Friday, September 03, 2010
In Forbes, Paul Johnson asks if universities are worth the cost.
Universities, as such, were first created in the Middle Ages to train the clergy, and they began assuming their modern form in 18th-century Germany. For two centuries Germany was home to the best universities in the world, leading the field in philosophy, theology, philology and most of the sciences. But this was the same Germany that under Otto von Bismarck became a militaristic state and under Adolf Hitler a totalitarian one. Germany led the world into the two most destructive wars in history. Hitler always received higher ratings from students than from any other group in society, his views being strongly supported by a majority of German academics, with the world-famous philosopher Martin Heidegger setting the pattern.That was then, now universities are umpteen times more expensive, so they must be that much better. Reflecting further, Heidegger's dream, that the university elite should lead or run things, has in effect happened. Don't all our rulers come from academia? And what a bang-up job they've done of demonstrating the value of an education from an elite university. They've certainly enriched themselves and their fellow alumni. ¶ 9:30 AM
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Johnson makes the ForbesCo execs happy as usual (not to say Silicon valley mgmt as a whole)-- why, academia leads to Heideggers, not to say the entire nazi intelligentsia. Ergo, academia's not to be trusted
Johnson also hints at the hegelian statist dreams typical of german intellectuals--universities, at least public ones (a noble institution like Stanford U's another matter), are bad for business, bad for corporations, not to say british-zionist gold. Or something. That libertarian quack Goldberg does the same thing--nazis, blackshirts stalinists, liberals--all blood brothers.
The managerial right now depends on this sort of quasi-argumentative rhetoric. They don't really prove things--they offer a sort of sophisticated corporate code, with various assumptions, even...symbols of a sort...paladin students blessing Hitler, the evil statists, Herr Doktor Professor Heidegger (quick cut to one of those grainy pics ). Sort of like a James Bond movie
Johnson also hints at the hegelian statist dreams typical of german intellectuals--universities, at least public ones (a noble institution like Stanford U's another matter), are bad for business, bad for corporations, not to say british-zionist gold. Or something. That libertarian quack Goldberg does the same thing--nazis, blackshirts stalinists, liberals--all blood brothers.
The managerial right now depends on this sort of quasi-argumentative rhetoric. They don't really prove things--they offer a sort of sophisticated corporate code, with various assumptions, even...symbols of a sort...paladin students blessing Hitler, the evil statists, Herr Doktor Professor Heidegger (quick cut to one of those grainy pics ). Sort of like a James Bond movie
I read a book by Johnson a couple decades ago, Intellectuals I think, where he beat up on intellectuals as dangerous idealists, or maybe it was just the French and Germans variety.
I'm not sure I can easily distinguish between the managerial right, and the managerial left.
I think there are obvious signs of a disconnect between the technocrats (left or right) cranked out by the elite universities, and reality. For example, this week I'm reading a lot about the administration economists' inability to predict the actual effects of the economic "stimulus". They excuse themselves by asserting that "everyone" agreed in their diagnosis of the situation, but the reality is that only members of their echo chamber agreed. I recall economists of the Austrian/Chicago ilk stating that the "stimulus" would instead drive up unemployment, and that's what happened - check the archives of mises.org.
Why don't our rulers put economists that make correct predictions in charge? Really what we're governed by are not competent technocrats, but the opposite, a bunch of idiots (in the classical Greek sense, individuals divorced from the polis) who are not prepared to entertain notions that contradict their ideology.
I'm not sure I can easily distinguish between the managerial right, and the managerial left.
I think there are obvious signs of a disconnect between the technocrats (left or right) cranked out by the elite universities, and reality. For example, this week I'm reading a lot about the administration economists' inability to predict the actual effects of the economic "stimulus". They excuse themselves by asserting that "everyone" agreed in their diagnosis of the situation, but the reality is that only members of their echo chamber agreed. I recall economists of the Austrian/Chicago ilk stating that the "stimulus" would instead drive up unemployment, and that's what happened - check the archives of mises.org.
Why don't our rulers put economists that make correct predictions in charge? Really what we're governed by are not competent technocrats, but the opposite, a bunch of idiots (in the classical Greek sense, individuals divorced from the polis) who are not prepared to entertain notions that contradict their ideology.
"Heidegger's dream, that the university elite should lead or run things, has in effect happened."
But I wonder though --was that really Heidegger's dream? I think you might be able to make a strong case that what has happened is nearly the opposite of Heidegger's "dream" --that is, because the sciences were never properly revitalized from the ground up as Heidegger had so desparately striven to do, their atrophied essence has come to dominate the public sphere by further fragmenting it into irreconcilable specializations. If you read the rektoratsrede and the Spiegel interview of 1966 in continuity with the dream of University reform active in the 1919 Kriegsnotsemester, as well as with the further articulation of that dream implied in the 1929 Was ist Metaphysik? --and I do read them as betraying a unity of intention --then you end up seeing that the current university machinery has subordinated itself in the worst of ways to what Heidegger wanted to resist by way of selbst-behauptung, namely the dominance of a technological will-to-will as providing the only unity whatsoever to scientific productions of the university --and even the way they manufacture "politcal leaders".
But I wonder though --was that really Heidegger's dream? I think you might be able to make a strong case that what has happened is nearly the opposite of Heidegger's "dream" --that is, because the sciences were never properly revitalized from the ground up as Heidegger had so desparately striven to do, their atrophied essence has come to dominate the public sphere by further fragmenting it into irreconcilable specializations. If you read the rektoratsrede and the Spiegel interview of 1966 in continuity with the dream of University reform active in the 1919 Kriegsnotsemester, as well as with the further articulation of that dream implied in the 1929 Was ist Metaphysik? --and I do read them as betraying a unity of intention --then you end up seeing that the current university machinery has subordinated itself in the worst of ways to what Heidegger wanted to resist by way of selbst-behauptung, namely the dominance of a technological will-to-will as providing the only unity whatsoever to scientific productions of the university --and even the way they manufacture "politcal leaders".
It's true that today's universities, and their poli-sci departments, are totally technocratic - at least the ones I'm familiar with. They are primarily concerned with how to get elected (using the tools of marketing and psychological gimmicks efficiently) rather than how or why to govern.
I considered scrawling something in reference to QCT and the "Dwelling" essay (often disregarded), and bring in the organicism, the critique of Techne, the hints of...Luddite-ness in the elder Heidegger..but Pseudita's bon mots will suffice. In other words, Heidegger wasn't really part of the official Academy (and isn't now) in terms of providing information/knowledge useful for the technocrats, and Johnson's...scheissevoll.
Which is to say, at some point Heideggerian thought (at least the...anti-Techne material) seems to intersect with the anti-establishment thinking of gents such as Feyerabend, though most postmods have not bothered to address that (or are just unaware of it).
Which is to say, at some point Heideggerian thought (at least the...anti-Techne material) seems to intersect with the anti-establishment thinking of gents such as Feyerabend, though most postmods have not bothered to address that (or are just unaware of it).
J--responding re "scheissevoll"--I don't know that the real thrust of Johnson's article concerns the possibility that a university might churn out a bunch of socially and politically unwise Heideggers (he isn't complaining about Heidegger's students, who probably received tons of "opportunities and encouragement . . . to teach themselves"). I think enowning has been showing all along, with posts like this, that Heidegger is really just a useful name to most people (like Goldberg, as you point out). The critique seems to be of the unjust intellectual elevation of the unworthy (Hitler, Obama, Cameron), the (implicit/explicit/opportunistic) support given to the unworthy by the worthy (Heidegger), and the corruption of the average student who is not then compensated with an actual education or even a situation in which he might acquire one for himself.
I think his book on intellectuals was more about exposing them for the immoral, deviant bastards they were. And exposing the free pass they were given because their "dangerous ideals" aligned with those of the people who mattered. Which isn't all that different from attempting to disguise economists' "inability to predict." The question is whether the probably good and correct work that is churned out in specialized sciences is worth the price that is paid in the cultural upheaval endorsed by the "official Academy."
I think his book on intellectuals was more about exposing them for the immoral, deviant bastards they were. And exposing the free pass they were given because their "dangerous ideals" aligned with those of the people who mattered. Which isn't all that different from attempting to disguise economists' "inability to predict." The question is whether the probably good and correct work that is churned out in specialized sciences is worth the price that is paid in the cultural upheaval endorsed by the "official Academy."
immoral, deviant bastards
I read most of Johnson's neo-Tory opus "Intellectuals", like afternoon in an B & n a few years back. While some criticism of the the likes of Marx and Sartre may have been justified, Johnson did not really tackle the problems of marxist-ideology (or "existentialism") but generally relied upon/resorted to ad hominem and character assassination, like every other paragraph. Then for a real christian fundamentalist (and JOhnson's that) just a pic of the aged shaggy Marx will do (simply... ghastly).
Let's not forget Johnson wasn't just attacking marxists however. He includes PB Shelley, Ibsen, Tolstoy, Bertrand Russell, Chomsky, and many others in his rants. Shelley, for one, was a rather talented lad--and hardly an academic, or really even intellectual. Maybe Johnson hates Shelley because Shelley detested the British crown and was somewhat sympathetic to the French Revolution? Johnson generally sounds like a half-baked Edmund Burke.
His attacks on Russell were about the same. I doubt the Enowning crew have much love for Russell, but he was not merely a scandalizer or "pagan". Johnson's critique of Russell was utterly superficial. At least one should make a distinction between Russell the serious logician and Russell the popular writer (tho' even his journalistic/political writings while "glib" perhaps, are hardly fluff). Toss Russell in the virtual gulag (or is it Dachau) if you will but he was a rather serious and important thinker quite beyond the likes of Johnson--.
And anyone who defends existentialism (not me, exactly) should detest Johnson for his slash-attack on Sartre--not a perfect human being but at times rather eloquent spokesman for le condition humaine.....
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I read most of Johnson's neo-Tory opus "Intellectuals", like afternoon in an B & n a few years back. While some criticism of the the likes of Marx and Sartre may have been justified, Johnson did not really tackle the problems of marxist-ideology (or "existentialism") but generally relied upon/resorted to ad hominem and character assassination, like every other paragraph. Then for a real christian fundamentalist (and JOhnson's that) just a pic of the aged shaggy Marx will do (simply... ghastly).
Let's not forget Johnson wasn't just attacking marxists however. He includes PB Shelley, Ibsen, Tolstoy, Bertrand Russell, Chomsky, and many others in his rants. Shelley, for one, was a rather talented lad--and hardly an academic, or really even intellectual. Maybe Johnson hates Shelley because Shelley detested the British crown and was somewhat sympathetic to the French Revolution? Johnson generally sounds like a half-baked Edmund Burke.
His attacks on Russell were about the same. I doubt the Enowning crew have much love for Russell, but he was not merely a scandalizer or "pagan". Johnson's critique of Russell was utterly superficial. At least one should make a distinction between Russell the serious logician and Russell the popular writer (tho' even his journalistic/political writings while "glib" perhaps, are hardly fluff). Toss Russell in the virtual gulag (or is it Dachau) if you will but he was a rather serious and important thinker quite beyond the likes of Johnson--.
And anyone who defends existentialism (not me, exactly) should detest Johnson for his slash-attack on Sartre--not a perfect human being but at times rather eloquent spokesman for le condition humaine.....
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