Facts and Fingers

Galileo’s Middle Finger...

A while back I attempted to indicate that I do worry about the level of our discourse these days (see: It Is Even Worse Than it Looks). I also worry that on an increasing number of campuses, I gather one is not even allowed to have a discourse about some subjects - what we used to call a ‘dialogue’ when we sat in circles on pillows. Given my interest in those issues I thought of another recent article in which a woman made a remark that reminds me of  some of the ones I mentioned in the earlier post.  The remark:   "I very much identify as a liberal feminist," she says. "That said, I get extremely impatient with liberals who want to rail about Republicans who won’t look at facts and then you get people who are making decisions based on identity and not on the facts. To me, that’s just a perversion of liberalism." I reluctantly introduce you to the ‘remarker’ - Alice Dreger.

You should know right away that it is highly likely that Dr. Dreger is a very decent person and fine scholar. My reluctance stems from the fact that: a) her most recent book is about gender and genitalia. I know little about the latter subject and, as a male, I am not allowed to speak about the former one, so I will probably not get around to reading her book for a while; b) I will point you to what you should read which will be better than what I can produce and, c) Dr. Dreger has a blog (actually a couple) and you can decide for yourself. I have, and think she is very much someone to whom attention should be paid.

One of the issues about which she worries is  “whether or not a scholar should be allowed to present evidence for a theory that some find profoundly threatening and deeply offensive.” They should. Here are a couple of other quotes that get at the issues she feels compelled to pursue. Such utterances have not made her life easier.

"Forms of scholarship that deny evidence, that deny truth, that deny the importance of facts, even when performed in the name of good, are dangerous, not only to science and to ethics but to democracy.”

“And questions are raised, chief among them whether certain branches of science have become infected with a pernicious groupthink, the kind that exalts identity and politics over inquiry and evidence — a problem that often occurs, as Dreger puts it, when "liberal hearts bleed so much that brains stop getting enough oxygen."

So there you have it. The quotes are from the very good piece by Tom Bartlett: “Reluctant Crusader: Why Alice Dreger’s Writing on Sex and Science Makes Liberals So Angry,” Chronicle of Higher Education, Mar. 10, 2015

Go to her blog. She is clearly someone we would all like to have as a friend and she has been able to maintain her sense of humor even if her enemies have not. http://alicedreger.com/

We have now covered the Facts. For the Finger see her new book: Galileo’s Middle Finger: Heretics, Activists, and the Search for Justice in Science. For a good review by David Dobbs see the New York Times Book Review, April 17, 2015. Here is how she starts the book:

“Soon enough,” Alice Dreger writes at the beginning of her romp of a book, “I will get to the death threats, the sex charges, the alleged genocides, the epidemics, the alien abductees, the anti-lesbian drug, the unethical ethicists, the fight with Martina Navratilova and, of course, Galileo’s middle finger. But first I have to tell you a little bit about how I got into this mess.”

Although I am somewhat more of an expert on the finger, having given some and received many, I will again simply refer you to a source that is better if you have begun wondering exactly “When Did the Middle Finger Become Offensive?” An article with that title by Daniel Nasaw is found in BBC News Magazine, Feb. 6, 2012. As additional incentive you will also learn about the bras d’honneur.