The Agreement

Neil deGrasse Tyson recently made a stir in the philosophy community by disparaging the entire field as asking pseudoquestions. Essentially, he says philosophers waste their time, think they are doing important things, and he doesn’t have time for them. Admittedly, he has done great work promoting inquiry and reason.

… I could defend philosophy, as I think it is continuous with science. But others have done that better than I could. The only thing I think I need to say is to point out we already live in a very anti-intellectual culture. Education seems to be the target of much of the culture war. Those of us who favor education, understanding, and betterment need to provide a more unified front. When scientists attack the humanities or arts (or other sciences), we give people reason to cast doubt onto everyone. The public impression isn’t of competing values (which it is, whether any side understands it or not). The public impression is one of self-defeat. People will give up on the pursuit of knowledge to pursue anything that promises the delivery of knowledge.

So everyone. Can we please all just make an agreement? It’s a very simple one:

“I will not publicly disparage a field, topic, or area of which I am not an expert.”

Neil deGrasse Tyson recently made a stir in the philosophy community by disparaging the entire field as asking pseudoquestions. Essentially, he says philosophers waste their time, think they are doing important things, and he doesn’t have time for them. Admittedly, he has done great work promoting inquiry and reason.   … I could defend philosophy,…