Agonism in CFC, or "Gorbechev, (don't) Tear Down This Post"

[Cheezy the Wiz]

From what I've read the literary works of book critics get the worst reviews.

So from that I infer that the "art" of argument is a hobby for people who cannot succeed at any other.

Or maybe book critics just hate each other.

Poetic justice, methinks, for them having played armchair novelist for so long.

 

[plarq]

If the genre was judged "bad", then the book is less worthy of discussion because it belongs to a wrong group. This is logically fine. The real point is, how they can judge a genre being "bad" without such authority in literature critic circles?

 

[gay_Aleks]

I think the example in the article was well chosen.

People were criticizing the book because of the genre, without even having read the book. And that the criticism was self-serving and dominated the discussion and then prevented an actual review of what the book itself contained.

So, in essence, agonism is blind criticism of the whole, instead of the individual?

 

[brennan]

I would like to add that this agonism is not only reminiscent of some kind of tribal fighting ritual - but also falsification. Since falsification is pretty much nothing but agonism (a theory is true until it has been falsified)

Falsification is the notion that a hypothesis or statement is only worth consideration if it can be shown to make any sense - the test being to see if it is possible to show it to be wrong.

It is not the idea that everything anyone says is true until it is proved wrong. This would be silly.

More on topic: it takes no effort to agree with something, there is far more motivation in disagreeing - one requires no more than a nod, the other requires that an opposing argument be put forward.

 

[Terxpahseyton]

That it must be in principle possible to falsify it to begin with is of course part of it...
But yes, true until proven otherwise certainly is the gist of it. That is illustrated by what it was the response to: positivism.

It is true that hence scientist don't literally assume everything to be true unless they know otherwise. That just would be terribly impractical. But I also did not intend to write an essay on falsification, but simply wanted to name its principle mechanism.

 

[brennan]

But yes, true until proven otherwise certainly is the gist of it.

1. If your conjecture on the nature of falsification theory were correct, then I would hold every theory I had ever heard that was falsifiable but not falsified to be simultaneously true irrespective of any contradictions involved.

2. I don't. It would be supremely silly, and i've never heard of any formulation of positivism that would suggest anything so daft.

3. Therefore, your conjecture is false.

 

[Terxpahseyton]

So is this behavior if yours a clever illustration of what the OP criticized?

You are arguing with extremely bad faith and are merely interested in "proving me wrong". You showcase the arrogance such behavior facilitates as well as the tendency to simplify/distort the opponents argument while not noticing nuance - just as the OP argued.
Well done I am impressed by your demonstration.

Now, I think your problem is that you assume that "falsification theory" is supposed to be a practical guide to how to handle research and theories.
It is not. It isn't supposed to tell you how you would actually do things. It is rather a theoretical building block on which actually work is supposed to rest. At least that is my impression.

Now what I meant with positivism (perhaps it is the wrong term, but there also seems to be a lot of confusion involving this term to begin with) was what theory preceded falsification. Which was the principle that you were supposed to prove theories. You had to positively establish their truth value. Falsification then responds: that is not possible. The 100th swan could be a black and not a white swan and all that. All you can do is prove a theory wrong, you can never prove it right. Hence, you will just have to assume that a theory is right as long has it has not been proven wrong. Which is all what I have been saying. That hence a theory also has to be able to be proven wrong follows from there.

 

[Gori the Grey]

I like Terx’s comments. They seem really in the spirit of this exercise. Not only are his own posts constructive, he casts other people’s posts, that on the surface seem to me agonistic, as contributions.

Anyway, I think I’ve got something I can contribute. The author says that we need to devise different metaphors for the academic enterprise. She proposes barn-building rather than Wild West shoot-outs.

That puts me in mind of something I regard as a great formulation on these matters. It’s by the 17th century writer John Milton, best known for Paradise Lost, but this is in a prose treatise of his called Areopagitica, which is a (classic) treatise on freedom of the press. He’s actually concerned about the opposite problem in England’s intellectual life: about too much conformity enforced by having unorthodox ideas dismissed out of hand as heretical or schismatic. But I think that what says can be adapted to this context. He hones in on the root meaning of schismatic, cutting, and it leads to this elaborate metaphor of stonecutters and carpenters working together to build a building. So this is like an epic metaphor of barn building:

Yet these are the men cry'd out against for schismaticks and sectaries; as if, while the Temple of the Lord was building, some cutting, some squaring the marble, others hewing the cedars, there should be a sort of irrationall men who could not consider there must be many schisms and many dissections made in the quarry and in the timber, ere the house of God can be built. And when every stone is laid artfully together, it cannot be united into a continuity, it can but be contiguous in this world; neither can every peece of the building be of one form; nay rather the perfection consists in this, that out of many moderat varieties and brotherly dissimilitudes that are not vastly disproportionall arises the goodly and the gracefull symmetry that commends the whole pile and structure.

What I like best of all is the phrase “brotherly dissimilitudes.” He imagines each author as a stonecutter bringing his idea, his stone, to help build the temple. The stones aren’t exactly alike, they are dissimilitudes. But you fit them together to make a bigger idea, so they are brotherly dissimilitudes.

If science is the field in which agonism (in the form of falsification) is most integral, it still seems to me that one can honor the findings that one’s own findings falsify: honor that that other scientist was a brother, engaged in the same overall effort of getting at the truth, maybe even honor that his false idea provided the occasion or pretext for your working your way toward your truer one. Yours is a plank on the barn, but his was at least part of the scaffolding that positioned you to nail your plank onto the barn. How much more in fields like the humanities that the article in the OP seems to be addressing.

So brothers (and sisters, for we must jettison the sexism), can we imagine a form of intellectual exchange in which we assemble our ideas, however dissimilar, into a larger truth structure?

 

[brennan]

So is this behavior if yours a clever illustration of what the OP criticized?

No, it's me pointing out that something you said is obviously wrong.

Bad Faith? Which one of us felt the need to poison the well here?

Now what I meant with positivism (perhaps it is the wrong term, but there also seems to be a lot of confusion involving this term to begin with) was what theory preceded falsification. Which was the principle that you were supposed to prove theories. You had to positively establish their truth value. Falsification then responds: that is not possible. The 100th swan could be a black and not a white swan and all that. All you can do is prove a theory wrong, you can never prove it right. Hence, you will just have to assume that a theory is right as long has it has not been proven wrong. Which is all what I have been saying. That hence a theory also has to be able to be proven wrong follows from there.

Incorrect. Falsification theory was an evolution of verification theory for the precise reason you state. But neither ever required that we assume theories to be true.

Verifiability/falsifiability was a positivist requirement before we could consider statements or hypotheses to be meaningful - i.e. to be possibly true or false conjectures about reality rather than gibberish. Not to label them a'priori as true. Positivism is heavily reliant upon the idea that theories must be tested empirically, the idea that it requires you to think any coherent theory is true is clearly contradictory to that basic tenet.

The position you suggest would be stunningly stupid and I would challenge you to provide any evidence that any positivist ever seriously held it. To me it appears as a ridiculous strawman.

 

[brennan]

Yours is a plank on the barn, but his was at least part of the scaffolding that positioned you to nail your plank onto the barn...So brothers (and sisters, for we must jettison the sexism), can we imagine a form of intellectual exchange in which we assemble our ideas, however dissimilar, into a larger truth structure?

Planks and scaffolding a real, solid objects. Ideas are not. If you show me a plank of wood and I can't see it, touch it or stand a tin of paint on it, why would I walk on it 30 feet up in the air?

You can't just accept the ideas of other people and work on them if you think they are wrong, your scaffolding may turn out not to exist.

 

[Gori the Grey]

The position you suggest would be stunningly stupid

And by "stunningly stupid," I assume you mean, "Thank you, Terx, my good man, for engaging with me on this issue, so that collectively we can work out the truth of this matter in a spirit of brotherly cooperation."

 

[brennan]

I mean it in the spirit of this paragraph:

You are arguing with extremely bad faith and are merely interested in "proving me wrong". You showcase the arrogance such behavior facilitates as well as the tendency to simplify/distort the opponents argument while not noticing nuance - just as the OP argued.
Well done I am impressed by your demonstration.

Sarcasm, insults and misrepresentation get what they deserve.

He can prove himself right merely by citing some credible exponent of positivism declaring the opinion that 'any falsifiable statement or hypothesis is a'priori true until proven wrong'.

I'm not holding my breath.

 

[Tarquelne]

So, in essence, agonism is blind criticism of the whole, instead of the individual?

No. It's one possible form for it to take. Angonism could also be expressed as criticism of an individual rather than the whole. Someone confronted with evaluating a "whole" like, say, a political party, instead launching into an attack on one individual from that party.

It's more like the classic "I've got a hammer, everything is a nail." sort of attitude. I think it's the author's contention that the people in the group wanted to criticize something. That oppositional criticism* is their default mode.

They criticized the genre instead of the book because, not having read the book(!), it was the best available target for criticism.

I don't think the author believes that it's merely criticism for the sake of criticism. Rather, criticism is often employed to further an individual's position, or to hurt someone else's. Not for the sake of furthering knowledge or making some determination. And criticism can become a habit, or someone simply may not know any other way to act.



*I've finally remembered where I've encountered "angonism" before. (I thought I might have been confusing it with "algesic therapy"... which has some similarities to a pointless argument.) It's the concept that conflict (as in debate and argument) can have a very positive political role. So ... sort of the opposite of this usage.

 

[Tarquelne]

Falsification:

But yes, true until proven otherwise certainly is the gist of it.

I also disagree. (Strongly.)

Religion is a good example.
The significant claims about God, for example, are not falsifiable. So they're a bad, bad, bad subject for any positivism-based investigation. However, that does not mean we should assume they're true until proven wrong.

And, remember, they *can't* be proven wrong! That's the point - they aren't falsifiable.

A simple example would be the contention that invisible, immaterial 30-foot tall unicorns roam the woods behind my house eating racoons*. It's not falsifiable, but I don't think there's any reason to assume it's true until proven otherwise.

What falsification does is provide a constructive way forward. When someone makes a falsifiable claim you aren't stuck criticizing their moral choices because they're the best available target for criticism. Instead, you can go try to falsify their claim rather than simply arguing. That's the constructive response.

It's why it's so important to distinguish between simple claims of fact and other claims. Claims about facts can be falsified. Lots of arguments fall astray here. Especially political ones, where the facts that are the basis of the argument are from sensational news reports and, in fact, false.

The concept is important in experiment design (going back to science) because an experiment that cannot fail is a experiment that can't prove someone's claim either. The experiment will show some level of success no matter what.

The existence of an experiment so poorly designed it cannot fail shouldn't, in itself, motivate you to assume a claim is true until a better experiment comes along. But, with regard to angonism, what you can do is point out the lack of falsification and then shut up. You do have the option of assuming the claim might be true.

*
"If they're eating the racoons, why wasn't there a dip in the raccoon population?"
"Because there would have been more racoons otherwise."
"Then what about the racoon population here being on par with raccoon populations elsewhere."
"You've just demonstrated the unicorns are widespread!"

That's an "immunization strategy." It's the elaborations people put around unfalsifiable ideas to keep them unfalsifiable.

 

[Camikaze]

@Camikaze
So if I understand you correctly you get the impression that the OP says that to just criticize is a no-go, but that is only allowed if it serves the end of positively contributing to a POV? Whereas you think that is a unduly dogmatic (and ironically binary) view?
Well I think I understood it in a more loose sense than you did. I think what it comes down to is intend and the larger picture.

For instance: Say we have a discussion were a couple of people are involved. Person A offers a hypothesis. Person B expands on that hypothesis. Person C finds a problem and based on that problem argues for an alteration of the hypothesis. Now Person D simply criticizes the hypothesis without offering a suggestion what follows from there for the hypothesis. You seem to think that is a no-go according to the OP. I think this is fine as long as it is done in good faith. I.e. Person D did not want to disregard the hypothesis - as you did not want to disregard the OP - but a critic was simply all Person D had to contribute as this point. Now, for instance, the group of people try to figure out what this critic means for the hypothesis. Instead of say the group declaring Person D the winner because he/she dismantled the hypothesis.

Yes, that's pretty much what I mean. To me the OP article is saying 'be Person C, not Person D', which seems to restrict any discussion to the original hypothesis to some extent.

Your reading of the article might be more accurate, or it could be an improvement on what the article is arguing.

They could also be considered a from of display. (Sociologists, btw, should always be discussed in anthropological terms. It's a tradition.)

Since I've started another post to make the point, I should explain what I mean by display: Opposition would be "display" when the goal of the opposition isn't really to attack whatever is being opposed, rather it's to further the position of the individual making the attack. ("All I had learned about was the acumen of the critics.")

I don't know if 'display' is really a necessary element of this sort of critique, though. I guess opposing something must reveal at least part of your position to some small extent, but often the purpose is much more directed towards 'exposing' the underpinnings of another argument, theory, or approach, without flying any particular or specific opposition flag. Through opposition they could be displaying their position, if that position is only described in terms of opposition, not in terms of a coherent alternative. This is kinda what I mean by saying this idea of agonism might be reinforcing norms or a binary discourse; the assumption that criticism puts you into a coherent 'against' camp, with the only other option naturally being 'for'.

I assumed she meant that people are taught more or less by experience. No positivism ... except in the sense it is based on observation. They see the unofficial reward mechanisms for opposition, and that opposition is rewarded. (Though, heck, maybe she was told many of the same things as cybrxkhan.)

I only have anecdotal evidence to go on here, so perhaps my experience is the exception, but I don't really think reward mechanisms are invariably based on opposition, either in terms of grades, or more socially (e.g. gaining respect by being seen as a tough and skilled debater). Of course, sometimes this 'ritualised opposition' can be rewarded, but I'm sceptical about the idea that the social sciences are predominantly structured that way, ignoring nuance for the sake of showmanship. The argumentative individual who takes a dogmatic position and refuses to concede opposition points because they're more interested in winning than in constructive discussion, is the stereotypical mature-aged student that everyone rolls their eyes at.

 

[Tarquelne]

I don't know if 'display' is really a necessary element of this sort of critique, though.

Certainly not. It's just one of the possible benefits.

... but I don't really think reward mechanisms are invariably based on opposition, either in terms of grades, or more socially (e.g. gaining respect by being seen as a tough and skilled debater).

Right, not invariably.

Of course, sometimes this 'ritualised opposition' can be rewarded, but I'm sceptical about the idea that the social sciences are predominantly structured that way, ignoring nuance for the sake of showmanship.

Yeah. I'd say not "predominately," but "overly so."

The argumentative individual who takes a dogmatic position and refuses to concede opposition points because they're more interested in winning than in constructive discussion, is the stereotypical mature-aged student that everyone rolls their eyes at.

True.

If nothing else, professional academics are generally far, far too canny to be that obvious about it.

Come to think of it, I think younger students are often - though not as often - just as bad as that stereotypical mature-aged student you describe and I find so familiar*. It's my impression that what really separates the mature dogmatics from the younger ones is that the older students are more willing to speak at length, and do so most often in defense of certain ideas. Or they keep trying the discussion back to pet ideas. Younger people may be just as dogmatic but, I suspect, more focused on being oppositional in all the ways described in this thread. They are, however, usually more loathe to engage in direct confrontation. (Eye rolling, OTOH, may be a highly-developed skill.)


*I should mention that, IME, boorish mature students are the exception rather than the rule. They do, however, stick out.

 

[Kyriakos]

'Agonism'

Well, the root term is Agon(Agonas), which means race/fight and similar contests. The term antagonism refers to fighting someone else, while if you merely are in the struggle yourself (eg someone running in training, on his own) then it is a pleonasm to use the Agon root in a noun expansion, cause there simply is no contest. The verb itself is used (in greek), when one is trying very hard, and it does not matter in that context if he is trying against other forces or if those are deemed crucial in the sentence describing this effect.

I hate corruptions of Greek#1 beautiful terms in English#1776

 

[Hygro]

So, in essence, agonism is blind criticism of the whole, instead of the individual?

Not necessarily, it's just criticism for the sake of it. The example was just a really clear example of that.

TBH I don't get why it's not just called antagonism. Agonism would mean to be promoting something. But we're working with this thesis for now.

 

[Kyriakos]

Not necessarily, it's just criticism for the sake of it. The example was just a really clear example of that.

TBH I don't get why it's not just called antagonism. Agonism would mean to be promoting something. But we're working with this thesis for now.

Any peasant knows the term 'antagonism', and an academician should try to use rarer terms, and this often leads to a dumb use as in this case. :hipsteracademic:

 

[Terxpahseyton]

@ Brennan & Tarquelne

I fear this is one of those moments which would have been resolved within minutes in an actual conversation but which spans several long (and in itself still valuable) posts on a forum.

I am not disagreeing with anything you have said in itself. Moreover I have to say that my memory of falsification was a bid dusted and your contributions have put off that dust. Meaning if in the same original situation I would put it differently what falsification means so not to conflict whith what you guys see as essential. So what you have said is not in vain

However - what does it mean if we can not prove stuff? It means we have to rely on a series of unsuccessful falsification - okay fair enough. One does not just assume something to be true. One tends to rests this on a legacy of failed efforts to prove it wrong (though I think in practice - meaning in people's minds - validation is strong - and not unrighteously so, actually - falsification is the theory and validation the praxis - that is IMO the best description of it).

Now what does this mean as - I think this is the right term? - a meta-theory? It means that theories (which have been usuccesfullly been tried to be flasisied) are just assumed to be true.
My failure is to not have spelled out what I got clamped their. But I - in my original "defiinition" - assumed it to be just implicit.