tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1812431336777691886.post1202814832283186985..comments2024-02-29T03:57:00.088-05:00Comments on The Mermaid's Tale: When truisms become RevelationsAnne Buchananhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/09212151396672651221noreply@blogger.comBlogger4125tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1812431336777691886.post-30115897906631034612010-04-02T09:54:59.325-04:002010-04-02T09:54:59.325-04:00I totally agree. That's why in a broader and ...I totally agree. That's why in a broader and perhaps more profound sense, this is an anthropological phenomenon--a cultural anthropological phenomenon. It is partly about science and the technological, reductionist approach that can indeed solve certain important kinds of problem.<br /><br />But it's at least as much due to the way our culture now operates. Culture is largely about the apportionment of symbolic and material resources. Each culture has its own way. An aristocracy, for example, hands resources out permanently to a small fraction of families. Their symbolic sense of self-worth comes with their first teething ring. They need to pose and posture to each other, perhaps, but they often want to lay low relative to popular culture, because that just draws attention to their unfair wealth. Religion and acceptance of the status quo keep these people in their place.<br /><br />In our middle-class society, you are what you earn. If market fundamentalism with open competition reigns, you have to do the promotion to secure your place. You want display traits (job titles, public visibility, and so on) and you need money to establish your importance.<br /><br />This may oversimplify things, but it's an important component of what we're like these days.<br /><br />Whether there is a stable, fairer system who can say? Science might be different in such a system, but it may be just as tribal and blinkered, in its own way. Who knows?Ken Weisshttps://www.blogger.com/profile/02049713123559138421noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1812431336777691886.post-14647395425553843102010-04-02T09:45:04.522-04:002010-04-02T09:45:04.522-04:00Ken and Anne, I thank you as well.
There are othe...Ken and Anne, I thank you as well.<br /><br />There are other issues too... accolades from higher-ups when your research splashes around the internet (and these things are included in tenure and promotion portfolios at some places!). And of course, scientists are workign within a larger phenomenon: this mesmerizing cultural imperative that everyone get famous.Holly Dunsworthhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/05260104967932801186noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1812431336777691886.post-46435286619116500162010-04-02T07:56:59.807-04:002010-04-02T07:56:59.807-04:00John,
Of course we greatly appreciate this kind of...John,<br />Of course we greatly appreciate this kind of feedback. We certainly hope to stimulate thought, for those who know of the blog and who care to think about what is going on these days, as well as the narrow daily box we all have to work in.Ken Weisshttps://www.blogger.com/profile/02049713123559138421noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1812431336777691886.post-50705490806452379382010-04-02T01:03:32.265-04:002010-04-02T01:03:32.265-04:00Ken,
So brilliant, I had to send the URL to all a...Ken,<br /> So brilliant, I had to send the URL to all and sundry (the latter probably objecting to the label, but still).<br /><br />You keep writing pithy pieces like this and you will have to collect them in a volume of essays. Indeed, ...<br /><br />Again, this is one of best things you have written on this blog. Thank you.John R. Vokeyhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/03822243132435056442noreply@blogger.com