Jordan Peterson’s redefinition of truth comes to mind. During his first appearance on Sam Harris’ podcast, he presented the following: “Nietzsche said that truth is useful (for humanity). Therefore, what is harmful for humanity, cannot be “true”. Example—if scientists discover how to create a new plague, that knowledge may be technically correct, but cannot be called “true”. On the other hand, the bible is very useful. Like, extremely useful. So very useful, that even if not technically correct, the bible is nevertheless “true”.”
Of course, how to judge whether “E=mc^2” is “true” or only correct (before the Apocalypse!) is left to the listener. The important part is being able to say that the bible is “true”, everything else is secondary.
I think the problem you’re pointing at is “using words to confuse the issue”. Most people know what truth is, and don’t need a definition (except to clarify which sense of the word we’re talking about). But humans do a lot of linguistic reasoning. So if you introduce a new definition for a word, one that people don’t normally use, you have a chance of confusing people into reasoning using that new definition, and using the results of that reasoning on the original sense of the word.
Here, I don’t know what Nietzsche said, but it does not follow from the phrase “truth is useful” that “it is not true that this is a discovery for creating a plague, because plagues are not useful”. It seems, rather, that he’s misrepresenting Nietzsche by simply mislabeling usefulness as truth (and if Nietzsche actually did that, he’s wrong).
Another way to look at it is to observe that the word “is” is used in the same sense as “a sphere is rollable”, which does not imply “if it is rollable, it must be a sphere”. In the same way, “truth is useful” does not imply “if it is useful, it must be truth”.
Either way, people make logical mistakes all the time, and therefore one mistake in isolation is not dark epistemology. But what if you had the chance to explain to Peterson what his logical mistake was, and he responded by (1) denying that he made any mistake or (2) ignoring your point entirely? Now that’s what I call dark epistemology. Or what if Peterson makes the same mistake over and over and never seems to notice unless his opponents do it? More dark epistemology.
I’ve heard Peterson accuse feminists of disregarding what is true in the name of ideology on many occasions.
Sam Harris initially spent an hour arguing against Peterson’s redefinition of “truth” to include a “moral dimension”. They’ve clashed about it since, with no effect. Afaik, “the bible is true because it is useful” is central component of Peterson’s worldview.
To be fair, I believe Peterson has managed to honestly delude himself on this point and is not outright lying about his beliefs.
Nevertheless, when prompted to think of a “General Defense of Fail”, attempting to redefine the word “truth” in order to protect one’s ideology came to mind very quickly.
Jordan Peterson’s redefinition of truth comes to mind. During his first appearance on Sam Harris’ podcast, he presented the following: “Nietzsche said that truth is useful (for humanity). Therefore, what is harmful for humanity, cannot be “true”. Example—if scientists discover how to create a new plague, that knowledge may be technically correct, but cannot be called “true”. On the other hand, the bible is very useful. Like, extremely useful. So very useful, that even if not technically correct, the bible is nevertheless “true”.”
Of course, how to judge whether “E=mc^2” is “true” or only correct (before the Apocalypse!) is left to the listener. The important part is being able to say that the bible is “true”, everything else is secondary.
I think the problem you’re pointing at is “using words to confuse the issue”. Most people know what truth is, and don’t need a definition (except to clarify which sense of the word we’re talking about). But humans do a lot of linguistic reasoning. So if you introduce a new definition for a word, one that people don’t normally use, you have a chance of confusing people into reasoning using that new definition, and using the results of that reasoning on the original sense of the word.
Here, I don’t know what Nietzsche said, but it does not follow from the phrase “truth is useful” that “it is not true that this is a discovery for creating a plague, because plagues are not useful”. It seems, rather, that he’s misrepresenting Nietzsche by simply mislabeling usefulness as truth (and if Nietzsche actually did that, he’s wrong).
Another way to look at it is to observe that the word “is” is used in the same sense as “a sphere is rollable”, which does not imply “if it is rollable, it must be a sphere”. In the same way, “truth is useful” does not imply “if it is useful, it must be truth”.
Either way, people make logical mistakes all the time, and therefore one mistake in isolation is not dark epistemology. But what if you had the chance to explain to Peterson what his logical mistake was, and he responded by (1) denying that he made any mistake or (2) ignoring your point entirely? Now that’s what I call dark epistemology. Or what if Peterson makes the same mistake over and over and never seems to notice unless his opponents do it? More dark epistemology.
I’ve heard Peterson accuse feminists of disregarding what is true in the name of ideology on many occasions.
Sam Harris initially spent an hour arguing against Peterson’s redefinition of “truth” to include a “moral dimension”. They’ve clashed about it since, with no effect. Afaik, “the bible is true because it is useful” is central component of Peterson’s worldview.
To be fair, I believe Peterson has managed to honestly delude himself on this point and is not outright lying about his beliefs.
Nevertheless, when prompted to think of a “General Defense of Fail”, attempting to redefine the word “truth” in order to protect one’s ideology came to mind very quickly.