Hi List,

 

  I wanted to share a fascinating article I stumbled across yesterday on the state of our knowledge, by Jonathan Rauch called The Constitution of Knowledge (https://www.nationalaffairs.com/publications/detail/the-constitution-of-knowledge). Here is its key point:

 

America has faced many challenges to its political culture, but this is the first time we have seen a national-level epistemic attack: a systematic attack, emanating from the very highest reaches of power, on our collective ability to distinguish truth from falsehood. 

 

The state of knowledge is, of course, one of the central concerns of our TOK society. When we combine the attack that Rauch illuminates with all the fake traffic that is on the internet (thanks to Waldemar for sharing this article with me), and all the other global and technological changes we are witnessing, it is little wonder that we are living in the age of confusion. The Rauch article ends with a critique of the academy, and expresses a concern about the academy tilting so far left that it loses credibility. From my vantage point, the article misses the other key dynamic in the academy that is at play here, which is the academy’s epistemic state of fragmented pluralism. This is Christian Smith’s critique about BS in the academy, which starts off with the key problem, which is lack of Big Picture coherence, resulting in what Smith calls the “fragmentiversities.”

 

Hopefully, in the years to come, our society can contribute finding effective vision that allow us to move the academy from its current state of fragmented pluralism to a much healthier integrated pluralism. An integrated pluralism is able to embrace the academy’s successes in moving toward a more inclusive and diverse system, without falling off the cliff of postmodern relativism and epistemological chaos and an extreme victimhood culture of the hyper progressive left.

 

I think the pendulum is getting ready to swing back toward looking for effective, synthetic consilient visions that can help us make sense of the chaos and move us toward foundational values.

 

Here's to looking forward to 2019 with hope to contributing to a better future!

 

Best,

G

 

___________________________________________

Gregg Henriques, Ph.D.
Professor
Department of Graduate Psychology
216 Johnston Hall
MSC 7401
James Madison University
Harrisonburg, VA 22807
(540) 568-7857 (phone)
(540) 568-4747 (fax)

Be that which enhances dignity and well-being with integrity.

Check out my Theory of Knowledge blog at Psychology Today at:

https://www.psychologytoday.com/blog/theory-knowledge

 

Check out my webpage at:

www.gregghenriques.com