OSE Chapter 24. The Revolt Against Reason
“The conflict between rationalism and irrationalism has become the most important intellectual, and perhaps even moral, issue of our time.”
This is a big chapter, 26 pages, as befits a topic that has generated such a mountain of literature, much of it confused and confusing due to (a) the numerous meanings of “reason’ and ‘rationality’ and (b) the many and varied arguments and objections that are raised against the idea of using evidence and discussion to improve our plans and practices.
Section I spells out the kind of rationalism and rationality that Popper is prepared to defend, “an attitude that seeks to solve as many problems as possible by an appeal to clear thought and experience, rather than by an appeal to emotions and passions”. In case people get the idea that Popper had no time for the emotions it is helpful to note his comment (in this chapter) that a life without emotions such as love would hardly be worth living. Further, he suggested that a deal of passion is required to make an impact in any field of human endeavour, including science. Read more »
OSE Chapter 23. The Sociology of Knowledge
This chapter signals what Ian Jarvie later called Popper’s “social turn”, his recognition that whatever objectivity and rationality we can achieve cannot be attributed to special qualities of mind but to the give and take of criticism in a community.
Two dangerous ideas were emerging in intellectual circles at the time: one was the idea of controlling social change by means of largescale central planning, the other was the theory of the social determination of scientific knowledge.
In our own time of still more rapid change, we even find the desire not only to predict change, but to control it by centralized large-scale planning. These holistic views (which I have criticized in The Poverty of Historicism) represent a ompromise, as it were, between Platonic and Marxian theories. Plato’s will to arrest change, combined with Marx’s doctrine of its inevitability, yield, as a kind of Hegelian ‘synthesis’, the demand that since it cannot be entirely arrested, change should at least be ‘planned’, and controlled by the state whose power is to be vastly extended.
Moving on to the subject of this chapter, Popper refers to the Marxist doctrine that our opinions, including our moral and scientific opinions, are determined by class interest, and more generally by the social and historical situation of our time. The main target is Karl Mannheim who apparently anticipated by some decades the strong sociology of science that came later in the wake of T S Kuhn. Read more »
Catallaxy Files- Not all criticism of government is rent-seeking May 17, 2012Jess Irvine has an op-ed in the SMH where she makes the argument Meanwhile, business is acting like an adolescent, too, chucking hissy fits about workplace laws and taxation because it has learnt that this is an extremely effective parental manipulation strategy. In the teenage economy, the returns from rentseeking – or seeking special treatment [...]Sinclair Davidson
- Words from the wise May 17, 2012Graham Richardson has a must-read op-ed in the Australian today. He reveals the depths of hatred towards the PM. While it is clear Julia Gillard just doesn’t understand how bad things really are, she is at the very core of the disenchantment. These two MPs, who both voted for her in Kevin Rudd’s February challenge, [...]Sinclair Davidson
- Reactions to the The Heretic May 17, 2012Jo Nova reports some discussion stirred up by The Heretic, a play that addresses climate issues, on stage in Melbourne this week. Golly, but The Heretic is a play that appears to be genuinely useful art, something that actually challenges the paradigm. Brice Bosnich reviews it ( see below), Andrew Glikson rails against it (see, [...]Poor Old Rafe
- Not all criticism of government is rent-seeking May 17, 2012
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- Govt furphy on Indigenous homeownership May 16, 2012In a media release on the Indigenous Affairs part of the 2012 Budget, the federal government insists it ‘will continue to prioritise access to the new program for people seeking to move into home ownership on Indigenous land’ – but this is a furphy. The government is well aware that people living on Indigenous land will not be able to access money from the n […]Sara Hudson
- A move long overdue May 15, 2012At long last, services on Sydney’s highly inefficient rail network are getting some attention. Transport Minister Gladys Berejiklian has announced that 750 jobs will be cut in a restructuring effort intended to reduce bureaucratic waste. Even more heartening is that RailCorp’s projected job cuts are relatively mild, consisting of voluntary redundancies to m […]Alexander Philipatos
- Generalising about racism May 14, 2012The Sydney Morning Herald is running a poll asking if Australians are Racist. So far 74% of respondents say yes and 26% say no. Some of the commentators include Larissa Berendt who argues that Australia is a racist country because Aboriginal people have a shorter life expectancy. However, there are many reasons why their life expectancy is shorter than the a […]Sara Hudson
- Govt furphy on Indigenous homeownership May 16, 2012
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