BabbCenter

BabbBot Coaching

For the 2004-2005 debate season, I'd like to introduce an affordable coaching alternative for students either without coaching of their own or simply seeking additional help. In a sense, this is a reintroduction, as I provided online coaching assistance to a handful of students a couple of years ago. Whatever your skill level, I have broad experience working with debaters of all backgrounds.

The service will include topic discussion (independent of my work with Victory Briefs) and evidence (also indepedent of evidence found in VBs). Additionally, I will avail myself to email discussions with students that sign-up throughout the school year, and they will be thorough. Whether you debate on the national circuit or locally, I will work with you individually to hammer out arguments and positions ideal for your particular competitive interests. I'll review as many cases and arguments as you'd like.

Feel free to email me with specific questions about the service to see if it's right for you. Address is: stephenbabb@msn.com

For a limited time, the fee structure will be quite affordable.

A yearlong subscription to the service (four topics at $25 each): only $100

Optional additions include: NFL Nationals topic (an additional $20 to be paid upon qualification to NFLs) and AOL Instant Messaging Option ($50).

I always leave my instant messaging service on, and ask for the additional charge only because of the unique demand working via AOL places on my time throughout the year. It may however be valuable to you in order to secure real-time feedback. That said, I check email several times a day, so coaching interaction via email should work fine for many of you.

This price structure is good for a limited time; I will honor it for checks *received* prior to June 15, 2004. That gives you nearly a month to decide. After that, the $100 base will be $150, or roughly $37 a topic.

Please mail checks along with a description of your debate background and goals for this season to:

Stephen Babb
700 S. 4th St. #1105
Waco, TX 76706

Below is a brief debate bio-->

Currently, Stephen coaches under Dave Huston at Highland Park High School, where his students have broken at St. Marks, Emory, Colleyville, the Glenbrooks and Lexington and qualified for the TOC. He has past teaching experience from the Baylor Summer Debate Workshop, the Stanford National Forensic Institute, the University of Texas National Institute for Forensics—and also be teaches at the Bates Debate Institute in Maine. He is the instructor of NDF’s top lab and curriculum director of NDF’s Repeaters’ Program. Additionally, Stephen teaches VBI’s Top Lab and has co-directed VBI@UCLA for three years. Stephen currently attends Baylor University, majoring in human resource management and minoring in political science and philosophy. As a debater, he was invited to the Gulf Coast, Greenhill, Montgomery Bell Academy, and Flatirons Round Robins, taking first at the Flatirons. He competed successfully on the national circuit, debating through elimination rounds at Emory and Greenhill in both his sophomore and senior years & taking second at the Colorado Classic. Additionally, he broke at the Texas State tournament three consecutive years, becoming TX State Champion his senior year, and broke at NFL nationals three straight years, placing in the Top 30, fourth, and ninth respectively.

Please feel free to contact me with any questions!

Reminders!

A few reminders for debaters out there:

First, in San Antonio from May 31 through June 4, Tyler Bexley and I will be hosting the Alamo City LD Workshop at Churchill High School. Please email me for more information; it is primarily for commuters, but we may be able to make arrangements with students wanting to spend the week in San Antonio from out of town.

Second, if you're interested in a longer camp this summer, you have a few options still open. VBI will still be accepting applications; we will be more likely to have room left for Session2, so contact me if your're interested or know someone who might be. Remember, Session2 includes a state of the art novice curriculum ideal for anyone thinking about doing LD or new to the activity.

Also, the Bates Forensic Institute in Maine is still accepting applications; their website (along with VBI's & NDF's) is on the right-hand of the screen in the links' section. Bates is ideal for intermediate debaters, and it's small, so if you just want to work with yours truly for an extended period of time, it'd be ideal.

If you have any questions about these opportunities, post here or--better yet--email me at: stephen_babb@baylor.edu or stephenbabb@msn.com .

Thanks! Babb

Year in Reflection

When thinking back upon what was unquestionably an exciting debate season, I think that two trends are both worth discussing. If you’re looking to read a cozy series of memories from debate tournaments like, “when so-and-so laughed so hard milk flew out his nose,” then this is a waste of your time. I do want to briefly examine two issues that seemed increasingly prominent this year.

The first is, of course, the importance of ignoring all the talking-head debate teachers like me. I recently perused the list of TOC tournament champions Jon Cruz posted on the VBD, paying particular attention to the winners of the octafinal bids. It struck me immediately that these were students with unique styles and approaches to debate, approaches that defied the common myth that there’s a ‘right way’ to do it all. The Edina boys (John McNeil and Jed Glickstein) avoided overly complex strategic options in favor of crafting positions that were simply cohesive and difficult to refute. Both debaters did an amazing job of examining an opponent’s case and finding its central and most intuitive problems. Spreads were unnecessary. John McKay, on the other hand, emerged in my opinion as one of the most strategically sound debaters I’ve seen. In one particular round, he elected not to address the NC constructive in front of 5 judges, using the AC standard analysis to preclude negative offense. And to be sure, Eric Palmer, David Wolfish, and Matt Scarola all achieved octas-bid championships in entirely different ways. Among these debaters, there was never a single methodology that led them to the top. Some went slow; some went fast. Some were better at persuading; some were better at debating the flow; some were better at crafting the arguments themselves. To be sure, each debater had a command of some basic skills, but I would struggle mightily to point to some common quality that was central to winning ballots.

Of course, this kind of display is nothing new. My senior year witnessed everyone from the philosophically deep Reed Winegar to the masterfully strategic Tommy Clancy to the well-researched and progressive David Vivero do consistently amazing. Indeed, it was also the year that Tom Pryor became the middle-ground debater of the ages, winning judges from all paradigmatic backgrounds. It has been MY experiences that those who advocate an especially narrow road to debate success are merely attempting to universalize their particular experience as THE way. Debaters would be well off to settle into an approach they find comfortable and effective; there will always be room for improvement, but improvement doesn’t always mean radical change.

I think this debate season was also one in which a number of students reevaluated what mattered to them about debating. To be sure, there were a few for whom the competition (and successes there from) were all that really mattered. But it seemed to me more than ever that the community became concerned with making good arguments and close friends. And indeed, I think that the problem of elitism in debate was again rolled back to some degree. It will always be the case that students who do well at the most prestigious of tournaments receive the most attention and that these students befriend one another from constant exposure and the common experience of succeeding at high levels. It is how the student chooses to respond to this attention and how the student treats those outside his immediate clique of fellow elim participants that matters most.

It is never popular to make comments on the general culture of the debate community and where it seems lacking. A recent interjection I made on lddebate.org (on the thread of “25 Things Learned at TOC”) had a mixed reception. Some thought that a defense of mutual civility between judges and competitor was welcomed. Other confused such a defense as a criticism of post-round dialogue. Still others seemed to think that debaters were more or less entitled to any range of post-round or post-tournament outbursts, given the great effort debaters put into competition. On the last count, I would venture a distinction between ‘caring indefinitely about winning a round’ and ‘putting in a lot of work’. With the exception of writing an additional case or two, preparing some blocks, or reading a whole book, I have typically not seen high school debaters put in all that much work. My experience as a debater and amidst many other current debaters is that the typically high school debater has been extremely fortunate (myself included), and that if the extent to which students actually read important literature is any indication, students don’t typically work too hard at all.

Many do not have the opportunities that debaters do, particularly those that compete nationally. Debate tournaments are hosts to some of the most fun that students will have in high school. Preparing for the tournaments is often a fairly brief affair. And indeed, staying to watch elimination rounds has become increasingly less and less popular, which is an educational tragedy and a stark contrast to the full audiences that once followed elimination rounds at St. Marks and Emory, among others. In all, I think students are not particularly overworked, and that the fruits of the debate experience are many. It seems that we should tend towards patience and appreciation rather than pompous demands for the ‘right decision’. Judges should be willing to explain themselves, engage in dialogue, and respect the debaters. But that respect should be returned to the judges and afforded to the opponents, even if not especially when that tournament is a thing of the past.

I’m not sure what we have to lose by wanting to be nicer. I have witnessed a number of moments in which the debate community reevaluated itself. Great dialogues have ensued. As a community we decided at one point that it matters more to make reasonably inoffensive arguments than to simply make an argument that’s hard to refute in a 4 minute 1AR. There is a reason that racist, sexist, or pro-genocidal arguments won’t fly with most judges. As a community, we have time and again decided that elitism, though perhaps unavoidable, should be discouraged as possible. As a community, we decided a long time ago that intellectual honesty was crucial—how we present evidence and the integrity we display during the round are now values that go without saying. It is odd to me that there are not the same kinds of admonitions against gossip or tackiness towards others in the community.

To be sure, it is hard to frown too heavily on that kind of interaction, because it doesn’t happen during a round. It often happens on the internet or in other casual venues. And yet, gossip is no less integral to the fabric of the debate community, or rather, to the unraveling of that fabric. Like unnecessary antagonism towards one judge, gossip reflects a simple preoccupation with one’s own success and image and a disregard for others in the community. I’d hope that in the same way that we have found consensus on the importance of things like intellectual honesty, we would find a common resolve to be intolerant of gossip and general meanness. And with that hope, I have been encouraged by the genuine humility and kindness that many in this community have quietly put on display. Jon’s recent interviews of some well-known debaters on the VBD reveal, I believe, exactly this kind of progress. Nice people do finish first sometimes, and it’s high time we took this to heart as a community.

Nozick Article on Academia and the Left

Lee Solomon sent this article by Robert Nozick for posting. It's an excellent piece and seems to have great relevance for debaters, given their similar tendency to the Left. Read--comment--enjoy!

Why Do Intellectuals Oppose Capitalism?

by Robert Nozick

It is surprising that intellectuals oppose capitalism so. Other groups of comparable socio-economic status do not show the same degree of opposition in the same proportions. Statistically, then, intellectuals are an anomaly.

Not all intellectuals are on the "left." Like other groups, their opinions are spread along a curve. But in their case, the curve is shifted and skewed to the political left.

By intellectuals, I do not mean all people of intelligence or of a certain level of education, but those who, in their vocation, deal with ideas as expressed in words, shaping the word flow others receive. These wordsmiths include poets, novelists, literary critics, newspaper and magazine journalists, and many professors. It does not include those who primarily produce and transmit quantitatively or mathematically formulated information (the numbersmiths) or those working in visual media, painters, sculptors, cameramen. Unlike the wordsmiths, people in these occupations do not disproportionately oppose capitalism. The wordsmiths are concentrated in certain occupational sites: academia, the media, government bureaucracy.

Wordsmith intellectuals fare well in capitalist society; there they have great freedom to formulate, encounter, and propagate new ideas, to read and discuss them. Their occupational skills are in demand, their income much above average. Why then do they disproportionately oppose capitalism? Indeed, some data suggest that the more prosperous and successful the intellectual, the more likely he is to oppose capitalism. This opposition to capitalism is mainly "from the left" but not solely so. Yeats, Eliot, and Pound opposed market society from the right.

The opposition of wordsmith intellectuals to capitalism is a fact of social significance. They shape our ideas and images of society; they state the policy alternatives bureaucracies consider. From treatises to slogans, they give us the sentences to express ourselves. Their opposition matters, especially in a society that depends increasingly upon the explicit formulation and dissemination of information.

We can distinguish two types of explanation for the relatively high proportion of intellectuals in opposition to capitalism. One type finds a factor unique to the anti-capitalist intellectuals. The second type of explanation identifies a factor applying to all intellectuals, a force propelling them toward anti-capitalist views. Whether it pushes any particular intellectual over into anti-capitalism will depend upon the other forces acting upon him. In the aggregate, though, since it makes anti-capitalism more likely for each intellectual, such a factor will produce a larger proportion of anti-capitalist intellectuals. Our explanation will be of this second type. We will identify a factor which tilts intellectuals toward anti-capitalist attitudes but does not guarantee it in any particular case.

The Value of Intellectuals

Intellectuals now expect to be the most highly valued people in a society, those with the most prestige and power, those with the greatest rewards. Intellectuals feel entitled to this. But, by and large, a capitalist society does not honor its intellectuals. Ludwig von Mises explains the special resentment of intellectuals, in contrast to workers, by saying they mix socially with successful capitalists and so have them as a salient comparison group and are humiliated by their lesser status. However, even those intellectuals who do not mix socially are similarly resentful, while merely mixing is not enough--the sports and dancing instructors who cater to the rich and have affairs with them are not noticeably anti-capitalist.

Why then do contemporary intellectuals feel entitled to the highest rewards their society has to offer and resentful when they do not receive this? Intellectuals feel they are the most valuable people, the ones with the highest merit, and that society should reward people in accordance with their value and merit. But a capitalist society does not satisfy the principle of distribution "to each according to his merit or value." Apart from the gifts, inheritances, and gambling winnings that occur in a free society, the market distributes to those who satisfy the perceived market-expressed demands of others, and how much it so distributes depends on how much is demanded and how great the alternative supply is. Unsuccessful businessmen and workers do not have the same animus against the capitalist system as do the wordsmith intellectuals. Only the sense of unrecognized superiority, of entitlement betrayed, produces that animus.

Why do wordsmith intellectuals think they are most valuable, and why do they think distribution should be in accordance with value? Note that this latter principle is not a necessary one. Other distributional patterns have been proposed, including equal distribution, distribution according to moral merit, distribution according to need. Indeed, there need not be any pattern of distribution a society is aiming to achieve, even a society concerned with justice. The justice of a distribution may reside in its arising from a just process of voluntary exchange of justly acquired property and services. Whatever outcome is produced by that process will be just, but there is no particular pattern the outcome must fit. Why, then, do wordsmiths view themselves as most valuable and accept the principle of distribution in accordance with value?

From the beginnings of recorded thought, intellectuals have told us their activity is most valuable. Plato valued the rational faculty above courage and the appetites and deemed that philosophers should rule; Aristotle held that intellectual contemplation was the highest activity. It is not surprising that surviving texts record this high evaluation of intellectual activity. The people who formulated evaluations, who wrote them down with reasons to back them up, were intellectuals, after all. They were praising themselves. Those who valued other things more than thinking things through with words, whether hunting or power or uninterrupted sensual pleasure, did not bother to leave enduring written records. Only the intellectual worked out a theory of who was best.

The Schooling of Intellectuals

What factor produced feelings of superior value on the part of intellectuals? I want to focus on one institution in particular: schools. As book knowledge became increasingly important, schooling--the education together in classes of young people in reading and book knowledge--spread. Schools became the major institution outside of the family to shape the attitudes of young people, and almost all those who later became intellectuals went through schools. There they were successful. They were judged against others and deemed superior. They were praised and rewarded, the teacher's favorites. How could they fail to see themselves as superior? Daily, they experienced differences in facility with ideas, in quick-wittedness. The schools told them, and showed them, they were better.

The schools, too, exhibited and thereby taught the principle of reward in accordance with (intellectual) merit. To the intellectually meritorious went the praise, the teacher's smiles, and the highest grades. In the currency the schools had to offer, the smartest constituted the upper class. Though not part of the official curricula, in the schools the intellectuals learned the lessons of their own greater value in comparison with the others, and of how this greater value entitled them to greater rewards.

The wider market society, however, taught a different lesson. There the greatest rewards did not go to the verbally brightest. There the intellectual skills were not most highly valued. Schooled in the lesson that they were most valuable, the most deserving of reward, the most entitled to reward, how could the intellectuals, by and large, fail to resent the capitalist society which deprived them of the just deserts to which their superiority "entitled" them? Is it surprising that what the schooled intellectuals felt for capitalist society was a deep and sullen animus that, although clothed with various publicly appropriate reasons, continued even when those particular reasons were shown to be inadequate?

In saying that intellectuals feel entitled to the highest rewards the general society can offer (wealth, status, etc.), I do not mean that intellectuals hold these rewards to be the highest goods. Perhaps they value more the intrinsic rewards of intellectual activity or the esteem of the ages. Nevertheless, they also feel entitled to the highest appreciation from the general society, to the most and best it has to offer, paltry though that may be. I don't mean to emphasize especially the rewards that find their way into the intellectuals' pockets or even reach them personally. Identifying themselves as intellectuals, they can resent the fact that intellectual activity is not most highly valued and rewarded.

The intellectual wants the whole society to be a school writ large, to be like the environment where he did so well and was so well appreciated. By incorporating standards of reward that are different from the wider society, the schools guarantee that some will experience downward mobility later. Those at the top of the school's hierarchy will feel entitled to a top position, not only in that micro-society but in the wider one, a society whose system they will resent when it fails to treat them according to their self-prescribed wants and entitlements. The school system thereby produces anti-capitalist feeling among intellectuals. Rather, it produces anti-capitalist feeling among verbal intellectuals. Why do the numbersmiths not develop the same attitudes as these wordsmiths? I conjecture that these quantitatively bright children, although they get good grades on the relevant examinations, do not receive the same face-to-face attention and approval from the teachers as do the verbally bright children. It is the verbal skills that bring these personal rewards from the teacher, and apparently it is these rewards that especially shape the sense of entitlement.

Central Planning in the Classroom

There is a further point to be added. The (future) wordsmith intellectuals are successful within the formal, official social system of the schools, wherein the relevant rewards are distributed by the central authority of the teacher. The schools contain another informal social system within classrooms, hallways, and schoolyards, wherein rewards are distributed not by central direction but spontaneously at the pleasure and whim of schoolmates. Here the intellectuals do less well.

It is not surprising, therefore, that distribution of goods and rewards via a centrally organized distributional mechanism later strikes intellectuals as more appropriate than the "anarchy and chaos" of the marketplace. For distribution in a centrally planned socialist society stands to distribution in a capitalist society as distribution by the teacher stands to distribution by the schoolyard and hallway.

Our explanation does not postulate that (future) intellectuals constitute a majority even of the academic upper class of the school. This group may consist mostly of those with substantial (but not overwhelming) bookish skills along with social grace, strong motivation to please, friendliness, winning ways, and an ability to play by (and to seem to be following) the rules. Such pupils, too, will be highly regarded and rewarded by the teacher, and they will do extremely well in the wider society, as well. (And do well within the informal social system of the school. So they will not especially accept the norms of the school's formal system.) Our explanation hypothesizes that (future) intellectuals are disproportionately represented in that portion of the schools' (official) upper class that will experience relative downward mobility. Or, rather, in the group that predicts for itself a declining future. The animus will arise before the move into the wider world and the experience of an actual decline in status, at the point when the clever pupil realizes he (probably) will fare less well in the wider society than in his current school situation. This unintended consequence of the school system, the anti-capitalist animus of intellectuals, is, of course, reinforced when pupils read or are taught by intellectuals who present those very anti-capitalist attitudes.

No doubt, some wordsmith intellectuals were cantankerous and questioning pupils and so were disapproved of by their teachers. Did they too learn the lesson that the best should get the highest rewards and think, despite their teachers, that they themselves were best and so start with an early resentment against the school system's distribution? Clearly, on this and the other issues discussed here, we need data on the school experiences of future wordsmith intellectuals to refine and test our hypotheses.

Stated as a general point, it is hardly contestable that the norms within schools will affect the normative beliefs of people after they leave the schools. The schools, after all, are the major non-familial society that children learn to operate in, and hence schooling constitutes their preparation for the larger non-familial society. It is not surprising that those successful by the norms of a school system should resent a society, adhering to different norms, which does not grant them the same success. Nor, when those are the very ones who go on to shape a society's self-image, its evaluation of itself, is it surprising when the society's verbally responsive portion turns against it. If you were designing a society, you would not seek to design it so that the wordsmiths, with all their influence, were schooled into animus against the norms of the society.

Our explanation of the disproportionate anti-capitalism of intellectuals is based upon a very plausible sociological generalization.

In a society where one extra-familial system or institution, the first young people enter, distributes rewards, those who do the very best therein will tend to internalize the norms of this institution and expect the wider society to operate in accordance with these norms; they will feel entitled to distributive shares in accordance with these norms or (at least) to a relative position equal to the one these norms would yield. Moreover, those constituting the upper class within the hierarchy of this first extra-familial institution who then experience (or foresee experiencing) movement to a lower relative position in the wider society will, because of their feeling of frustrated entitlement, tend to oppose the wider social system and feel animus toward its norms.

Notice that this is not a deterministic law. Not all those who experience downward social mobility will turn against the system. Such downward mobility, though, is a factor which tends to produce effects in that direction, and so will show itself in differing proportions at the aggregate level. We might distinguish ways an upper class can move down: it can get less than another group or (while no group moves above it) it can tie, failing to get more than those previously deemed lower. It is the first type of downward mobility which especially rankles and outrages; the second type is far more tolerable. Many intellectuals (say they) favor equality while only a small number call for an aristocracy of intellectuals. Our hypothesis speaks of the first type of downward mobility as especially productive of resentment and animus.

The school system imparts and rewards only some skills relevant to later success (it is, after all, a specialized institution) so its reward system will differ from that of the wider society. This guarantees that some, in moving to the wider society, will experience downward social mobility and its attendant consequences. Earlier I said that intellectuals want the society to be the schools writ large. Now we see that the resentment due to a frustrated sense of entitlement stems from the fact that the schools (as a specialized first extra-familial social system) are not the society writ small.

Our explanation now seems to predict the (disproportionate) resentment of schooled intellectuals against their society whatever its nature, whether capitalist or communist. (Intellectuals are disproportionately opposed to capitalism as compared with other groups of similar socioeconomic status within capitalist society. It is another question whether they are disproportionately opposed as compared with the degree of opposition of intellectuals in other societies to those societies.) Clearly, then, data about the attitudes of intellectuals within communist countries toward apparatchiks would be relevant; will those intellectuals feel animus toward that system?

Our hypothesis needs to be refined so that it does not apply (or apply as strongly) to every society. Must the school systems in every society inevitably produce anti-societal animus in the intellectuals who do not receive that society's highest rewards? Probably not. A capitalist society is peculiar in that it seems to announce that it is open and responsive only to talent, individual initiative, personal merit. Growing up in an inherited caste or feudal society creates no expectation that reward will or should be in accordance with personal value. Despite the created expectation, a capitalist society rewards people only insofar as they serve the market-expressed desires of others; it rewards in accordance with economic contribution, not in accordance with personal value. However, it comes close enough to rewarding in accordance with value--value and contribution will very often be intermingled--so as to nurture the expectation produced by the schools. The ethos of the wider society is close enough to that of the schools so that the nearness creates resentment. Capitalist societies reward individual accomplishment or announce they do, and so they leave the intellectual, who considers himself most accomplished, particularly bitter.

Another factor, I think, plays a role. Schools will tend to produce such anti-capitalist attitudes the more they are attended together by a diversity of people. When almost all of those who will be economically successful are attending separate schools, the intellectuals will not have acquired that attitude of being superior to them. But even if many children of the upper class attend separate schools, an open society will have other schools that also include many who will become economically successful as entrepreneurs, and the intellectuals later will resentfully remember how superior they were academically to their peers who advanced more richly and powerfully. The openness of the society has another consequence, as well. The pupils, future wordsmiths and others, will not know how they will fare in the future. They can hope for anything. A society closed to advancement destroys those hopes early. In an open capitalist society, the pupils are not resigned early to limits on their advancement and social mobility, the society seems to announce that the most capable and valuable will rise to the very top, their schools have already given the academically most gifted the message that they are most valuable and deserving of the greatest rewards, and later these very pupils with the highest encouragement and hopes see others of their peers, whom they know and saw to be less meritorious, rising higher than they themselves, taking the foremost rewards to which they themselves felt themselves entitled. Is it any wonder they bear that society an animus?

Some Further Hypotheses

We have refined the hypothesis somewhat. It is not simply formal schools but formal schooling in a specified social context that produces anti-capitalist animus in (wordsmith) intellectuals. No doubt, the hypothesis requires further refining. But enough. It is time to turn the hypothesis over to the social scientists, to take it from armchair speculations in the study and give it to those who will immerse themselves in more particular facts and data. We can point, however, to some areas where our hypothesis might yield testable consequences and predictions. First, one might predict that the more meritocratic a country's school system, the more likely its intellectuals are to be on the left. (Consider France.) Second, those intellectuals who were "late bloomers" in school would not have developed the same sense of entitlement to the very highest rewards; therefore, a lower percentage of the late-bloomer intellectuals will be anti-capitalist than of the early bloomers. Third, we limited our hypothesis to those societies (unlike Indian caste society) where the successful student plausibly could expect further comparable success in the wider society. In Western society, women have not heretofore plausibly held such expectations, so we would not expect the female students who constituted part of the academic upper class yet later underwent downward mobility to show the same anti-capitalist animus as male intellectuals. We might predict, then, that the more a society is known to move toward equality in occupational opportunity between women and men, the more its female intellectuals will exhibit the same disproportionate anti-capitalism its male intellectuals show.

Some readers may doubt this explanation of the anti-capitalism of intellectuals. Be this as it may, I think that an important phenomenon has been identified. The sociological generalization we have stated is intuitively compelling; something like it must be true. Some important effect therefore must be produced in that portion of the school's upper class that experiences downward social mobility, some antagonism to the wider society must get generated. If that effect is not the disproportionate opposition of the intellectuals, then what is it? We started with a puzzling phenomenon in need of an explanation. We have found, I think, an explanatory factor that (once stated) is so obvious that we must believe it explains some real phenomenon.

Robert Nozick is Arthur Kingsley Porter Professor of Philosophy at Harvard University and the author of Anarchy, State, and Utopia and other books. This article is excerpted from his essay "Why Do Intellectuals Oppose Capitalism?" which originally appeared in The Future of Private Enterprise, ed. Craig Aronoff et al. (Georgia State University Business Press, 1986) and is reprinted in Robert Nozick, Socratic Puzzles (Harvard University Press, 1997).

An Aside on Critical Theory in Debate

It is my sense after having judged a number of rounds over the last few years that debaters (toward the improvement of the activity, in my opinion) are attempting to develop “critical” positions. It is also my sense that they are not doing a good job of it much of the time. I’d like to digress on this point a bit.

It is the belief of many in the activity (even if not especially those oft termed “progressive” coaches or instructors) that the failure of students to effectively run contemporary, critical literature in debate suggests that they ought avoid the attempts altogether. Between the lines, they seem to be saying, “debate about body counts… something you know how to do.” But of course, their reasoning deserves more credit than that. Much of today’s critical thought is dense; assuming that it has some merit in the first place and is more than ‘fashionable nonsense,’ it is still shrouded in difficult jargon and veiled concept. More than that, critical literature is often itself not to be extrapolated as argument, but perhaps merely as a textual game… a rhetorical question… a thorn in the side of the Enlightenment. Certainly, Derrida does not wish to be considered “philosophy,” and one wonders how he’d view his appropriation in debate.

Aside from the inherent difficulty of this argumentation (and the prior necessity of truly absorbing the literature), debate skeptics would also point to the incompatibility of critical thought with two components of every debate round: the inevitable recourse to strategy and time constraints. On the one hand, debaters are interested in winning rounds and will, instead of accurately appropriating critical texts, use them haphazardly in efforts to get a ballot. This may mean using the texts to simply confuse an opponent who is less well-read. And in these cases, both debaters are generally confused—one only more obviously so. On the other hand, even when one runs a critical position with the best of intentions, it is nearly impossible to correctly develop the arguments in the limited span of a case constructive.

While I think this more or less does justice to the positions of the skeptics, I invite their clarification of the above. Precluding a significant departure from the above concerns, however, I have several rejoining comments.

First, the general failure of debaters to run the positions well should not be attributed to the critical theory itself. After all, debaters have been running Kant poorly for as long as I can remember. And even the rounds absent any philosophy whatsoever often open the door to horribly researched or articulated empirical debates. The problem in all of these cases is not the subject matter; rather, the problems include a lack of reading and research, a failure of coaches and summer instructors to move beyond short-hand philosophy and present in-depth commentary, the unwillingness of many debaters to make strategy secondary to accuracy in their technique, and the obliviousness of critics to all of the above in rounds. The solution, by no means a short-term fix, is of course a widespread commitment to education within the debate community—a commitment that need no come at the expense of competition, but must properly *precede* competition as debate’s defining characteristic.

Second, critical theory is no more difficult to engage than Kant or Hegel. In some cases, given its extra-philosophical content and application to contemporary issues, it may even be easier (I stress only in *some* cases). The traditional appropriation of philosophy in LD has suffered from a bastardizing simplicity every bit as pernicious as confusing critical arguments. The LD “canon” leaves us with debaters using Rawl’s “justice principle,” Mill’s “harm principle,” or Nozick’s side-constraints—and almost never do these debaters give a reason to prefer a Rawlsian interpretation rather than a Nozickian one. Rarely are there any foundational arguments at all. We are simply to accept on face that Rawls had it right, or that communitarianism is just *true*, or that justice is obviously the cornerstone of institutions.

The problem with critical argumentation is often not far removed: a debater might claim that we must have some overriding respect for Otherness, and her opponent simply has no clue to respond. On the one hand, educators must help debaters run these positions more articulately. But even more, debaters must be prepared to answer positions thus *forcing* the development of more sophisticated positions in the first place. Any position will be difficult to debate if one or both sides have nothing particularly interesting to say. Once again, however, it is not the fault of the subject matter.

It strikes me that the most problematic aspect of critical literature is that the text itself is not meant to be used as argument. This is often difficult to decipher. If it is any clue, the misappropriation by published scholars in this regard is prevalent in academic circles. It is not at all rare, for instance, to find Derrida or Beaudrillard telling their “advocates”: “no, that’s actually not what I meant at all.” The lynching of Derrida’s deconstruction by those seeking aimlessly to subvert and cause havoc appears case and point. It goes without saying that high school debaters with little extra time on their hands may have great difficultly in using these texts correctly. Where I part with the skeptic is the move, given this problematic, to throw the baby out with the bath water as they say. Rather than going so far (and *reverting* so extremely), debaters must simply be discriminating and careful. They must seek the opinion and ideas of fellow debaters and educators—and it would help, of course, to seek out secondary sources that take it as their mission to analyze and make the leading minds of our time significantly more accessible.

In short, I think that the problems with using critical theory (or any progressive, contemporary thought) can be overcome. If anything, they are reasons for more open discussion and education on the topic—and *not* a general consensus to shy away from these issues in disgust, nor a roll of the eyes in dismissal of ‘fashionable nonsense.’ It should be acknowledged that the retreat to an LD canon of dead Enlightenment philosophy is no coincident, but indeed a parallel to the academic world in which American philosophy proper has neglected to embrace much of the recent Continental and post-colonial literature. Richard Rorty’s articles on the subject are worth a glance.

Lincoln-Douglas has long insisted on being the event for modernist thought; whilst the post-modern becomes a refuge for those ‘nutty CX debaters’. Jason Baldwin once attributed the tendency of LDers to speak quickly and use CX jargon as indicative of their repressed, latent insecurity about not actually being CX debaters. These strategies are more than anything a way of compensating. I think he had it turned around. It seems to me that it is right that LDers have some latent insecurity over being involved with the ‘lesser’ event. Baldwin is correct here. The extension of his psychoanalysis is the problem. LDers would not then *mimic* the Other—they would differentiate themselves while attempting to marginalize the Other as radical and without serious credibility. Thus the insecurity has caused the LD community to shape itself as a civilized, slow-speaking, polite alternative. The event shapes itself as a return to “real” philosophy, and not the nonsense all those French loons are sporting… as every LD knows, the only good Frenchman was Rousseau. This move is perhaps most evident in the rhetoric used to justify LD as an event—we were born as an “alternative” to CX in light of its going off the ‘deep end’. LD would like to envision itself as the new center—always distancing itself from the marginal Other. And of course, nothing jeopardizes this identity more than an increasing resemblance to the Other. Some cope by returning to the classical LD identity time and time again, dismissing the evolution as a turn for the worse. The rest cope by integrating policy technique just enough to in effect parody it—this is certainly one way to deal with a threat of Otherness to one’s identity [straight males engaging in homoerotic humor as parody; whites mimicking hip-hop culture as it “threatens” to overtake mainstream white culture].

The only way to overcome this opposition, as Zizek always suggests, is to transcend the opposition altogether—admitting that they are both bad choices and pursuing a radically unique identity neither in opposition to nor in parody of policy debate. And we shall hopefully engage this another time.

License to Marry

Many thanks to Andrew for letting me post his paper. I hope this encourages others of you to send in your own work and offer it up for discussion. I'm also posting a link Lee Solomon sent me which is just *outstanding* [ Carol Lloyd ] I hope to discuss more after my return from the Glenbrooks Tournament in Chicago. Best wishes... and here's the main event (thanks again AG):

Licensed to Marry
by Andrew Garvin

"I believe in the sanctity of marriage. I believe a marriage is between a man and a woman, and I think we ought to codify that one way or the other.” – President Bush (7/03)
In light of recent events which seem to support gay liberation in the United States, it is surprising that President Bush would be so audacious as to propose a definition of marriage that excludes homosexuals. On a social level, homosexuality has come into the media spotlight through a boom in television programming. Shows like the Emmy-winning and nationally popular Will and Grace have brought the gay community to each and every household in America. More significant, however, was the election of a gay bishop to the Episcopalian Diocese of New Hampshire, as well as the Supreme Court ruling to overturn Texas’ anti-sodomy law. These precedents clearly show that it is not just a radical portion of our society that recognizes the existence and importance of the gay community, but also, that politicians and even religious groups are coming around.
Although our society is quickly evolving, Bush and his administration have not yet received the message. In fact, the Bush administration is currently waiting on the outcome of a few state court cases before they charge head-on into supporting a proposed constitutional amendment to ban gay marriage (legislation that is pending in the House of Representatives). Apparently Bush is not worried about alienating moderate voters with his conviction on this issue. Indeed, White House representative Scott McClellan proclaimed that “[this is a] principle [Bush] will not compromise on… He is strongly committed to protecting the sanctity of marriage.”
This staunch advocacy of exclusionary law stemming from “principles” and a concern for the “sanctity” of marriage reveals the ultimate problem with Bush’s support of the amendment – that his position is very clearly religiously biased. Given that government-sponsored marriage is a privilege granted by a secular entity – and not one particular religious group – it seems necessary to be as inclusive as possible when constructing a definition of marriage. Since the government acknowledges that all people deserve equal rights, regardless of race, sex, or sexual preference, it only makes sense that the legal status of marriage should be extended to same-sex couples – even if certain religious sects feel that marriage is somehow “de-sanctified” because of it. Unfortunately, this argument becomes lost in the skewed rhetoric of today’s conservative world that seeks to shift the debate away from issues of equality.
Let’s not kid ourselves, though: Bush is not the only president of the last decade to support a ban on gay marriage. President Clinton was the one who signed the infamous Defense of Marriage Act – after seeming to purport gay rights all throughout his presidency. It is this legislation that moderate liberals like Tom Daschle point to when asked whether or not a constitutional amendment is necessary. “No changes are necessary in my view. You’ve got it in law today,” said Daschle. In other words, Republicans want an exclusive definition of marriage, while Democrats claim that one already exists.
Unfortunately, this semantic squabble represents nothing more than a political “rock and a hard place” for the gay community. With little support for what is construed as “radical change”, it seems, at first glance, that gays in the US will be waiting a long while before they will be able to enjoy full personal freedoms. One would hope that with our history of discrimination that we, as a country, would have learned from our mistakes. Instead, the gay community has become our politicians’ favorite scapegoat (save anyone resembling a terrorist).
But all is not lost: There are signs of progress on the horizon, with CNN/USA Today/Gallup polls showing a near 50/50 split on extending marriage to gays. However, predicting when this change will be realized is impossible – especially if Bush is elected for a second term. Additionally, if global sentiment is indicative of a forthcoming liberal trend for the United States, then it is clear that marriage rights will eventually be granted to gay couples. For example, in June of 2003, Canada adopted a policy which proposed to redefine marriage to include gays and lesbians. Prime Minister of Canada, Jean Chretien, recognized that there is a difference between “sanctifying” and legalizing marriage. ''We'll be proposing legislation that will protect the right of churches and religious organizations to sanctify marriage as they define it,'' he said. ''At the same time, we will ensure that our marriage legislation includes and legally recognizes the unions of same-sex couples.''
This important distinction marks the key counterargument against “Pro-Family” Organizations which seek to shut down similar attempts to liberate homosexuals in the United States. The “sanctity” of marriage is obviously a vague concept since its very Webster definition only asserts that marriage holds some inherent value - some “holy or sacred quality”. However, what that inherent value, that “sanctity”, actually means, is different for each and every individual in society – and of course, for each individual religion. The fact that our society allows different religious institutions to perform different marriages with different values proves that a policy enacting a standardized definition of the “sanctity” of marriage would be entirely inconsistent.
In other words, the question of marriage is not a question of radical change but a question of equality, individual rights, and, in effect, sensible policy. Bush himself has made it clear that what a same-sex couple does together is their “personal business”. If these private relationships happen to be strong enough to be categorized as mutual dependencies, as shared love, then there is no reason why they should not also be legally bound in marriage. There is no need to drastically redefine our values, but rather, to realize that what we really value is the special bond between two loving people. It is this principle of love that we should codify - not a principle of exclusion.
“This case is ultimately about the recognition and protection of human dignity and equality in the context of the social structures available to conjugal couples...The question at the heart of this appeal is whether excluding same-sex couples from another of the most basic elements of civic life - marriage - infringes human dignity and violates the Canadian Constitution." – Court of Appeal for Ontario

Update

There are two new articles to begin with.

I'd like to invite people to send me articles or essays they're interested in posting for discussion. I think it'd be a good way to expand on the limited function of the "comment" boxes. So please do send in thoughts and rants. Anything at all intriguiging would be more than welcomed.

Please send to:

stephenbabb@msn.com

Best,
Babb

the new isolationism

the new isolationism
by stephen babb

In case there was any doubt, the greatest insights do indeed occur at Jiffy Lube. Whilst waiting for the magical gnomes behind the curtain to change my oil, I witnessed a dialogue that inspired shock and awe with the splendor found only amongst really old people. “We have no business being over there… it’s no use with *them people*.” For those unlearned in the language of the decrepit, “them people” refers to Iraqis. Waco, Texas ladies and gentlemen! Somewhere just outside the Garden of Eden… right next to The Waffle House.

Here’s your cast of characters:

Old Person 1—A male who was himself retired from the Navy and seemingly good natured. I wanted to hug him.

Old Person 2—His wife and vehemently anti-war and anti-Bush advocate… refers to Iraqi people as “them people”… no no no, that’s THEM people. I did not fancy hugging her.

Old Person 3—An old guy that didn’t know the other two but was talked at for some time… kindly nodding and agreeing. I was indifferent to hugging him.

It should be noted that the above three Waco residents took about five minutes trying to remember the name of “that guy that ran against Bush last election.” I thought about helping with a, “it’s four letters and sounds like sore” but was too fixated in amazement to join in on this festival of brilliance.

The general sentiment of these three blind mice was that the United States has no business gettin’ busy with a country until they threaten to attack us. At the very least, they had their foundations in that mysteriously enduring just war doctrine. Likewise, they represented the popular view that 87 billion dollars is simply too much money to be spending on Iraqis. After all, some classrooms here have dirty chalkboard erasers. And God knows, the Iraqis are at the perfect juncture to take things into their own hands.

Let us make some distinctions. My issue in this case is not with those who protest the war, think we’re in it for the wrong reasons, object to the use of violence for political ventures, and so on. Those are separate debates. At issue *here* is the argument that our rebuilding efforts cost too much money and human sacrifice.

This argument is rampant in the media, amongst politicians, and in numerous academic circles. No doubt, any argument that broadens the appeal of a position to those otherwise voting Republican (retired Veterans, for instance) is one the Left will exploit. I think, however, this argument is one to be left alone.

Implicit in the suggestion to bring the money/troops back home is unavoidably the assertion that American blood is redder than whatever is coursing through “them people.” Our dollars are better spent here… on us. And let us not forget, our troops were hatched and trained to kill Communists—not to restore peace. The horror stories from the Sunni Triangle forget the great stability now found in Northern and Southern Iraq. The unrest reported from the media ivory tower in Baghdad is inconsistent with reports from numerous other journals traveling about elsewhere in Iraq. In short, Vietnam makes news… so let’s construct another one. This is not to glamorize what is taking place… nor to underestimate the atrocity experienced by soldiers and Iraqis alike. This is to add perspective.

Given that perspective, we should remember that the American presence in Iraq is serving a critical function. At the very least, our dollars are essential to an Iraq in which medical care and education might become stable realities. We certainly have ulterior motives, but to essentialize the entire project into those motives would be radically reductionistic and absurd. If we are indeed making a contribution to a better Iraq—to take no stand on what our bombs did—then an important premise is established.

Without this premise, we may be tempted to say that the $87 billion is wasted in so far as it accomplishes nothing. But nobody really thinks this. The bill is too high because the Iraqi is Other. This is the sentiment latent in every lament over cost. We can’t even balance our own budget! How could we even think about picking up the tab for a vulnerable nation?!

Here the Left has found an odd bedfellow in isolationist-tending Buchanan Conservatives and moderates whose primary concerns are benefits, economy, and security. Welcome to Neurotic America… the self-help, self-indulging, assertive-self, masturbatory capital of the world. The Michael Moores of popular discourse love to rant on American imperialism—but conveniently slides to the suggestion that we are sacrificing *too much*. The question for the Left is simple: which is it? Are we to hate Empire or sacrifice?

The consistent position—taken by many on the Left—argues that the advance of Empire is notorious and evil, but that we should do what we can to leave Iraq in fit condition to *emerge* and displace Empire. In effect, we should fund the tools of our own departure.

In reality, the dichotomy proposed for the Left never exists—partly because those of inconsistent position have also mischaracterized the debate and poorly framed the international situation. Popular politics suggests that the $87 billion and the troop presence serve no strategic function and are costs we can’t afford. As only good consumers would, these people forget the value of long term investment. At one and the same time, our sacrifice is our strategic gain—a foot in the door of Black Gold Utopia and a geo-political presence alongside our nemesis Syria, the quickly changing but vulnerable Iran, the wish-washy Saudi Arabia. There is no question of whether we are giving too much or taking the world over. We are doing both—just as going into debt comes prior to business growth.

This suggestion is neither a slam of the Left nor the Right. It is a plea to reframe the debate—a debate that should properly reside along the battle line between Empire and resistance. The Jiffy Lube Geniuses had it all wrong. We are not making mistakes or miscalculations. We are either Empire gone too far or the Neo-Con saviors of the world. Perhaps our political dialogue might go beyond the Jiffy Lube waiting room and confront the real debate: the implications of Empire.

In so doing, we can avoid the implications of Isolationism. If we are to reject Empire, we ought do so on *behalf* of those to be colonized… not because it costs too much. The two arguments do not belong together. One speaks on behalf of people struggling for freedom and children who might one day know a world outside Empire. The other speaks on behalf of cheaper toaster ovens with which we might stuff our grinning faces. The world needs to eat too—even if they are only “them people.”

the numbers hegemony

the numbers hegemony
by stephen babb

It was a cold and bleak morning this day in Waco, Tx... and wouldn't you know the culprits were all numbers: 55... degress outside, 8:00... start time for class. 1... the number of Babbs it takes to brilliantly venture out in flip flops. And oh yes, there was that statistics exam. What better way to cap off a fine morning than with a quantification of my knowledge on critical issues like T-tests, sample variance, and confidence intervals. At least now I can test my hypotheses on the sample means of Company X and Company Y's respective widget product as I have so long wanted to do. Numbers bashing is a good outlet for the scorned student.

But is there something more to numbers bashing than a foul exam grade? Oh yes.

To begin, we must encounter the radically hegemonic force with which Western mathematics have invaded our discourses and routines... a force so radical that it is shamelessly referred to as the one *universal* language. Not only do universal languages exist, but indeed it is Western math! How's that for a Master Narrative...

In his outstanding Post-Colonial article "Western Mathematics: The Secret Weapon of Cultural Imperialism," Alan J. Bishop argues as only a mathematically handicapped person could. He suggests, "mathematics has somehow always been felt to be universal and, therefore, culture-free. It has in colonial times, and for most people it continues to have today, the status of a culturally neutral phenomenon in the otherwise turbulent waters of education and imperialism..." And of course Bishop implies one of the colonial Enlightenment's defining characteristics: it's tendency to totalize. Where would our universal truth (and the Western superiority thereof) be without at the very least a mathematic scheme to suggest once and for all objectivity. With science, Western mathematics have effectively sustained an illusion of central and indisputable *accuracy*... indeed the very possibility for such a thing as correspondence (a theory of truth which fell quickly even amongst those interested in such theories). And so we see the subversive pleasure of new logics or even the title to one of Radiohead's recently released songs on the Hail to the Thief Album... a song entitled "2+2=5". To the preoccupied modernist hack, these are but games for unruly children. For the thinker that takes seriously a history of totalizing thought extending always out from the Master's House, these are indeed games as well... but critical games integral to practices of deconstruction. In this case, however, why bother deconstructing math? Isn't it harmless and merely the basic knowledge one requires to move through grade school? [And this of course is the echo of the Master's voice ringing in our heads as it always does...]

Bishop admits that certain mathematic principles will remain universally valid, but only because of their, "intentionally abstract and general nature." The extent to which such principles are removed from the real world conveniently removes cultural context--thus, 2+2 really is 4 despite Thom Yorke's insistance otherwise. But to simply suggest Western mathematics to these principles alone would be to reduce an otherwise loaded story to its most incidental punctuation. Bishop continues, "But where do 'degrees' come from? Why is the total 180? Why not 200, or 100? Indeed, why are we interested in triangles and their properties at all? The answer to all these questions is essentially, 'because some people determined that it should be that way'. Mathematic ideas, like any other ideas, are humanly constructed. They have a cultural history."

And contrary to popular belief, there are in fact various and divergent mathematic systems in accordance with the presence of various and divergent cultural histories. Bishop discusses studies documenting “nearly 600” counting systems in Papua New Guinea alone, “containing various cycles of numbers, not all based on ten (Lean 1991). As well as finger counting, there is documented use of body counting, where one points to a part of the body and uses the name of that part as the number.” But counting isn’t even the fun part. He continues, “The conception of space which underlies Euclidian geometry is also only one conception—it relies particularly on the ‘atomistic’ and object-oriented ideas of points, lines, planes, and solids. Other conceptions exist, such as that of the Navajos where space is neither subdivided nor objectified, and where everything is in motion (Pinxten, Van Doren, and Harvey 1983). Bishop also acknowledges the presence of mathematic classification systems that do not rely on the hierarchical modes found in the West. Incidentally, this is a note of some interest given recent feminist theory indicting the hierarchical models of patriarchal/Western logics.

Bishop goes on to do a fine job tracing the way in which Western math colonized the world via trade, government and administration, and a scheme of education that thoroughly used mathematics as an invisible method of “acculturation.” And of course, we continue to be shaped and our understandings permeated by this narrow logic of Western mathematics. Rarely do we think twice about it; it is one of those givens formed in us even before capacities of critical thought have developed. Whereas those fields accepted as culturally informed and loaded (history, philosophy, politics) are delayed until the years of critical response, Western mathematics (with its fellow supposed universal: Science) are ingrained along with basic language structure, handwriting, and kindergarten wisdom on how properly to be a human being.

But what’s so bad about math? So what if it’s culturally loaded? On the one hand, there is merely the post-colonial concern of a Western methodology retaining its constructed status of universality. Projections of such status reify the superiority and exclusivity of Western ways of thinking. A dialogue that falls outside this preferred scope dismissed as irrelevant. Other voices may be heard, but only so long as they’re heard to be quaint and unmistakably foreign accents. Grand Narratives tend to work like Country Clubs.

But, there is a more insidious dimension to all this, one that is indeed political. Yannis Stavrakakis echoes the work of Sobel in his 1996 work Longitude, writing, “what was necessary for the stability and practical usefulness of a certain signification (the calculation of longitude) was the structural ordering introduced by a certain point of reference; this point of reference was a signifier whose signified could be produced in a number of ways, all of them having comparable implications in terms of symbolising the real. What is also very important is that ‘the placement of the prime meridian is a purely political decision’ (Sobel, 1996: 4)” (Stavrakakis, 1999: 61). It is not only that using one measurement rather than another as the content of our signifier time is an arbitrary move—in fact it is not arbitrary at all; the move is a wholly political one. Stavrakakis continues, “If the role of the point de capiton is necessary (or universal) in structural terms, its particular content (the signified produced by its signifying predominance) is not a matter of mirroring pre-existing objective reality but of a hegemonic struggle. It is not surprising then that the final decision to declare the Greenwich meridian as the prime meridian of the world was taken at an international gathering, the International Meridian Conference held in Washington in 1884. It is also worth mentioning that this decision was partly the result of the gradual hegemonisation of the use of nautical tables for navigation at sea by the Nautical Almanac which was printed in England and used the Greenwich Meridian as the universal reference point” (Stavrakakis, 1999: 61).

One might look at the politico-economic origination of longitude as allegorical for the organization of knowledge in general—and Western mathematics included. Where it was once the Church and the State forming systems of knowledge by decree or legislation, it is perhaps now a strange conglomerate of media and economy. But, that is the subject of another discussion. In any case, we are left with the artifacts of past and sustained constructions… constructions that, with there obsolescence neither here nor there, run along our current understandings as the deeply layered footsteps of hegemonic struggle.

In the instance of Western mathematics, the preeminence is in many ways benign. As earlier suggested, it is never entirely benign insofar as it remains a totalizing and exclusionary dialogue. Additionally, though, we should be suspect of any discipline which has so thoroughly and seamlessly permeated other discourses. Statistics and its unfortunate step-sister Economics are indeed significant ways in which we now conceptualize, categorize, and organize human behavior. They are methods used as reference points by which those in power or corporate control discipline their constituents into ever more docile subjects. The art of business marketing (read: manipulation of the subject) would skid to a halt without the invaluable mathematic analysis of populations, trends, and probabilities. [Take it from a Marketing major.] It is through mathematics that human tragedy is reduced to statistic, that we measure unfortunate “collateral damage,” and so on. As the human face dissolves into a number, it is far easier to treat it as Other—the trace of God in that Other is replaced with a symbol even more antiseptic than the letter: the number. The Black American was a ratio… the Jew a number branded onto her arm… the enemy death always a body count.

The number has conveniently obscured that which is human from our view—replacing it with a record, an anonymous place amongst data that has no name. We can thus address the Other as if she were an It—we can lose ourselves in a media spectacle of quantified and organized information, a spectacle distant but just close enough to elicit interest.

So do we abandon mathematics? Not quite. But, we should treat it as a practical discipline for technical crafts like engineering along the lines that basket weaving serves as an electorate for the home decorator. If mathematics is the universal language, I will remain always inarticulate and undeciphered. Such is life at the margin.

Introducing...

This new website is in some ways an extension of the VBD project and in some ways an entirely individual endeavor. My hope is to provide the debate community (and others interested) with a forum related entirely to contemporary issues in philosophy. As a personalized element, I will also include news on events in the debate community and especially those organizations and institutes of which I am a part. As for the essays and discussion I will be submitting, there are several comments.

I do not want this to be a soapbox. Rather, my hope is that this becomes a forum through which dialgoues begin and continue for some time. Through the "comment" boxes, you are invited to submit your own thoughts on subjects as they emerge. I think the possibility of a site dedicated to the ideas themselves (instead of gossip, debate stats, etc) is a refreshing step.

I do want this to be a community in every sense of the term. It seems to me that those most interested and involved with the ideas behind the debate are deterred by the numerous other clouding aspects of the activity. Perhaps this can be an outlet through which we return to the thought that inspires argument in the first place. This of course implies a cooperative, inclusive, and open community in which ideas are welcome as blocks upon which we grow as thinkers, citizens, and... debaters.

Finally, this is an academic endeavor. Casual comments are always welcome, but there should be no doubt that the mission of this project is one in which important dialogue is not trivialized by gossip, hurtful suggestions, or entirely off topic content. I will include links and material from the academic world that I find exciting and worth consideration. I hope you do too.

With that said, I will be posting my first article tomorrow... with many more to follow. If you have suggestions on the direction of this project, its content, method, etc... please indulge. If you would like to simply say "hello" and "this is a great/awful idea", feel free to do that as well. :-)

Best,
SB