This essay feels, in a way, incomplete to me. It’s part of a series called “Did the Welfare State Work?” The strapline refers to Beveridge’s “five evils” which are (according to Google): Want, disease, ignorance, squalor and idleness. The title asserts that the workers were never ignorant. So the current essay seems to be about ignorance, and its near antonym, knowledge, and, by implication, whether the Beveridge reforms solved the problem of the ignorance of working people, or whether the problem existed at all.
The author argues that the workers were never ignorant and possessed various types of knowledge, although not the academic type of knowledge which the author disdains. Workers, for example, understood at the time of the general strike, just as they understand today, that their pay packet was too small and they’re being lied to by employers and government alike. In that sense, workers aren’t, and never were, ignorant.
But how does the author’s abstract analysis of different types of knowledge bear on the practical question of whether the welfare state improved the lot of working people? Maybe pre-Beveridge workers possessed practical knowledge, but how did that help them when access to abstract knowledge, delivered by universities, was an invaluable step up in society and in the economic food chain?
Notwithstanding the author’s clever dissection of the concept of knowledge, if a working man at the time of Beveridge learned Latin (a largely useless, academic subject) and obtained a teaching certificate, he left the hard grind of manual labor behind and entered a materially improved station in life. Does the essay address the beneficial connection between improved access to academic attainment (even if such knowledge is impractical) and standard of living, or is the essay ultimately a meditation on the various aspects of knowledge, and therefore the type of dry scholarship the author frowns upon?
As is often the case the comments illuminate the subject of the article better than the article itself. I often turn first to the comment section to determine whether an article is worth my while reading. It often saves wading through a lot of overblown journalism.
I think you are a little hard on many of the people who write for UnHerd but I would agree that some essays go on a bit longer than necessary. I sometimes think, after the first 300 words, ‘OK, I’ve got the point.’
I entirely agree there are some outstanding contributors that I am happy to dive in and read without a glance at the comments knowing that I can expect an excellent article. It would perhaps be unfair to name them as I might inadvertently overlook some who should be on the list. Unfortunately there are plenty where a glance at the comments have or would have saved me from wading through dross.
“…there are some outstanding contributors…”
This not one of them.
The author seems to have an Oxbridge chip on each shoulder.
If Donald Rumsfeld only made one contribution to the sum of human knowledge it was one more than the author.
As to the election-deniers being just ignorant, only the truly ignorant or dishonest employ the term “denier”. There is nothing wrong about questioning the result of an election. It is those that try to quash any attempt to do so who are the ones that have something to hide. There was something obviously dodgy about the 2020 election, and the vehemence of those who used every available invective an slur to shut down any debate shows the denier were not far wrong.
As the saying goes, the flak is always heaviest over the target
That dig at Rumsfeld was the first tell. The second was the fashionable pejorative, “election denier”. The third, because I started to read it without noting the author, was “Terry Eagleton”, who always turns out humbug like this. “Literary theorist”. Good grief.
Yes Alison, the first tell. I then thought that the salient point should have been the unknown unknown rather than the known unknown; reinforced by the reference to the unconscious.Good grief indeed.
Yes Alison, the first tell. I then thought that the salient point should have been the unknown unknown rather than the known unknown; reinforced by the reference to the unconscious.Good grief indeed.
That dig at Rumsfeld was the first tell. The second was the fashionable pejorative, “election denier”. The third, because I started to read it without noting the author, was “Terry Eagleton”, who always turns out humbug like this. “Literary theorist”. Good grief.
“…there are some outstanding contributors…”
This not one of them.
The author seems to have an Oxbridge chip on each shoulder.
If Donald Rumsfeld only made one contribution to the sum of human knowledge it was one more than the author.
As to the election-deniers being just ignorant, only the truly ignorant or dishonest employ the term “denier”. There is nothing wrong about questioning the result of an election. It is those that try to quash any attempt to do so who are the ones that have something to hide. There was something obviously dodgy about the 2020 election, and the vehemence of those who used every available invective an slur to shut down any debate shows the denier were not far wrong.
As the saying goes, the flak is always heaviest over the target
I entirely agree there are some outstanding contributors that I am happy to dive in and read without a glance at the comments knowing that I can expect an excellent article. It would perhaps be unfair to name them as I might inadvertently overlook some who should be on the list. Unfortunately there are plenty where a glance at the comments have or would have saved me from wading through dross.
I think you are a little hard on many of the people who write for UnHerd but I would agree that some essays go on a bit longer than necessary. I sometimes think, after the first 300 words, ‘OK, I’ve got the point.’
You don’t have to know much about algebra, or indeed what a slide rules’ for, to know how to organise. That knowledge, the can-do (cannan?) of organising people, is fundamental to our species. And one reason ‘the workers’ haven’t always been taken in by the extravagant waffle of critical theory, especially where it rests heavily on an outdated 19th century idea of there being a singular form of economic organisation called capitalism that sweeps all before it.
Critical theory may be a clever tool for analysing Thomas Hardy, and for coming up with tidy notions like markets being capable of showing emotions like regret. Perhaps. But for all its claims not to be, it’s hard not to see the theory used by Terry Eagleton as a form of knowledge rooted in a utopian idea, an idea that has enfeebled the work of developing a more nuanced, more useful set of tools.
As is often the case the comments illuminate the subject of the article better than the article itself. I often turn first to the comment section to determine whether an article is worth my while reading. It often saves wading through a lot of overblown journalism.
You don’t have to know much about algebra, or indeed what a slide rules’ for, to know how to organise. That knowledge, the can-do (cannan?) of organising people, is fundamental to our species. And one reason ‘the workers’ haven’t always been taken in by the extravagant waffle of critical theory, especially where it rests heavily on an outdated 19th century idea of there being a singular form of economic organisation called capitalism that sweeps all before it.
Critical theory may be a clever tool for analysing Thomas Hardy, and for coming up with tidy notions like markets being capable of showing emotions like regret. Perhaps. But for all its claims not to be, it’s hard not to see the theory used by Terry Eagleton as a form of knowledge rooted in a utopian idea, an idea that has enfeebled the work of developing a more nuanced, more useful set of tools.
J Bryant
1 year ago
This essay feels, in a way, incomplete to me. It’s part of a series called “Did the Welfare State Work?” The strapline refers to Beveridge’s “five evils” which are (according to Google): Want, disease, ignorance, squalor and idleness. The title asserts that the workers were never ignorant. So the current essay seems to be about ignorance, and its near antonym, knowledge, and, by implication, whether the Beveridge reforms solved the problem of the ignorance of working people, or whether the problem existed at all.
The author argues that the workers were never ignorant and possessed various types of knowledge, although not the academic type of knowledge which the author disdains. Workers, for example, understood at the time of the general strike, just as they understand today, that their pay packet was too small and they’re being lied to by employers and government alike. In that sense, workers aren’t, and never were, ignorant.
But how does the author’s abstract analysis of different types of knowledge bear on the practical question of whether the welfare state improved the lot of working people? Maybe pre-Beveridge workers possessed practical knowledge, but how did that help them when access to abstract knowledge, delivered by universities, was an invaluable step up in society and in the economic food chain?
Notwithstanding the author’s clever dissection of the concept of knowledge, if a working man at the time of Beveridge learned Latin (a largely useless, academic subject) and obtained a teaching certificate, he left the hard grind of manual labor behind and entered a materially improved station in life. Does the essay address the beneficial connection between improved access to academic attainment (even if such knowledge is impractical) and standard of living, or is the essay ultimately a meditation on the various aspects of knowledge, and therefore the type of dry scholarship the author frowns upon?
Sophie Duggan
1 year ago
…says the man who spent 32 years teaching literature at Oxford. You could run a pit-wheel on the hypocrisy.
Oddly enough, although Terry is an entertaining and witty lecturer, “extravagant waffle” seems a good way to sum up his writings and interests. Post-structuralism, anyone?
Oddly enough, although Terry is an entertaining and witty lecturer, “extravagant waffle” seems a good way to sum up his writings and interests. Post-structuralism, anyone?
“Literary studies at the time were a combination of bone-dry scholarship and extravagant waffle.”
Yeah, at the time.
Sophie Duggan
1 year ago
…says the man who spent 32 years teaching literature at Oxford. You could run a pit-wheel on the hypocrisy.
Malcolm Knott
1 year ago
Well I suppose ‘My knowledge’ is a slight improvement on ‘My truth’. The fact remains that there are, and always have been, a large number of people in this country whose knowledge of history and politics is abysmal. That does not mean they are stupid, unreflective or lack wisdom but it does mean they are ill-informed which can be equally dangerous.
I am constantly reminded of the depths of my own ignorance even in my own subjects of special interest.
Yes, the opinions of intelligent people on subjects that they have in fact not properly evaluated are particularly dangerous as their intelligence can provide their opinion with a veneer of plausibility.
Yes, the opinions of intelligent people on subjects that they have in fact not properly evaluated are particularly dangerous as their intelligence can provide their opinion with a veneer of plausibility.
Malcolm Knott
1 year ago
Well I suppose ‘My knowledge’ is a slight improvement on ‘My truth’. The fact remains that there are, and always have been, a large number of people in this country whose knowledge of history and politics is abysmal. That does not mean they are stupid, unreflective or lack wisdom but it does mean they are ill-informed which can be equally dangerous.
I am constantly reminded of the depths of my own ignorance even in my own subjects of special interest.
Steve Jolly
1 year ago
This author, like many I’ve read, gets rather close to the crux of the matter but doesn’t quite say it. He extolls the virtues of self-education and the common sense wisdom of the everyman, but he isn’t quite ready to just flatly say that the Oxford professor possesses no particular virtue or worth greater than that of the average coal miner. After all, it would practically upend all human civilization if people admitted that the entire enterprise of organized human education is basically an exercise in social signaling, or, in other words, a way of distinguishing social classes and neatly grouping people and assigning them levels of power, status, influence, and wealth in a society. Even in the age of universal public education, there is a hierarchy of ‘educatedness’, a scale of value with Harvard, Yale, MIT, and Stanford PhDs on one end and high school dropouts on the other, a scale that, when reduced to its basest purpose, isn’t much different than the one the Nazis used to decide how much Jewish ancestry was required to send an individual to the ghetto or the gas chamber. Education and universities were created by the nobility for the nobility. Knowledge wasn’t the point. Education wasn’t the point. Yet another form of social hierarchy which they could and did control and use to elevate themselves above others was the point. The fact that education is so accessible to so many has not changed the basic algebra of more education/better education = higher social class. The Dukes who sent their second and third sons to Oxford and Cambridge did so for the same basic reason as celebrities who tried to buy their children’s admission to top universities. The same logic drives every politician or technocrat who insists that the ignorant voters defer to ‘experts’ on everything from COVID masks to economic policy to climate change. Unfortunately, western thought coming out of the Enlightenment era romanticized and lionized knowledge, reason, and education to such an extreme level that naming it for the caste system it is would be a bridge too far for most people, especially the ‘educated’ sort.
“He extolls the virtues of self-education and the common sense wisdom of the everyman, but he isn’t quite ready to just flatly say that the Oxford professor possesses no particular virtue or worth greater than that of the average coal miner.”
I know of no-one who ever thought that the possession of knowledge makes one socially superior. However it is necessary for the pursuit of truth that all education should be confined to an intellectual elite (either financially independent or in receipt of largesse (gifts, bursaries, scholarships etc.) from patrons). This is to prevent the confusion of acquiring and transmitting knowledge and engaging in commercial enterprises dependent on the supply of such knowledge, where financial considerations might lead people to alter or obfuscate the truth for financial gain (this becomes more likely the more the field is one considered to involve a certain urgency e.g. ‘medicine’). In short, the purpose of education is not ‘to get a job’. Knowledge acquired for that is called ‘training’ and has nothing to do with pure intellectual enquiry.
Really? Don’t think possession of knowledge makes one socially superior? You’ve never heard a derogatory comment or joke about high-school dropouts where the word high school dropout could be easily replaced by the N-word and still have the same denigrating purpose? You say the purpose of education is not ‘to get a job’. You don’t think employers value the word “Harvard” on a resume more than say, “Jackson State” without having ever met the person in question? I contend that much of the inequality of outcomes that is criticized as ‘racism’ is in fact the much more common and socially acceptable practice of discrimination based on educational background. It becomes an easy stand-in for older, less acceptable forms of discrimination.
We had a fibre box fitted recently. Guy working quickly, cleanly and competently in driving rain. He told me that a little boy had just asked , probably grandma, what he was doing. Her reply had been , that’s what you do if you don’t listen in school. We need to start valuing physical competence more. We need thinkers as well as doers but we need thinkers who learn from doers or can do themselves. Tangentially, just watched a 1964 Horizon on Buckminster Fuller from 1964. I recommend it. His theory began with practical observation leading to the maths not vice versa. Those who construct models please note.
We had a fibre box fitted recently. Guy working quickly, cleanly and competently in driving rain. He told me that a little boy had just asked , probably grandma, what he was doing. Her reply had been , that’s what you do if you don’t listen in school. We need to start valuing physical competence more. We need thinkers as well as doers but we need thinkers who learn from doers or can do themselves. Tangentially, just watched a 1964 Horizon on Buckminster Fuller from 1964. I recommend it. His theory began with practical observation leading to the maths not vice versa. Those who construct models please note.
Really? Don’t think possession of knowledge makes one socially superior? You’ve never heard a derogatory comment or joke about high-school dropouts where the word high school dropout could be easily replaced by the N-word and still have the same denigrating purpose? You say the purpose of education is not ‘to get a job’. You don’t think employers value the word “Harvard” on a resume more than say, “Jackson State” without having ever met the person in question? I contend that much of the inequality of outcomes that is criticized as ‘racism’ is in fact the much more common and socially acceptable practice of discrimination based on educational background. It becomes an easy stand-in for older, less acceptable forms of discrimination.
“Knowledge wasn’t the point. Education wasn’t the point. Yet another form of social hierarchy which they could and did control and use to elevate themselves above others was the point.”
I treat this point separately as it appears to be complete balderdash. How could even a nobility prevent anyone fromacquiring ‘knowledge’? And what advantage does the possession of ‘knowledge’ entail in any case? After all the vast majority of posters on Twitter are absolutely ignorant and incapable of logical conceptual thought. And yet they indirectly exercise lots of power in the everyday, political, world.
And we find that, historically, throughout the intellectual sphere, nobility acted as patrons to people of ‘humble’ birth, where some leanings towards intelligent thought existed.
First, I’ll concede I went too far in the statement you quoted. There are few topics I am truly passionate about, but this is one, and I tend to get carried away. You are correct to point out the excessive hyperbole. Whatever the formal or theoretical intent of higher education, its practical purpose is something else entirely. To answer your question about controlling knowledge though, they controlled it the same way they do today, by deciding what was taught and what qualified as knowledge. By awarding degrees and giving credentials which ‘qualified’ one to speak authoritatively on a particular topic. I see quite a bit of anti-elite sentiment on Unherd. That’s one reason why I like it. I don’t see as much explanation as to how elites become elites and hold themselves above the masses. A large part is by creating scales of social value based on some distinguishing characteristic which they possess and can pass directly or indirectly to children or other chosen successors. In the past, land, wealth, line of descent, race, and other largely heritable traits served this purpose. Those were eventually rejected, partly through moral arguments but partly by newer elites usurping older ones. As wealth once replaced land as a measure of power in society and a sign of nobility, now the wheel turns again and ‘knowledge’ or ‘information’ replaces wealth. I concede this makes me sound like a Marxist, but the man didn’t get everything wrong. Like so many others, I regard Marx as a man who made excellent observations and erred in the far more difficult task of drawing conclusions. I personally try not to draw many conclusions. I have no earthly idea what one could or should do to correct intellectual/educational elitism. I’d be satisfied if people simply recognize it exists.
First, I’ll concede I went too far in the statement you quoted. There are few topics I am truly passionate about, but this is one, and I tend to get carried away. You are correct to point out the excessive hyperbole. Whatever the formal or theoretical intent of higher education, its practical purpose is something else entirely. To answer your question about controlling knowledge though, they controlled it the same way they do today, by deciding what was taught and what qualified as knowledge. By awarding degrees and giving credentials which ‘qualified’ one to speak authoritatively on a particular topic. I see quite a bit of anti-elite sentiment on Unherd. That’s one reason why I like it. I don’t see as much explanation as to how elites become elites and hold themselves above the masses. A large part is by creating scales of social value based on some distinguishing characteristic which they possess and can pass directly or indirectly to children or other chosen successors. In the past, land, wealth, line of descent, race, and other largely heritable traits served this purpose. Those were eventually rejected, partly through moral arguments but partly by newer elites usurping older ones. As wealth once replaced land as a measure of power in society and a sign of nobility, now the wheel turns again and ‘knowledge’ or ‘information’ replaces wealth. I concede this makes me sound like a Marxist, but the man didn’t get everything wrong. Like so many others, I regard Marx as a man who made excellent observations and erred in the far more difficult task of drawing conclusions. I personally try not to draw many conclusions. I have no earthly idea what one could or should do to correct intellectual/educational elitism. I’d be satisfied if people simply recognize it exists.
A tad cynical perhaps? Surely wisdom at least and perhaps philosophy in particular have a value to all as an aid to forming one’s own beliefs? …and without beliefs we are no more that brute animals?
Much more than a tad cynical I’m afraid. My cynicism goes well beyond the scale of normal human beings. The only way I can explain it is to say I was just born this way. At age five, I found a quiet corner to read or think while the other kids ran around playing. By the time I was twelve, my mind was disciplined enough to discuss politics and science with my teachers, who I knew better than any of my classmates. By fifteen, I was laughing at silly notions like ‘moral consistency’, ‘romantic love’, or ‘human progress’. A ‘tad’ cynical doesn’t begin to cover it.
Much more than a tad cynical I’m afraid. My cynicism goes well beyond the scale of normal human beings. The only way I can explain it is to say I was just born this way. At age five, I found a quiet corner to read or think while the other kids ran around playing. By the time I was twelve, my mind was disciplined enough to discuss politics and science with my teachers, who I knew better than any of my classmates. By fifteen, I was laughing at silly notions like ‘moral consistency’, ‘romantic love’, or ‘human progress’. A ‘tad’ cynical doesn’t begin to cover it.
“He extolls the virtues of self-education and the common sense wisdom of the everyman, but he isn’t quite ready to just flatly say that the Oxford professor possesses no particular virtue or worth greater than that of the average coal miner.”
I know of no-one who ever thought that the possession of knowledge makes one socially superior. However it is necessary for the pursuit of truth that all education should be confined to an intellectual elite (either financially independent or in receipt of largesse (gifts, bursaries, scholarships etc.) from patrons). This is to prevent the confusion of acquiring and transmitting knowledge and engaging in commercial enterprises dependent on the supply of such knowledge, where financial considerations might lead people to alter or obfuscate the truth for financial gain (this becomes more likely the more the field is one considered to involve a certain urgency e.g. ‘medicine’). In short, the purpose of education is not ‘to get a job’. Knowledge acquired for that is called ‘training’ and has nothing to do with pure intellectual enquiry.
“Knowledge wasn’t the point. Education wasn’t the point. Yet another form of social hierarchy which they could and did control and use to elevate themselves above others was the point.”
I treat this point separately as it appears to be complete balderdash. How could even a nobility prevent anyone fromacquiring ‘knowledge’? And what advantage does the possession of ‘knowledge’ entail in any case? After all the vast majority of posters on Twitter are absolutely ignorant and incapable of logical conceptual thought. And yet they indirectly exercise lots of power in the everyday, political, world.
And we find that, historically, throughout the intellectual sphere, nobility acted as patrons to people of ‘humble’ birth, where some leanings towards intelligent thought existed.
A tad cynical perhaps? Surely wisdom at least and perhaps philosophy in particular have a value to all as an aid to forming one’s own beliefs? …and without beliefs we are no more that brute animals?
Steve Jolly
1 year ago
This author, like many I’ve read, gets rather close to the crux of the matter but doesn’t quite say it. He extolls the virtues of self-education and the common sense wisdom of the everyman, but he isn’t quite ready to just flatly say that the Oxford professor possesses no particular virtue or worth greater than that of the average coal miner. After all, it would practically upend all human civilization if people admitted that the entire enterprise of organized human education is basically an exercise in social signaling, or, in other words, a way of distinguishing social classes and neatly grouping people and assigning them levels of power, status, influence, and wealth in a society. Even in the age of universal public education, there is a hierarchy of ‘educatedness’, a scale of value with Harvard, Yale, MIT, and Stanford PhDs on one end and high school dropouts on the other, a scale that, when reduced to its basest purpose, isn’t much different than the one the Nazis used to decide how much Jewish ancestry was required to send an individual to the ghetto or the gas chamber. Education and universities were created by the nobility for the nobility. Knowledge wasn’t the point. Education wasn’t the point. Yet another form of social hierarchy which they could and did control and use to elevate themselves above others was the point. The fact that education is so accessible to so many has not changed the basic algebra of more education/better education = higher social class. The Dukes who sent their second and third sons to Oxford and Cambridge did so for the same basic reason as celebrities who tried to buy their children’s admission to top universities. The same logic drives every politician or technocrat who insists that the ignorant voters defer to ‘experts’ on everything from COVID masks to economic policy to climate change. Unfortunately, western thought coming out of the Enlightenment era romanticized and lionized knowledge, reason, and education to such an extreme level that naming it for the caste system it is would be a bridge too far for most people, especially the ‘educated’ sort.
Last edited 1 year ago by Steve Jolly
Steve Murray
1 year ago
Was there a “history of post-Impressionism” to be educated in, at the time of the General Strike? I ask this question since the author cites it as something the striking workers didn’t need in order to understand that their conditions were under threat, but it’s the proverbial Straw Man (perhaps Eagleton has a secret hankering for English folklore?) and i also found his citing of female mill-workers studying Shakespeare before attending their looms just a little too twee. My mother started work in a Lancashire cotton mill aged 14, and whilst i don’t doubt Eagleton could provide circumstantial evidence for his claim, it would’ve made my mother Shake in a rather different way.
There’s a saying that used to do the rounds in my youth about “a little knowledge is a dangerous thing.” Eagleton’s essays remind me of nothing more than that. He very much appears to have a superficial knowledge of many of the streams of modernism, also citing Nietzsche, Freud, Lacan etc but without the essay comprising a river. He’d have been better off taking up stonemasonry.
Last edited 1 year ago by Steve Murray
Steve Murray
1 year ago
Was there a “history of post-Impressionism” to be educated in, at the time of the General Strike? I ask this question since the author cites it as something the striking workers didn’t need in order to understand that their conditions were under threat, but it’s the proverbial Straw Man (perhaps Eagleton has a secret hankering for English folklore?) and i also found his citing of female mill-workers studying Shakespeare before attending their looms just a little too twee. My mother started work in a Lancashire cotton mill aged 14, and whilst i don’t doubt Eagleton could provide circumstantial evidence for his claim, it would’ve made my mother Shake in a rather different way.
There’s a saying that used to do the rounds in my youth about “a little knowledge is a dangerous thing.” Eagleton’s essays remind me of nothing more than that. He very much appears to have a superficial knowledge of many of the streams of modernism, also citing Nietzsche, Freud, Lacan etc but without the essay comprising a river. He’d have been better off taking up stonemasonry.
Last edited 1 year ago by Steve Murray
Dustin Needle
1 year ago
“The election-deniers are just ignorant”.
Or perhaps representative of a worker class that has been educated to interpret, challenge data, spot trends? Which is similar to points made elsewhere in the essay.
If Process A delivers a certain trend – then enters a black box where none can enter – and comes out of the other side as Process B with the trend reversing, would you not want to see what variable occurred when the process entered the black box, then onto Process B to produce such a marked different in trends?
That’s not ignorance, that’s education. Or at least curiosity. Our media and it seems academia lack even curiosity. Unless they can blame Russia. Just who are the ignorant ones here?
Perhaps (I surmise) because the ends justify the means. But if the variables were open to outside influence, and that changed a democratic outcome, then beware. That same variable could be used to produce ends none of us will like.
Last edited 1 year ago by Dustin Needle
Dustin Needle
1 year ago
“The election-deniers are just ignorant”.
Or perhaps representative of a worker class that has been educated to interpret, challenge data, spot trends? Which is similar to points made elsewhere in the essay.
If Process A delivers a certain trend – then enters a black box where none can enter – and comes out of the other side as Process B with the trend reversing, would you not want to see what variable occurred when the process entered the black box, then onto Process B to produce such a marked different in trends?
That’s not ignorance, that’s education. Or at least curiosity. Our media and it seems academia lack even curiosity. Unless they can blame Russia. Just who are the ignorant ones here?
Perhaps (I surmise) because the ends justify the means. But if the variables were open to outside influence, and that changed a democratic outcome, then beware. That same variable could be used to produce ends none of us will like.
Last edited 1 year ago by Dustin Needle
Gandydancer x
1 year ago
I stopped reading this when I reached the bit about “election deniers”. I don’t assert or know if Trump lost the 2020 election due to the “fortification” that went on, but I saw video of a van load (at least one) of alleged absentee ballots trucked into Cobo Hall after midnight (conveniently pre-verified in the Democrat County Clerks office, but somehow not discovered until polls downstate had closed) and, observers having been sent home, they were counted as many times as necessary to eliminate Trump’s lead in Michigan. Then any attempt to examine the alleged ballots was juridically suppressed. Anyone who calls me abusive names while declaring out of his rectum “Nothing to see here” forfeits my attention to anything he has to say if he’s taking too long, which this Eagleton insect was doing.
Gandydancer x
1 year ago
I stopped reading this when I reached the bit about “election deniers”. I don’t assert or know if Trump lost the 2020 election due to the “fortification” that went on, but I saw video of a van load (at least one) of alleged absentee ballots trucked into Cobo Hall after midnight (conveniently pre-verified in the Democrat County Clerks office, but somehow not discovered until polls downstate had closed) and, observers having been sent home, they were counted as many times as necessary to eliminate Trump’s lead in Michigan. Then any attempt to examine the alleged ballots was juridically suppressed. Anyone who calls me abusive names while declaring out of his rectum “Nothing to see here” forfeits my attention to anything he has to say if he’s taking too long, which this Eagleton insect was doing.
AC Harper
1 year ago
Perhaps some literary critics employ extravagant waffle to make a fuzzy point or two. “You might very well think that; I couldn’t possibly comment”.
AC Harper
1 year ago
Perhaps some literary critics employ extravagant waffle to make a fuzzy point or two. “You might very well think that; I couldn’t possibly comment”.
Barbara Stevens
1 year ago
In my opinion only one political party who helped the poor of Britain after the second world war was Clement Attlee’s, they got things done, the Tory political party like now was all talk of getting things done but didn’t want to be parted from their wealth.
Barbara Stevens
1 year ago
In my opinion only one political party who helped the poor of Britain after the second world war was Clement Attlee’s, they got things done, the Tory political party like now was all talk of getting things done but didn’t want to be parted from their wealth.
Richard 0
1 year ago
Any article that quotes Brecht as some kind of sage has lost me.
Richard 0
1 year ago
Any article that quotes Brecht as some kind of sage has lost me.
Rhys Jaggar
1 year ago
It’s not a question of ‘a fair way to go’, it’s a reality that anti-intellectualism has thrived since 1980. I’m not promoting intellectualism as inherently superior, I’m just saying that virulent emotional hatred of those with intellectual skills has flourished in the ‘practical’ classes, those with poor analytical thinking skills. Hatred and schadenfreude are common amongst the less skilled, since nothing pleases them more than seeing those who apply themselves better in the main being brought down to their level. It’s an indelible feature of humanity, I’m afraid. And if you are on the receiving end of it, it’s not really very pleasant.
‘Intellectual thinking’ is supposed to be about the ability to gather large amounts of relevant and sometimes irrelevant information and subject it to rigorous scrutiny based on attempting to falsify certain specific testable hypotheses. It is therefore really only suited to those with significant empirical experience in the relevant field, as the ability to judge conflicting information is usually lacking in those who have not been at the cold field for quite a while. It is the logical progression from early experiences, dedicated practical activities, learning by doing and watching and being handed down the skills of the previous generations.
It really only has value if it leads to insights not obtained already by the artesans, the practical gurus etc.
In more arts-based fields, the purported relevance is ‘learning from history so as to avoid making the same mistakes’. If that is its raison d’etre, it’s continued existence should be questioned. Three years of pre-corrupt working lives never seems to prevent the same mistakes occurring, over and over again. The mistakes of the First World War are being made again in the 21st century, the imperialism of Europe was repeated by the USA, the Soviet Union and Israel/Judaism. Stock markets continually crash, mainly because certain people want them to crash and make money from them crashing.
The ignorance of ‘chemical farming’ is now being repeated in the form of ‘ignorant climate crisis mongers’. They have learned nothing about nature, about the real world, the solar system and the Universe. Nothing.
My view is that if you are an aggressive practical thug, then a bit of intellectual polishing may make you a less objectionable human being. If you are already intellectual and need to learn how to kick a working class yob in the genitals without ending up in hospital, schools in general are a form of societal child abuse.
All discussions on education must stop thinking that there is one solution for all. Hugely different solutions are needed for different humans, growing up in different communities, families and political prisons.
Rhys Jaggar
1 year ago
It’s not a question of ‘a fair way to go’, it’s a reality that anti-intellectualism has thrived since 1980. I’m not promoting intellectualism as inherently superior, I’m just saying that virulent emotional hatred of those with intellectual skills has flourished in the ‘practical’ classes, those with poor analytical thinking skills. Hatred and schadenfreude are common amongst the less skilled, since nothing pleases them more than seeing those who apply themselves better in the main being brought down to their level. It’s an indelible feature of humanity, I’m afraid. And if you are on the receiving end of it, it’s not really very pleasant.
‘Intellectual thinking’ is supposed to be about the ability to gather large amounts of relevant and sometimes irrelevant information and subject it to rigorous scrutiny based on attempting to falsify certain specific testable hypotheses. It is therefore really only suited to those with significant empirical experience in the relevant field, as the ability to judge conflicting information is usually lacking in those who have not been at the cold field for quite a while. It is the logical progression from early experiences, dedicated practical activities, learning by doing and watching and being handed down the skills of the previous generations.
It really only has value if it leads to insights not obtained already by the artesans, the practical gurus etc.
In more arts-based fields, the purported relevance is ‘learning from history so as to avoid making the same mistakes’. If that is its raison d’etre, it’s continued existence should be questioned. Three years of pre-corrupt working lives never seems to prevent the same mistakes occurring, over and over again. The mistakes of the First World War are being made again in the 21st century, the imperialism of Europe was repeated by the USA, the Soviet Union and Israel/Judaism. Stock markets continually crash, mainly because certain people want them to crash and make money from them crashing.
The ignorance of ‘chemical farming’ is now being repeated in the form of ‘ignorant climate crisis mongers’. They have learned nothing about nature, about the real world, the solar system and the Universe. Nothing.
My view is that if you are an aggressive practical thug, then a bit of intellectual polishing may make you a less objectionable human being. If you are already intellectual and need to learn how to kick a working class yob in the genitals without ending up in hospital, schools in general are a form of societal child abuse.
All discussions on education must stop thinking that there is one solution for all. Hugely different solutions are needed for different humans, growing up in different communities, families and political prisons.
Liam O'Mahony
1 year ago
Three things struck me immediately:
1. The idea that humans are sick animals is a new concept: it isn’t. JP Sartre used that exact term: ‘animal malade’ ..this, for some can be traced back to ‘the fall from grace’: knowledge of good and evil: abandoning the bliss of ignorance.
2. The failure to define terms: in this type off discussion clarity is crucial.. the difference between, knowledge (of facts): understanding (of theories and philosophy) and believing (due to intuition / faith): all honed by conditioning. And the notion of (sbsolute) truth.
3. The omission of the word (and concept) of WISDOM which is 2 above + lived experience + inate intelligenge.
Actions from 1 are liable to be contradictory and/or fruitless at best leading to mental illness of various kinds, notably neuroses and bipolar disorders. And perhaps tyranical at worst as attempts are made to ‘improve’ society to the tyrant’s worldview of what is ‘best’ despite the cost!
Clearly the best option is no.3 Wisdom. Successful cultures respected and relied on wisdom until recently. Even in our own we only voted for older, hopefully wiser politicians and successful PMs in particular tended to be old and wise.
In recent times wisdom counts for little or nothing. Old people are hidden away and any advice they might offer is regarded as out of date.
Knowledge / information grew and changed faster than any human could keep up: and cold, hard algorithms took over everything. Human judgement is no longer to be trusted.
The final nail in the coffin was the discarding of religion with nothing comparable in its place.
The gulf between the algorithm driven world and the few spiritual humans left is now so great that any reasonable discourse is impossible let alone any kind of compromise or coexistence.
Mark Kennedy
1 year ago
It’s a peculiar article, which commits the logical equivocation of using the terms ‘knowledge’ and ‘reason’ interchangeably, seems hostile to both, yet relies on them to make its case. I’m on board with its antipathy to Oxbridge snobbery, though. Why would anyone disparage the autodidactic impulse, which would seem to be the ideal mindset for any university student? What are university students if not autodidacts roaming free in artificially supercharged, resource-rich learning environments? A manual labourer who’s an autodidact is a student without portfolio, so to speak.
This essay feels, in a way, incomplete to me. It’s part of a series called “Did the Welfare State Work?” The strapline refers to Beveridge’s “five evils” which are (according to Google): Want, disease, ignorance, squalor and idleness. The title asserts that the workers were never ignorant. So the current essay seems to be about ignorance, and its near antonym, knowledge, and, by implication, whether the Beveridge reforms solved the problem of the ignorance of working people, or whether the problem existed at all.
The author argues that the workers were never ignorant and possessed various types of knowledge, although not the academic type of knowledge which the author disdains. Workers, for example, understood at the time of the general strike, just as they understand today, that their pay packet was too small and they’re being lied to by employers and government alike. In that sense, workers aren’t, and never were, ignorant.
But how does the author’s abstract analysis of different types of knowledge bear on the practical question of whether the welfare state improved the lot of working people? Maybe pre-Beveridge workers possessed practical knowledge, but how did that help them when access to abstract knowledge, delivered by universities, was an invaluable step up in society and in the economic food chain?
Notwithstanding the author’s clever dissection of the concept of knowledge, if a working man at the time of Beveridge learned Latin (a largely useless, academic subject) and obtained a teaching certificate, he left the hard grind of manual labor behind and entered a materially improved station in life. Does the essay address the beneficial connection between improved access to academic attainment (even if such knowledge is impractical) and standard of living, or is the essay ultimately a meditation on the various aspects of knowledge, and therefore the type of dry scholarship the author frowns upon?
As is often the case the comments illuminate the subject of the article better than the article itself. I often turn first to the comment section to determine whether an article is worth my while reading. It often saves wading through a lot of overblown journalism.
I think you are a little hard on many of the people who write for UnHerd but I would agree that some essays go on a bit longer than necessary. I sometimes think, after the first 300 words, ‘OK, I’ve got the point.’
I entirely agree there are some outstanding contributors that I am happy to dive in and read without a glance at the comments knowing that I can expect an excellent article. It would perhaps be unfair to name them as I might inadvertently overlook some who should be on the list. Unfortunately there are plenty where a glance at the comments have or would have saved me from wading through dross.
“…there are some outstanding contributors…”
This not one of them.
The author seems to have an Oxbridge chip on each shoulder.
If Donald Rumsfeld only made one contribution to the sum of human knowledge it was one more than the author.
As to the election-deniers being just ignorant, only the truly ignorant or dishonest employ the term “denier”. There is nothing wrong about questioning the result of an election. It is those that try to quash any attempt to do so who are the ones that have something to hide. There was something obviously dodgy about the 2020 election, and the vehemence of those who used every available invective an slur to shut down any debate shows the denier were not far wrong.
As the saying goes, the flak is always heaviest over the target
That dig at Rumsfeld was the first tell. The second was the fashionable pejorative, “election denier”. The third, because I started to read it without noting the author, was “Terry Eagleton”, who always turns out humbug like this. “Literary theorist”. Good grief.
Yes Alison, the first tell. I then thought that the salient point should have been the unknown unknown rather than the known unknown; reinforced by the reference to the unconscious.Good grief indeed.
Yes Alison, the first tell. I then thought that the salient point should have been the unknown unknown rather than the known unknown; reinforced by the reference to the unconscious.Good grief indeed.
What ‘obviously dodgy’ stuff might you be referring to? Counting every vote? Letting the impoverished participate in an election?
more like letting dead people vote
Vote harvesting, stopping the count to go get more votes, making sure no one can watch the count……..
Vote harvesting, stopping the count to go get more votes, making sure no one can watch the count……..
more like letting dead people vote
That dig at Rumsfeld was the first tell. The second was the fashionable pejorative, “election denier”. The third, because I started to read it without noting the author, was “Terry Eagleton”, who always turns out humbug like this. “Literary theorist”. Good grief.
What ‘obviously dodgy’ stuff might you be referring to? Counting every vote? Letting the impoverished participate in an election?
“…there are some outstanding contributors…”
This not one of them.
The author seems to have an Oxbridge chip on each shoulder.
If Donald Rumsfeld only made one contribution to the sum of human knowledge it was one more than the author.
As to the election-deniers being just ignorant, only the truly ignorant or dishonest employ the term “denier”. There is nothing wrong about questioning the result of an election. It is those that try to quash any attempt to do so who are the ones that have something to hide. There was something obviously dodgy about the 2020 election, and the vehemence of those who used every available invective an slur to shut down any debate shows the denier were not far wrong.
As the saying goes, the flak is always heaviest over the target
I entirely agree there are some outstanding contributors that I am happy to dive in and read without a glance at the comments knowing that I can expect an excellent article. It would perhaps be unfair to name them as I might inadvertently overlook some who should be on the list. Unfortunately there are plenty where a glance at the comments have or would have saved me from wading through dross.
I think you are a little hard on many of the people who write for UnHerd but I would agree that some essays go on a bit longer than necessary. I sometimes think, after the first 300 words, ‘OK, I’ve got the point.’
You don’t have to know much about algebra, or indeed what a slide rules’ for, to know how to organise. That knowledge, the can-do (cannan?) of organising people, is fundamental to our species. And one reason ‘the workers’ haven’t always been taken in by the extravagant waffle of critical theory, especially where it rests heavily on an outdated 19th century idea of there being a singular form of economic organisation called capitalism that sweeps all before it.
Critical theory may be a clever tool for analysing Thomas Hardy, and for coming up with tidy notions like markets being capable of showing emotions like regret. Perhaps. But for all its claims not to be, it’s hard not to see the theory used by Terry Eagleton as a form of knowledge rooted in a utopian idea, an idea that has enfeebled the work of developing a more nuanced, more useful set of tools.
As is often the case the comments illuminate the subject of the article better than the article itself. I often turn first to the comment section to determine whether an article is worth my while reading. It often saves wading through a lot of overblown journalism.
You don’t have to know much about algebra, or indeed what a slide rules’ for, to know how to organise. That knowledge, the can-do (cannan?) of organising people, is fundamental to our species. And one reason ‘the workers’ haven’t always been taken in by the extravagant waffle of critical theory, especially where it rests heavily on an outdated 19th century idea of there being a singular form of economic organisation called capitalism that sweeps all before it.
Critical theory may be a clever tool for analysing Thomas Hardy, and for coming up with tidy notions like markets being capable of showing emotions like regret. Perhaps. But for all its claims not to be, it’s hard not to see the theory used by Terry Eagleton as a form of knowledge rooted in a utopian idea, an idea that has enfeebled the work of developing a more nuanced, more useful set of tools.
This essay feels, in a way, incomplete to me. It’s part of a series called “Did the Welfare State Work?” The strapline refers to Beveridge’s “five evils” which are (according to Google): Want, disease, ignorance, squalor and idleness. The title asserts that the workers were never ignorant. So the current essay seems to be about ignorance, and its near antonym, knowledge, and, by implication, whether the Beveridge reforms solved the problem of the ignorance of working people, or whether the problem existed at all.
The author argues that the workers were never ignorant and possessed various types of knowledge, although not the academic type of knowledge which the author disdains. Workers, for example, understood at the time of the general strike, just as they understand today, that their pay packet was too small and they’re being lied to by employers and government alike. In that sense, workers aren’t, and never were, ignorant.
But how does the author’s abstract analysis of different types of knowledge bear on the practical question of whether the welfare state improved the lot of working people? Maybe pre-Beveridge workers possessed practical knowledge, but how did that help them when access to abstract knowledge, delivered by universities, was an invaluable step up in society and in the economic food chain?
Notwithstanding the author’s clever dissection of the concept of knowledge, if a working man at the time of Beveridge learned Latin (a largely useless, academic subject) and obtained a teaching certificate, he left the hard grind of manual labor behind and entered a materially improved station in life. Does the essay address the beneficial connection between improved access to academic attainment (even if such knowledge is impractical) and standard of living, or is the essay ultimately a meditation on the various aspects of knowledge, and therefore the type of dry scholarship the author frowns upon?
…says the man who spent 32 years teaching literature at Oxford. You could run a pit-wheel on the hypocrisy.
“Literary studies at the time were a combination of bone-dry scholarship and extravagant waffle.”
Yeah, at the time.
Oddly enough, although Terry is an entertaining and witty lecturer, “extravagant waffle” seems a good way to sum up his writings and interests. Post-structuralism, anyone?
Oddly enough, although Terry is an entertaining and witty lecturer, “extravagant waffle” seems a good way to sum up his writings and interests. Post-structuralism, anyone?
“Literary studies at the time were a combination of bone-dry scholarship and extravagant waffle.”
Yeah, at the time.
…says the man who spent 32 years teaching literature at Oxford. You could run a pit-wheel on the hypocrisy.
Well I suppose ‘My knowledge’ is a slight improvement on ‘My truth’. The fact remains that there are, and always have been, a large number of people in this country whose knowledge of history and politics is abysmal. That does not mean they are stupid, unreflective or lack wisdom but it does mean they are ill-informed which can be equally dangerous.
I am constantly reminded of the depths of my own ignorance even in my own subjects of special interest.
Yes, the opinions of intelligent people on subjects that they have in fact not properly evaluated are particularly dangerous as their intelligence can provide their opinion with a veneer of plausibility.
I think the phrase you’re seeking is:
“A little learning is a dangerous thing” (Pope)
I think the phrase you’re seeking is:
“A little learning is a dangerous thing” (Pope)
Yes, the opinions of intelligent people on subjects that they have in fact not properly evaluated are particularly dangerous as their intelligence can provide their opinion with a veneer of plausibility.
Well I suppose ‘My knowledge’ is a slight improvement on ‘My truth’. The fact remains that there are, and always have been, a large number of people in this country whose knowledge of history and politics is abysmal. That does not mean they are stupid, unreflective or lack wisdom but it does mean they are ill-informed which can be equally dangerous.
I am constantly reminded of the depths of my own ignorance even in my own subjects of special interest.
This author, like many I’ve read, gets rather close to the crux of the matter but doesn’t quite say it. He extolls the virtues of self-education and the common sense wisdom of the everyman, but he isn’t quite ready to just flatly say that the Oxford professor possesses no particular virtue or worth greater than that of the average coal miner. After all, it would practically upend all human civilization if people admitted that the entire enterprise of organized human education is basically an exercise in social signaling, or, in other words, a way of distinguishing social classes and neatly grouping people and assigning them levels of power, status, influence, and wealth in a society. Even in the age of universal public education, there is a hierarchy of ‘educatedness’, a scale of value with Harvard, Yale, MIT, and Stanford PhDs on one end and high school dropouts on the other, a scale that, when reduced to its basest purpose, isn’t much different than the one the Nazis used to decide how much Jewish ancestry was required to send an individual to the ghetto or the gas chamber. Education and universities were created by the nobility for the nobility. Knowledge wasn’t the point. Education wasn’t the point. Yet another form of social hierarchy which they could and did control and use to elevate themselves above others was the point. The fact that education is so accessible to so many has not changed the basic algebra of more education/better education = higher social class. The Dukes who sent their second and third sons to Oxford and Cambridge did so for the same basic reason as celebrities who tried to buy their children’s admission to top universities. The same logic drives every politician or technocrat who insists that the ignorant voters defer to ‘experts’ on everything from COVID masks to economic policy to climate change. Unfortunately, western thought coming out of the Enlightenment era romanticized and lionized knowledge, reason, and education to such an extreme level that naming it for the caste system it is would be a bridge too far for most people, especially the ‘educated’ sort.
“He extolls the virtues of self-education and the common sense wisdom of the everyman, but he isn’t quite ready to just flatly say that the Oxford professor possesses no particular virtue or worth greater than that of the average coal miner.”
I know of no-one who ever thought that the possession of knowledge makes one socially superior. However it is necessary for the pursuit of truth that all education should be confined to an intellectual elite (either financially independent or in receipt of largesse (gifts, bursaries, scholarships etc.) from patrons). This is to prevent the confusion of acquiring and transmitting knowledge and engaging in commercial enterprises dependent on the supply of such knowledge, where financial considerations might lead people to alter or obfuscate the truth for financial gain (this becomes more likely the more the field is one considered to involve a certain urgency e.g. ‘medicine’). In short, the purpose of education is not ‘to get a job’. Knowledge acquired for that is called ‘training’ and has nothing to do with pure intellectual enquiry.
Really? Don’t think possession of knowledge makes one socially superior? You’ve never heard a derogatory comment or joke about high-school dropouts where the word high school dropout could be easily replaced by the N-word and still have the same denigrating purpose? You say the purpose of education is not ‘to get a job’. You don’t think employers value the word “Harvard” on a resume more than say, “Jackson State” without having ever met the person in question? I contend that much of the inequality of outcomes that is criticized as ‘racism’ is in fact the much more common and socially acceptable practice of discrimination based on educational background. It becomes an easy stand-in for older, less acceptable forms of discrimination.
We had a fibre box fitted recently. Guy working quickly, cleanly and competently in driving rain. He told me that a little boy had just asked , probably grandma, what he was doing. Her reply had been , that’s what you do if you don’t listen in school. We need to start valuing physical competence more. We need thinkers as well as doers but we need thinkers who learn from doers or can do themselves. Tangentially, just watched a 1964 Horizon on Buckminster Fuller from 1964. I recommend it. His theory began with practical observation leading to the maths not vice versa. Those who construct models please note.
We had a fibre box fitted recently. Guy working quickly, cleanly and competently in driving rain. He told me that a little boy had just asked , probably grandma, what he was doing. Her reply had been , that’s what you do if you don’t listen in school. We need to start valuing physical competence more. We need thinkers as well as doers but we need thinkers who learn from doers or can do themselves. Tangentially, just watched a 1964 Horizon on Buckminster Fuller from 1964. I recommend it. His theory began with practical observation leading to the maths not vice versa. Those who construct models please note.
Really? Don’t think possession of knowledge makes one socially superior? You’ve never heard a derogatory comment or joke about high-school dropouts where the word high school dropout could be easily replaced by the N-word and still have the same denigrating purpose? You say the purpose of education is not ‘to get a job’. You don’t think employers value the word “Harvard” on a resume more than say, “Jackson State” without having ever met the person in question? I contend that much of the inequality of outcomes that is criticized as ‘racism’ is in fact the much more common and socially acceptable practice of discrimination based on educational background. It becomes an easy stand-in for older, less acceptable forms of discrimination.
“Knowledge wasn’t the point. Education wasn’t the point. Yet another form of social hierarchy which they could and did control and use to elevate themselves above others was the point.”
I treat this point separately as it appears to be complete balderdash. How could even a nobility prevent anyone from acquiring ‘knowledge’? And what advantage does the possession of ‘knowledge’ entail in any case? After all the vast majority of posters on Twitter are absolutely ignorant and incapable of logical conceptual thought. And yet they indirectly exercise lots of power in the everyday, political, world.
And we find that, historically, throughout the intellectual sphere, nobility acted as patrons to people of ‘humble’ birth, where some leanings towards intelligent thought existed.
First, I’ll concede I went too far in the statement you quoted. There are few topics I am truly passionate about, but this is one, and I tend to get carried away. You are correct to point out the excessive hyperbole. Whatever the formal or theoretical intent of higher education, its practical purpose is something else entirely. To answer your question about controlling knowledge though, they controlled it the same way they do today, by deciding what was taught and what qualified as knowledge. By awarding degrees and giving credentials which ‘qualified’ one to speak authoritatively on a particular topic. I see quite a bit of anti-elite sentiment on Unherd. That’s one reason why I like it. I don’t see as much explanation as to how elites become elites and hold themselves above the masses. A large part is by creating scales of social value based on some distinguishing characteristic which they possess and can pass directly or indirectly to children or other chosen successors. In the past, land, wealth, line of descent, race, and other largely heritable traits served this purpose. Those were eventually rejected, partly through moral arguments but partly by newer elites usurping older ones. As wealth once replaced land as a measure of power in society and a sign of nobility, now the wheel turns again and ‘knowledge’ or ‘information’ replaces wealth. I concede this makes me sound like a Marxist, but the man didn’t get everything wrong. Like so many others, I regard Marx as a man who made excellent observations and erred in the far more difficult task of drawing conclusions. I personally try not to draw many conclusions. I have no earthly idea what one could or should do to correct intellectual/educational elitism. I’d be satisfied if people simply recognize it exists.
First, I’ll concede I went too far in the statement you quoted. There are few topics I am truly passionate about, but this is one, and I tend to get carried away. You are correct to point out the excessive hyperbole. Whatever the formal or theoretical intent of higher education, its practical purpose is something else entirely. To answer your question about controlling knowledge though, they controlled it the same way they do today, by deciding what was taught and what qualified as knowledge. By awarding degrees and giving credentials which ‘qualified’ one to speak authoritatively on a particular topic. I see quite a bit of anti-elite sentiment on Unherd. That’s one reason why I like it. I don’t see as much explanation as to how elites become elites and hold themselves above the masses. A large part is by creating scales of social value based on some distinguishing characteristic which they possess and can pass directly or indirectly to children or other chosen successors. In the past, land, wealth, line of descent, race, and other largely heritable traits served this purpose. Those were eventually rejected, partly through moral arguments but partly by newer elites usurping older ones. As wealth once replaced land as a measure of power in society and a sign of nobility, now the wheel turns again and ‘knowledge’ or ‘information’ replaces wealth. I concede this makes me sound like a Marxist, but the man didn’t get everything wrong. Like so many others, I regard Marx as a man who made excellent observations and erred in the far more difficult task of drawing conclusions. I personally try not to draw many conclusions. I have no earthly idea what one could or should do to correct intellectual/educational elitism. I’d be satisfied if people simply recognize it exists.
A tad cynical perhaps? Surely wisdom at least and perhaps philosophy in particular have a value to all as an aid to forming one’s own beliefs? …and without beliefs we are no more that brute animals?
Much more than a tad cynical I’m afraid. My cynicism goes well beyond the scale of normal human beings. The only way I can explain it is to say I was just born this way. At age five, I found a quiet corner to read or think while the other kids ran around playing. By the time I was twelve, my mind was disciplined enough to discuss politics and science with my teachers, who I knew better than any of my classmates. By fifteen, I was laughing at silly notions like ‘moral consistency’, ‘romantic love’, or ‘human progress’. A ‘tad’ cynical doesn’t begin to cover it.
Much more than a tad cynical I’m afraid. My cynicism goes well beyond the scale of normal human beings. The only way I can explain it is to say I was just born this way. At age five, I found a quiet corner to read or think while the other kids ran around playing. By the time I was twelve, my mind was disciplined enough to discuss politics and science with my teachers, who I knew better than any of my classmates. By fifteen, I was laughing at silly notions like ‘moral consistency’, ‘romantic love’, or ‘human progress’. A ‘tad’ cynical doesn’t begin to cover it.
“He extolls the virtues of self-education and the common sense wisdom of the everyman, but he isn’t quite ready to just flatly say that the Oxford professor possesses no particular virtue or worth greater than that of the average coal miner.”
I know of no-one who ever thought that the possession of knowledge makes one socially superior. However it is necessary for the pursuit of truth that all education should be confined to an intellectual elite (either financially independent or in receipt of largesse (gifts, bursaries, scholarships etc.) from patrons). This is to prevent the confusion of acquiring and transmitting knowledge and engaging in commercial enterprises dependent on the supply of such knowledge, where financial considerations might lead people to alter or obfuscate the truth for financial gain (this becomes more likely the more the field is one considered to involve a certain urgency e.g. ‘medicine’). In short, the purpose of education is not ‘to get a job’. Knowledge acquired for that is called ‘training’ and has nothing to do with pure intellectual enquiry.
“Knowledge wasn’t the point. Education wasn’t the point. Yet another form of social hierarchy which they could and did control and use to elevate themselves above others was the point.”
I treat this point separately as it appears to be complete balderdash. How could even a nobility prevent anyone from acquiring ‘knowledge’? And what advantage does the possession of ‘knowledge’ entail in any case? After all the vast majority of posters on Twitter are absolutely ignorant and incapable of logical conceptual thought. And yet they indirectly exercise lots of power in the everyday, political, world.
And we find that, historically, throughout the intellectual sphere, nobility acted as patrons to people of ‘humble’ birth, where some leanings towards intelligent thought existed.
A tad cynical perhaps? Surely wisdom at least and perhaps philosophy in particular have a value to all as an aid to forming one’s own beliefs? …and without beliefs we are no more that brute animals?
This author, like many I’ve read, gets rather close to the crux of the matter but doesn’t quite say it. He extolls the virtues of self-education and the common sense wisdom of the everyman, but he isn’t quite ready to just flatly say that the Oxford professor possesses no particular virtue or worth greater than that of the average coal miner. After all, it would practically upend all human civilization if people admitted that the entire enterprise of organized human education is basically an exercise in social signaling, or, in other words, a way of distinguishing social classes and neatly grouping people and assigning them levels of power, status, influence, and wealth in a society. Even in the age of universal public education, there is a hierarchy of ‘educatedness’, a scale of value with Harvard, Yale, MIT, and Stanford PhDs on one end and high school dropouts on the other, a scale that, when reduced to its basest purpose, isn’t much different than the one the Nazis used to decide how much Jewish ancestry was required to send an individual to the ghetto or the gas chamber. Education and universities were created by the nobility for the nobility. Knowledge wasn’t the point. Education wasn’t the point. Yet another form of social hierarchy which they could and did control and use to elevate themselves above others was the point. The fact that education is so accessible to so many has not changed the basic algebra of more education/better education = higher social class. The Dukes who sent their second and third sons to Oxford and Cambridge did so for the same basic reason as celebrities who tried to buy their children’s admission to top universities. The same logic drives every politician or technocrat who insists that the ignorant voters defer to ‘experts’ on everything from COVID masks to economic policy to climate change. Unfortunately, western thought coming out of the Enlightenment era romanticized and lionized knowledge, reason, and education to such an extreme level that naming it for the caste system it is would be a bridge too far for most people, especially the ‘educated’ sort.
Was there a “history of post-Impressionism” to be educated in, at the time of the General Strike? I ask this question since the author cites it as something the striking workers didn’t need in order to understand that their conditions were under threat, but it’s the proverbial Straw Man (perhaps Eagleton has a secret hankering for English folklore?) and i also found his citing of female mill-workers studying Shakespeare before attending their looms just a little too twee. My mother started work in a Lancashire cotton mill aged 14, and whilst i don’t doubt Eagleton could provide circumstantial evidence for his claim, it would’ve made my mother Shake in a rather different way.
There’s a saying that used to do the rounds in my youth about “a little knowledge is a dangerous thing.” Eagleton’s essays remind me of nothing more than that. He very much appears to have a superficial knowledge of many of the streams of modernism, also citing Nietzsche, Freud, Lacan etc but without the essay comprising a river. He’d have been better off taking up stonemasonry.
Was there a “history of post-Impressionism” to be educated in, at the time of the General Strike? I ask this question since the author cites it as something the striking workers didn’t need in order to understand that their conditions were under threat, but it’s the proverbial Straw Man (perhaps Eagleton has a secret hankering for English folklore?) and i also found his citing of female mill-workers studying Shakespeare before attending their looms just a little too twee. My mother started work in a Lancashire cotton mill aged 14, and whilst i don’t doubt Eagleton could provide circumstantial evidence for his claim, it would’ve made my mother Shake in a rather different way.
There’s a saying that used to do the rounds in my youth about “a little knowledge is a dangerous thing.” Eagleton’s essays remind me of nothing more than that. He very much appears to have a superficial knowledge of many of the streams of modernism, also citing Nietzsche, Freud, Lacan etc but without the essay comprising a river. He’d have been better off taking up stonemasonry.
“The election-deniers are just ignorant”.
Or perhaps representative of a worker class that has been educated to interpret, challenge data, spot trends? Which is similar to points made elsewhere in the essay.
If Process A delivers a certain trend – then enters a black box where none can enter – and comes out of the other side as Process B with the trend reversing, would you not want to see what variable occurred when the process entered the black box, then onto Process B to produce such a marked different in trends?
That’s not ignorance, that’s education. Or at least curiosity. Our media and it seems academia lack even curiosity. Unless they can blame Russia. Just who are the ignorant ones here?
Perhaps (I surmise) because the ends justify the means. But if the variables were open to outside influence, and that changed a democratic outcome, then beware. That same variable could be used to produce ends none of us will like.
“The election-deniers are just ignorant”.
Or perhaps representative of a worker class that has been educated to interpret, challenge data, spot trends? Which is similar to points made elsewhere in the essay.
If Process A delivers a certain trend – then enters a black box where none can enter – and comes out of the other side as Process B with the trend reversing, would you not want to see what variable occurred when the process entered the black box, then onto Process B to produce such a marked different in trends?
That’s not ignorance, that’s education. Or at least curiosity. Our media and it seems academia lack even curiosity. Unless they can blame Russia. Just who are the ignorant ones here?
Perhaps (I surmise) because the ends justify the means. But if the variables were open to outside influence, and that changed a democratic outcome, then beware. That same variable could be used to produce ends none of us will like.
I stopped reading this when I reached the bit about “election deniers”. I don’t assert or know if Trump lost the 2020 election due to the “fortification” that went on, but I saw video of a van load (at least one) of alleged absentee ballots trucked into Cobo Hall after midnight (conveniently pre-verified in the Democrat County Clerks office, but somehow not discovered until polls downstate had closed) and, observers having been sent home, they were counted as many times as necessary to eliminate Trump’s lead in Michigan. Then any attempt to examine the alleged ballots was juridically suppressed. Anyone who calls me abusive names while declaring out of his rectum “Nothing to see here” forfeits my attention to anything he has to say if he’s taking too long, which this Eagleton insect was doing.
I stopped reading this when I reached the bit about “election deniers”. I don’t assert or know if Trump lost the 2020 election due to the “fortification” that went on, but I saw video of a van load (at least one) of alleged absentee ballots trucked into Cobo Hall after midnight (conveniently pre-verified in the Democrat County Clerks office, but somehow not discovered until polls downstate had closed) and, observers having been sent home, they were counted as many times as necessary to eliminate Trump’s lead in Michigan. Then any attempt to examine the alleged ballots was juridically suppressed. Anyone who calls me abusive names while declaring out of his rectum “Nothing to see here” forfeits my attention to anything he has to say if he’s taking too long, which this Eagleton insect was doing.
Perhaps some literary critics employ extravagant waffle to make a fuzzy point or two. “You might very well think that; I couldn’t possibly comment”.
Perhaps some literary critics employ extravagant waffle to make a fuzzy point or two. “You might very well think that; I couldn’t possibly comment”.
In my opinion only one political party who helped the poor of Britain after the second world war was Clement Attlee’s, they got things done, the Tory political party like now was all talk of getting things done but didn’t want to be parted from their wealth.
In my opinion only one political party who helped the poor of Britain after the second world war was Clement Attlee’s, they got things done, the Tory political party like now was all talk of getting things done but didn’t want to be parted from their wealth.
Any article that quotes Brecht as some kind of sage has lost me.
Any article that quotes Brecht as some kind of sage has lost me.
It’s not a question of ‘a fair way to go’, it’s a reality that anti-intellectualism has thrived since 1980. I’m not promoting intellectualism as inherently superior, I’m just saying that virulent emotional hatred of those with intellectual skills has flourished in the ‘practical’ classes, those with poor analytical thinking skills. Hatred and schadenfreude are common amongst the less skilled, since nothing pleases them more than seeing those who apply themselves better in the main being brought down to their level. It’s an indelible feature of humanity, I’m afraid. And if you are on the receiving end of it, it’s not really very pleasant.
‘Intellectual thinking’ is supposed to be about the ability to gather large amounts of relevant and sometimes irrelevant information and subject it to rigorous scrutiny based on attempting to falsify certain specific testable hypotheses. It is therefore really only suited to those with significant empirical experience in the relevant field, as the ability to judge conflicting information is usually lacking in those who have not been at the cold field for quite a while. It is the logical progression from early experiences, dedicated practical activities, learning by doing and watching and being handed down the skills of the previous generations.
It really only has value if it leads to insights not obtained already by the artesans, the practical gurus etc.
In more arts-based fields, the purported relevance is ‘learning from history so as to avoid making the same mistakes’. If that is its raison d’etre, it’s continued existence should be questioned. Three years of pre-corrupt working lives never seems to prevent the same mistakes occurring, over and over again. The mistakes of the First World War are being made again in the 21st century, the imperialism of Europe was repeated by the USA, the Soviet Union and Israel/Judaism. Stock markets continually crash, mainly because certain people want them to crash and make money from them crashing.
The ignorance of ‘chemical farming’ is now being repeated in the form of ‘ignorant climate crisis mongers’. They have learned nothing about nature, about the real world, the solar system and the Universe. Nothing.
My view is that if you are an aggressive practical thug, then a bit of intellectual polishing may make you a less objectionable human being. If you are already intellectual and need to learn how to kick a working class yob in the genitals without ending up in hospital, schools in general are a form of societal child abuse.
All discussions on education must stop thinking that there is one solution for all. Hugely different solutions are needed for different humans, growing up in different communities, families and political prisons.
It’s not a question of ‘a fair way to go’, it’s a reality that anti-intellectualism has thrived since 1980. I’m not promoting intellectualism as inherently superior, I’m just saying that virulent emotional hatred of those with intellectual skills has flourished in the ‘practical’ classes, those with poor analytical thinking skills. Hatred and schadenfreude are common amongst the less skilled, since nothing pleases them more than seeing those who apply themselves better in the main being brought down to their level. It’s an indelible feature of humanity, I’m afraid. And if you are on the receiving end of it, it’s not really very pleasant.
‘Intellectual thinking’ is supposed to be about the ability to gather large amounts of relevant and sometimes irrelevant information and subject it to rigorous scrutiny based on attempting to falsify certain specific testable hypotheses. It is therefore really only suited to those with significant empirical experience in the relevant field, as the ability to judge conflicting information is usually lacking in those who have not been at the cold field for quite a while. It is the logical progression from early experiences, dedicated practical activities, learning by doing and watching and being handed down the skills of the previous generations.
It really only has value if it leads to insights not obtained already by the artesans, the practical gurus etc.
In more arts-based fields, the purported relevance is ‘learning from history so as to avoid making the same mistakes’. If that is its raison d’etre, it’s continued existence should be questioned. Three years of pre-corrupt working lives never seems to prevent the same mistakes occurring, over and over again. The mistakes of the First World War are being made again in the 21st century, the imperialism of Europe was repeated by the USA, the Soviet Union and Israel/Judaism. Stock markets continually crash, mainly because certain people want them to crash and make money from them crashing.
The ignorance of ‘chemical farming’ is now being repeated in the form of ‘ignorant climate crisis mongers’. They have learned nothing about nature, about the real world, the solar system and the Universe. Nothing.
My view is that if you are an aggressive practical thug, then a bit of intellectual polishing may make you a less objectionable human being. If you are already intellectual and need to learn how to kick a working class yob in the genitals without ending up in hospital, schools in general are a form of societal child abuse.
All discussions on education must stop thinking that there is one solution for all. Hugely different solutions are needed for different humans, growing up in different communities, families and political prisons.
Three things struck me immediately:
1. The idea that humans are sick animals is a new concept: it isn’t. JP Sartre used that exact term: ‘animal malade’ ..this, for some can be traced back to ‘the fall from grace’: knowledge of good and evil: abandoning the bliss of ignorance.
2. The failure to define terms: in this type off discussion clarity is crucial.. the difference between, knowledge (of facts): understanding (of theories and philosophy) and believing (due to intuition / faith): all honed by conditioning. And the notion of (sbsolute) truth.
3. The omission of the word (and concept) of WISDOM which is 2 above + lived experience + inate intelligenge.
Actions from 1 are liable to be contradictory and/or fruitless at best leading to mental illness of various kinds, notably neuroses and bipolar disorders. And perhaps tyranical at worst as attempts are made to ‘improve’ society to the tyrant’s worldview of what is ‘best’ despite the cost!
Clearly the best option is no.3 Wisdom. Successful cultures respected and relied on wisdom until recently. Even in our own we only voted for older, hopefully wiser politicians and successful PMs in particular tended to be old and wise.
In recent times wisdom counts for little or nothing. Old people are hidden away and any advice they might offer is regarded as out of date.
Knowledge / information grew and changed faster than any human could keep up: and cold, hard algorithms took over everything. Human judgement is no longer to be trusted.
The final nail in the coffin was the discarding of religion with nothing comparable in its place.
The gulf between the algorithm driven world and the few spiritual humans left is now so great that any reasonable discourse is impossible let alone any kind of compromise or coexistence.
It’s a peculiar article, which commits the logical equivocation of using the terms ‘knowledge’ and ‘reason’ interchangeably, seems hostile to both, yet relies on them to make its case. I’m on board with its antipathy to Oxbridge snobbery, though. Why would anyone disparage the autodidactic impulse, which would seem to be the ideal mindset for any university student? What are university students if not autodidacts roaming free in artificially supercharged, resource-rich learning environments? A manual labourer who’s an autodidact is a student without portfolio, so to speak.