Moonbat alert: Chomksy condemns Bin Laden kill.

Virus said:
So you agree that his handling of historical sources isn't considered reliable?
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not finding anyone to agree with you?
not surprising in light of this quote that childlike empress posted:
Originally Posted by Summers
Is Chomsky left out because he is not a professional historian? The journals have reviewed such nonhistorians as Robert Bellah, Randall Collins, Michel Foucault, Clifford Geertz, Nathan Glazer, Irving Howe, Seymour Martin Lipset, Richard Rorty, Edward Said, Garry Wills, and John Updike because the books in question show a strong historical component. Chomsky, in any case, presents his evidence with an extensive record of citation, and keeps the rhetorical content of his writings extremely low.

yes, disappointing, i know.
chomsky is one of the most quoted writers in the world.
 
HoverBoarder said:
Well I would definitely disagree with that. Israel could be classified as a democratic theocracy, but a full out democracy is not very accurate.
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A prime example of a theocracy would be Iran. Its clergy can override any actions/determinations by said government. This can't be said for Israel. If the argument were to be that of ancient Israel, then I would be more in agreement with you, but this isn't the case with the rule of law, respect for individual rights, court of law, etc. in modern Israel. Its even a stretch to accuse Israel of being a semi-theocracy.

I think Emanuel Gutman put it in better terms:

Israel & Theocracy
The organs of government and state power neither derive their legal authority from religion or church nor their legitimation from any divine source. It cannot be claimed with any semblance of realism that state and church are coequal partners in the governance of the state. Indeed, all legal powers of the religious institutions and organs are ultimately devolved upon them by the state. (Emanuel Gutman, AReligion in Israeli Politics,@ in Jacob Landau, ed., Man, State, and Society in the Contemporary Middle East, NY: Praeger, 1972, p. 123.)
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stokes234 said:
The entire premise that your reputation as a political commentator and thus your ability to contribute to discussions such as that in the OP depends on having been reviewed by historical journals. Well, it's actually you making that argument - unless you weren't intending for your point to extend to cover political commentary, and were just making a passing remark about Chomsky not being a historian, in which case I refer back to my point about interpretive dancers.
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Let me be very frank with you. I honestly don't give a **** if Chomsky is accepted by historians or not. I'm not using it as an argument for anything. The only point I've made is that if you think his honors and awards means something, his rejection from historical academia means something. I would rather talk about the facts and the inferences we can accept from them. It's a side issue. The only reason I stepped in this time is I had a cogent point to make.
 
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Childlike Empress said:
Your hyper-selective quoting is indeed funny.
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Is it funny I am demanding people read the article before debating me on it? I'm not hiding anything with "selective quoting". My only point was that even a Harvard historian admits Chomsky has been ignored by academia. Now I'm "selective quoting". :rolleyes:
What do YOU disagree with Harvard historian Summers about? Maybe this?
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See my quote of his on new atheists for my position on his rhetoric.
Or this?
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Yeah, they are trying to silence him. Trutherism is a cult, Chomsky must of caught the virus...
What Summers talks about is btw only the US landscape of historians. Around the world he is not isolated at all, but, as mentioned, the most cited living author, and that is not only due to his works in linguistics.

I can go to the next mainstream bookstore here in Germany and will find a dozen of his political books.
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I can't go to Germany and use nuclear power by 2022. Not much of an argument here...

Anyway, like I said, it doesn't even matter to me what you or anyone else thinks of Chomsky. I'd rather talk about facts and what we can infer from them. Does he make stupid statements? How about you attack the quotes I have posted from him. If you could make a case against me for posting the stuff about "academic cowardice towards his theories" or "New atheists eat babies" That would be cool.
 
bikerdruid said:
chomsky is one of the most quoted writers in the world.
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He's the most quoted because he's the most controversial. Welcome to the world of marketing. ;)

Same can be said for Shlaim, Finkelstein, and Pappe. You beat to the drum of the useful idiots and conspiracy theorists, and sell, sell, sell!

However, how this applies to the validy of Chomsky's writings is beyond me....
 
Joey McGee said:
The only point I've made is that if you think his honors and awards means something, his rejection from historical academia means something.
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I agree. None of the honors he has received relate to his ability to do historical research. The mere fact that he includes citations in his articles doesn't mean he is using those citations accurately of that they are themselves reliable. (I initially thought the fellowship from the "Literary and Historical Society" would count, until I found they are a debating club, not a scholarly society).

Which doesn't make his statements about history accurate or inaccurate. But citing to the number of times he's been quoted or honored for stuff unrelated to the stuff for which he is being criticized is silly.

If the amount of times something is quoted was evidence of its accuracy, we'd have to concede that the Bible is historically accurate. And I'm pretty sure none of us wants to do that!
 
stokes234 said:
What? From "respected around the world" to being considered reliable by historians? Have your goalposts send us back a postcard.

On a related note, according to wiki he is most likely the most cited living author.
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Being frequently cited is meaningless as far as how accurate or reliable you are.
It as big a fallacy as those who claim how well researched and reliable a book is because of the number of footnotes in it..without regard to what is in the footnotes.
 
dudalb said:
Being frequently cited is meaningless as far as how accurate or reliable you are.
It as big a fallacy as those who claim how well researched and reliable a book is because of the number of footnotes in it..without regard to what is in the footnotes.
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Who was making the argument that being cited alot maked you reliable? My point was that being cited alot, as an individual scientist, implies that you're intelligent enough to develop new theories and that you're respected enough for your opinion to be considered relevant. If you read carefully you'll see that I do not make the argument that this makes him correct.
 
I've noticed that this thread seems to have degenerated into an argument about "credentials", not about the actual arguments of Chomsky for this position. What is the point?!
 
mike3 said:
I've noticed that this thread seems to have degenerated into an argument about "credentials", not about the actual arguments of Chomsky for this position. What is the point?!
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Well, I was trying to say that Chomsky isn't ignored by academia, and that his opinion is one to be considered even if it is occasionally crazy, but by this point it is mostly point scoring. Feel free to throw us back on topic.
 
The value of peer review is widely recognized among scientists; so much so that favorable review by subject-matter experts is highly regarded as an indication of one's insight and contribution to the overall body of knowledge. Why should it be different among historians?

If one's work as a historian has merit, it is reasonable to expect that other historians will review one's work favorably, and cite one's work frequently in their own. That this is not the case does not indicate that one is a history crackpot, any more than a lack of mainstream citations and favorable peer review indicate that one is a science crackpot.

Another possibility is that Chomsky is a historian of such groundbreaking vision that other historians are unable to comprehend his insights. It is left to the rest of us--no more credentialed in history than Chomsky himself--to truly recognize his genius and learn the wisdom of his teachings.

Hrm.

Maybe we should revisit the Iron Sun hypothesis, too.
 
stokes234 said:
Who was making the argument that being cited alot maked you reliable?
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bikerdruid appears to be.
bikerdruid said:
chomsky is one of the most quoted writers in the world.
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My point was that being cited alot, as an individual scientist, implies that you're intelligent enough to develop new theories and that you're respected enough for your opinion to be considered relevant.
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Depends on who cites him and for what purpose. The Bible is cited a lot by idiots. That doesn't mean the Bible should be considered relevant.

Chomsky is not cited by historians. He's cited by people with an agenda. Which is fine, depending on whether you agree with the agenda or not. But it doesn't necessarily make him relevant.
 
theprestige said:
The value of peer review is widely recognized among scientists; so much so that favorable review by subject-matter experts is highly regarded as an indication of one's insight and contribution to the overall body of knowledge. Why should it be different among historians?
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Has anyone yet come up with an explanation as to why we should be referring to Chomsky as a historian? Because it's pretty easy to say anyone has been ignored academically if you claim they are in a field that they aren't.

From his wiki: "Avram Noam Chomsky ( /ˈnoʊm ˈtʃɒmski/; born December 7, 1928), known as Noam Chomsky, is an American linguist, philosopher,[2][3] cognitive scientist, and activist. He is an Institute Professor and professor emeritus of linguistics at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology.[4] Chomsky is well known in the academic and scientific community as one of the fathers of modern linguistics,[5][6][7] and a major figure of analytic philosophy.[2] Since the 1960s, he has become known more widely as a political dissident and an anarchist,[8] referring to himself as a libertarian socialist. Chomsky is the author of more than 150 books and has received worldwide attention for his views."
 
mike3 said:
I've noticed that this thread seems to have degenerated into an argument about "credentials", not about the actual arguments of Chomsky for this position. What is the point?!
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Authoritarians favor smear and abuse.
 
It's not a smear to say he isn't taken seriously by proper historians. It's a fact.
 
Virus said:
It's not a smear to say he isn't taken seriously by proper historians. It's a fact.
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So proper historians are ignoring someone who isn't actually a historian, and instead provides political analysis of events based on his own political opinions. Stop the press.
 
stokes234 said:
So proper historians are ignoring someone who isn't actually a historian, and instead provides political analysis of events based on his own political opinions. Stop the press.
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Quite a lot of his writing has to do with history. Which he cherry picks and distorts to make America appear the moral equal of the Nazis.

Arthur Schlesinger (real historian) trashed Chomsky's first book pretty bad back in the 60's:

http://www.paulbogdanor.com/chomsky/schlesinger.pdf
 
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