled":true,"jetpack_social_post_already_shared":true,"jetpack_social_options":{"image_generator_settings":{"template":"highway","default_image_id":0,"font":"","enabled":false},"version":2},"jetpack_post_was_ever_published":false},"categories":[11],"tags":[103],"class_list":["post-3727","post","type-post","status-publish","format-aside","hentry","category-asides","tag-google","post_format-post-format-aside"],"jetpack_publicize_connections":[],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","jetpack_shortlink":"https:\/\/wp.me\/s6Ded-3727","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"jetpack-related-posts":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/glenandpaula.com\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/3727","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/glenandpaula.com\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/glenandpaula.com\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/glenandpaula.com\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/glenandpaula.com\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=3727"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/glenandpaula.com\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/3727\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/glenandpaula.com\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=3727"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/glenandpaula.com\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=3727"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/glenandpaula.com\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=3727"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}