Philosophy is concerned only with open questions as Socrates acknowledged. That means some other discipline hasn't closed a particular door better as yet.
In particular, a question is philosophical, Socrates tells us, if one can argue for two or more conflicting theses with equal efficacy. Legal and political processes in Athens at that time depended on
1) a principle of eligibility or dokimasiai.
2) where a decision was impugned there could be 'euthynai' or the demand for an account of how it was arrived at.
Socrates himself was put on trial for asebia- impiety or 'adharma'. He failed to show that 'philosophers' like himself were a class of experts who should enjoy superior immunities. This was because
1) he could not show there was a principle of eligibility that was enforceable. Anybody could babble dangerous nonsense and claim to be a philosopher. Even after Plato created an Academy and thus a credentialized class, few were greatly impressed. This remains true to this day. In any case, even where a class of experts is respected, its immunities are lower and its obligations are higher.
2) Socrates, like all philosophers, was shit at giving an account of why they should be respected or their cogitations taken seriously. This too remains the case to this day.
Psilosophy means 'slender wisdom' like Aristophanes' Socrates. This is what Amia Srinivasan displays. She may think that she is helping 'women of colour'. She isn't. She is claiming a sort of Brahminical privilege for stupid people who got PhDs in worthless shit. Thus she is a laughing stock.
In 2018, OUP published a collection of essays on the theme of Academic Freedom.
Robert Mark Simpson and Amia Srinivasan contributed a chapter on 'No Platforming'- i.e. the practice of not allowing people or organisations with certain views to be allowed to visit a particular academic space and participate in any sort of expressive activity.
Liberalism, as a political regime, grants Hohfeldian immunities to property owners such that they can refuse to allow the entry or expression of views by anyone they dislike- or, for that matter, whom they like very much.
Liberalism does not make a distinction between an Academic and a non-Academic space. I am welcome to describe my toilet as a Research Institute or a Centre for Advanced Fartological Study.
Thus, liberal politics can't be greatly concerned with 'academic freedom' save by reason of curbing a nuisance or promoting a 'merit good'. But that is a matter for Law and Economics. There is no 'open question here' for any political philosophy deserving of the name 'Liberal'.
Simpson & Srinivasan take a different view. The following is the abstract of their paper-
This paper explains how the practice of ‘no platforming’ can be reconciled with a liberal politics. While opponents say that no platforming flouts ideals of open public discourse,
Which, thanks to the invention of writing, need not take place at any physical location. Moreover, an 'ideal' has no specific materialistic content. The thing is multiply realisable. Ideally, there should be a meeting of minds for a contract to exist. But what actually obtains is good enough almost all of the time. Since the matter is justiciable in a 'buck stopped', protocol bound, manner it follows that there is no 'open question' for philosophy here.
and defenders see it as a justifiable harm-prevention measure, both sides mistakenly treat the debate like a run-of-the-mill free speech conflict, rather than an issue of academic freedom specifically.
Why should academics have higher Hohfeldian rights than everybody else? Kant may say- as a servant of the State, the 'beamter' Professor must always say only nice things about Church and State in his private life. However, in his capacity as an official he may have a duty to point out that the fucking Russians or French or whomever are doing something more sensible in a particular regard. This was cool because Kant did not live in a Liberal society. The despot might be Enlightened but then again his successor might not. This type of academic freedom has to do with 'catch up growth'. The hoi polloi should have no freedom but a few smart people need to be able to find foreign 'mechanisms' for us to simulate.
Content-based restrictions on speech in
public spaces of all types not just
universities are ubiquitous. And this is no affront to a liberal conception of academic freedom,
It may be. The fact is 'academic freedom' may have a topos outside not just the public sphere but also the private sphere as defined by Hohfeldian incidents. Liberalism does not involve 'Presentism' or the denial that ontologically incompossible or dysphoric objects might exist.
I can imagine a Liberal Professor saying 'it is a scandal to me, being as I am, a Liberal, that my freedom as an academic may extend to rejecting every type of utilitarian or socially progressive thinking and embracing the theology of a Solovyov as expressed by the 'sad world' of LEJ Brouwer. But then, the Academy was always on a slippery slope to the Uranopolis of Mt. Athos.'
whose purpose isn’t just to protect the speech of academics,
'speech of academics' is a term with a finite 'extension'. We know there are multiple ad hoc ways to accomplish this objective. How? A finite extension means no intensional paradoxes arise. As C.S Pierce tried to argue, pure pragmatics closes the question for any practical, that is finite, purpose.
but also to give them the prerogative to determine which views and speakers have sufficient disciplinary credentials to receive a hearing in academic contexts.
Everyone has that prerogative. No 'disciplinary credentials' are sufficient to grant superior immunities to anyone in this respect. Srinivasan may prefer a Brahmanism where 'untouchable' reprobates like me aren't allowed to say her discipline is shit, but there's fuck all she can do about it.
Amia, proponent of a 'virulent wokeness', is the same age, and of the same ancestral background, as Vivek Ramaswamy who got his start in politics by writing a book attacking wokeness. It is the latter people are listening to.
No platforming should therefore be acceptable to liberals, in principle, in cases where it is used to support a university culture that maintains rigorous disciplinary standards, by denying attention and credibility to speakers without appropriate disciplinary credentials.
This already happens. No student of Mathematics will invite me to air my views on how the number 6 should never be placed next to the number 9 coz that's totes obscene, dude. However, where a University Department has permitted worthless shite to be taught, there are no fucking 'disciplinary standards'.
Following Robert Post
a fool who thinks ' academics are bound by evidence as constituted by their disciplines'. This isn't true even in Math or Physics. There are always 'open questions' where evidence can only be gained many decades in the future.
Moreover, whereas a Professional Association- e.g. that of Actuaries- may have some such requirement, this simply isn't true of Academics. That's a good thing precisely because 'open questions' abound.
and others, we distinguish principles of academic freedom,
They don't exist because there is no 'naturality square' or 'pullback'. Of what is arbitrary, no principle can be expounded. That's a good thing where 'open questions' abound.
which answer to the epistemic and intellectual aims of the university, from the wider free speech principles that govern the liberal public square.
Fuck the liberal public square. It doesn't matter- ought not to matter- because either the private sphere determines what happens there or Liberalism faces a scandal. It is either a 'noble lie' or else is on thin ice above an abyss of ontological dysphoria.
On this account, the content-based suppression of viewpoints by disciplinary gatekeepers isn’t merely permissible, but positively desirable – indeed, it stands in need of special protection.
Is it really the case that if I crash into a symposium on Super-String theory and start babbling about the Nicaraguan horcrux of my neighbour's cat, then 'disciplinary' gate-keepers are needed? Surely, the custodial staff can eject me efficiently enough even if they don't have two PhDs to rub together?
The fact is people who are interested in something useful- even if it is high IQ- figure out ways of getting rid of boring nutjobs without having to employ 'disciplinary gatekeepers'. Also, it is a fact that if I claim to be a Medical Doctor and seek to give people a prostate exam they fucking kick my head in more particularly if they happen to be policemen. Sad.
We identify some instances of no platforming that seem like they would be acceptable, and others that wouldn’t.
In neither case is any 'disciplinary gatekeeper' required. However, you may need to consult a lawyer if the obstreperous nutter creating a nuisance is litigious and has deep pockets. Alternatively, you could just keep kicking him in the slats till he goes away. You explain you thought he was a talent-scout for Chelsea Football club and no other balls were available for you to display your skill at kicking.
We then consider some hard cases, in particular, cases in which the prerogatives of disciplinary gatekeepers are contested, due to controversy about the scope and boundaries of disciplinary expertise. We finish by sketching a more radical way to adapt Post’s account in a defence of no platforming, one which allows that students, rather than only faculty members, may sometimes have a legitimate role to play in the formation of disciplinary standards.'
These stupid cunts have just slit their own throats! They are putting the sacred cow of 'tenure' under a knife wielded by their own students- i.e. peeps wot know better than most just how fucking useless they are.
J.S Mill, like his daddy, worked for the East India Company. That's one reason people of Indian heritage, unless they are very very fucking stupid or deracinated (i.e. Professors of shite at Ivy League) never invoke the 'harm principle'. Mill & Co thought you can't harm darkies by taking away any cool, shiny, stuff they might own. On the other hand, you might have to sentence a White dude in India to a year of hard labour if the fool started getting worked up about the horrible conditions under which some niggers were forced to grow indigo.
Simpson & Srinivasan quote Mill as saying- “the only purpose for which power can be rightfully exercised over any member of a civilized community, against his will, is to prevent harm to others”.
Mill had never actually visited India. Still, he knew lots of Indians were getting rich of indigo or opium or whatever. Moreover, power is generally only consistently exercised where it yields a profit. This is a question of 'incentive compatibility'. This means that 'civilised' has an arbitrary extension. But since the term is used to qualify 'harm' in an impredicative manner, 'harm' too is impredicative or arbitrary. There is no 'naturality' here and therefore no 'principle' can be discerned.
S&S now reveal their nakedly neo-Brahminical agenda- what we’re saying is (not) opposed to the view that some communicative acts are genuinely harmful.
Adequately credentialized Academics have super-powers! Beware! The curse of a Brahmin may cause you to live a long and happy life despite the fact that the truly civilised cognoscenti know you actually died horribly and are now being tortured in Hell!
Our point is that in order to defend no platforming via a harm-prevention rationale,
we can't do so. Otherwise this would be the sort of thing which any jury could decide de facti. We are super-special neo-Brahmins who have super-powers!
this view has to be combined with further claims
stupid self-serving lies
– about responsibility,
Foolish peeps think they are responsible for their own smart actions. Us neo-Brahmins say 'you are suffering from 'Maya'- delusion! Only we know what is true responsibility
the nature of harm,
true harm
and the scope of expressive liberties
which isn't expression as you fools think! Only we know what is true expression! As for 'Liberty' it is 'Moksha'- 'Liberation' from delusion- and only we know about that stuff. Carry on thinking you are doing a good thing when you love and help your neighbour! The truth is you died long ago because of some Brahmin's curse and are now being sodomized by demons!
– that can only underwrite a successful defence of no platforming if the contested questions are settled in a way that already favors no platforming.
No. You can defend 'no-platforming' easily enough. The thing curbs a nuisance. If nutters like S&S raise 'philosophical' objections you can easily show both are cretins who don't know logic or category theory or anything else.
There is only one reason people think Vivek Ramaswamy has a point. The dude made a lot of money in 'Life Sciences' which...urm... are about our not dying horribly or having to watch our kids die horribly. The woke nutters are harming our R&D initiatives with their 'Grievance Studies' demands for DIE. China is eating our lunch. If we become dependent on them for the vaccine to save us from the next 'gain of function' virus, they can demand we hand over critics of their regime. Initially it may only be nationals of their country. Then it will be anyone of Chinese heritage. After that, the floodgates open.
To be fair, S&S wrote the following shite 5 years ago when Trump was still in the White House and Beijing trembled lest he cruelly tweet Mean Girl style jibes about their beloved leader- Winnie the Pooh.
The civil libertarians who condemn no platforming routinely characterize the university as an institution that should be defined by a commitment to free speech.
Stupid ones may have done so. Libertarians say that any fucking property owner has the right to tell anyone at all to fuck off- more particularly if they happen to be your mother-in-law- if they get into your home (on the pretext of giving cuddles to the baby) and then hint that maybe you might consider getting a fucking job one of these fine days?
I'm not saying that happened to me. It was my Mum whom I had to ban from the house- well, I would have done but it was her house so I couldn't, and anyway, Mum always lets me sleep next to her after the wife beats me or I watch a horror movie on Netflix.
And this seems credible at face value. After all, if the right to free speech is to be respected anywhere,
These two cretins haven't noticed that in England and America, even ignorant, bigoted, clearly quite horrible, peeps like me are allowed to say what we like. Why pretend that the Secret Police are incessantly arresting me coz I keep Emailing King Charley with suggestions for how Dishy Rishi could become even funnier if he donned the garb of a fucking black-face nigger minstrel?
shouldn’t it be respected in institutions devoted to critical inquiry?
Amia can't do critical inquiry. She'd have been richer than Indra Nooyi if she could. Nor does she care about the plight of women of colour. She would have been the second Jayalalitha if that were case.
To invoke free speech in this context is to invoke a central pillar of the liberal tradition:
No. You aint invoking shit. The liberal tradition never distinguished between 'academic' and other spaces save to acknowledge why the former might choose to remain medieval shit-holes. This was because Liberals did not dispute that a Public School might have to teach a shitty curriculum if that is what its Charter said it had to do even though neither the parents nor the teachers nor anybody else closely concerned wanted that outcome. The Law is the law. Liberalism knows that 'hard cases make bad law'. Some Tories may have pretended that some utilitarian purpose was served by preventing Dissenters or Catholics or Benthamites from setting up Academies which could designate themselves as 'Universities' but nobody, including those Tories themselves believed any shite of that sort.
a principle encoded in every major liberal theory of justice,
Sadly, 'theories of justice' encode shit. There are no 'major liberal theories of Justice'. Hume ended the matter once and for all when he said Justice is merely a service industry. Utility rules all. Rawls was just stooooooopid.
enshrined in the constitutional or common law of all liberal societies, and – according to various international treaties and declarations – grounded in our inalienable human rights.
Rights are useless without incentive compatible remedies. That's how come my inalienable right not to fucking get Diabetes has been fucking alienated, mate even though the NHS is as nice as pie. Fuck! Shouldn't have mentioned pie. That's totes triggering for me. Still, maybe having a leg or two cut off won't be so bad.
The problem, however, is that this view treats the university as if it were just an outlet in the marketplace of ideas or an extension of the public square.
Don't be silly. A University is like a Brothel. It may be an 'outlet' but it has nothing to do with declasse street-walkers of ideas nor is it an extension of a crowded public square where girls are robbed and raped by predatory gangs specifically formed for that evil purpose.
This is a mischaracterization. Universities are specialized technical institutions
No. Research Institutes of Defence or Commercial Laboratories are specialised. Universities, speaking generally, aren't save in so far as some schools, or even kindergartens, serve those with special needs.
that exist for purposes of teaching and research.
Or that pretence. The fact is Institutions only exist if those running them find it worthwhile to do so.
S&S may have heard of 'Trump University'.
Communicative norms and practices in universities reflect these purposes.
Only to the extent that communicative norms reflect God's purposes or those of Satan or the Lizard People of Planet X.
First, they accord special protection to certain kinds of speech
No. They accord much lower protection. Having a job turns a Hohfeldian immunity into a qualified immunity. But, so does getting the sack or having the shit kicked out of you.
by those responsible for teaching and research: “a personal liberty to pursue the investigation, research, teaching, and publication of any subject matter of professional interest without vocational jeopardy” except in case of “an inexcusable breach of professional ethics in the exercise of that freedom” (van Alstyne 1972: 71).
S&S have no professional 'interests' or 'ethics'. Accountants and Actuaries and Doctors and Lawyers etc. have Professional Associations and Professional Certification. There is no point having any such thing for coprophagous shitheads.
Still S&S may be good enough child-minders or cogs in a Ponzi scheme whereby 'soft subject' shitheads subsidise 'hard science' or the College Football team.
This freedom is needed because the realization of the epistemic aims of teaching and research will be compromised
if stupid worthless virtue signalling 'woke' cunts like S&S 'teach'- except they don't at all. Nobody takes a course with them to learn shit. It's like me taking a 'Creative Writing' course with some other sad loser. Either the fucker praises my illiterate shite or I denounce him over a prolonged period for Racism or Homophobia or whatever till the Collidge gives me a fucking rebate.
if the employment of teacher-scholars depends upon the constant grace and favor of university management, society in general or – especially in the case of state universities – the government
Nothing changes. Either the thing burgeons and increasingly 'pays for itself' or it doesn't and goes fucking extinct.
In addition, the communicative norms and practices of universities
like Trump University- right?
also give recognized disciplinary experts – that is, academic faculty – various kinds of control over the speech of others, as is needed to uphold the intellectual rigors of, and thus promote the epistemic aims of, their disciplines.
What fucking 'intellectual rigour' are these cretins displaying? This is 'cut and paste' shite of a type an intern might perform.
In the public square we tolerate the speech of flat-earth cranks,
No we don't. Nothing is required of us 'in the public square' qua its public status. That is Liberalism 101- at least once darkies were recognised as 'civilised' or Bertrand Russell was understood to have had shit for brains. There are no 'Universals'. 'Naturality' for a specific purpose is the best we can do for 'Univalent Foundations'.
shills paid to undermine climate science,
like these guys know 'climate science'!
and revisionist historians who espouse conspiratorial misreadings of the evidence.
as opposed to psilosophers posing as saviours of some class to which they emphatically don't belong to. In Amiya's case, some Americans might think she is descended from Slaves, just as they thought Obama might be an actual African American rather than a guy with a posh African dad and a slightly less post American, White, Mum. Nothing wrong in that at all.
Historical evidence is a conspiracy when it is not a data set. The notion of 'Granger Causality' liberated us Econ dudes from the paranoia that still afflicts S&S.
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