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The great evil in my humble opinion which haunts our enterprise.
And I say this realizing I'm setting the fox among the chickens.
The great evil. That has been allowed to florish.
In the absence of mathematical understanding is relativism. And what is relativism?
Its the idea that there is no distinction between shift and shinola.
That all ideas are somehow operating on equal footing.
So one person is a chaos theorist.
Another is a follower of the relevations of this or that new age guru.
Someone else is channeling information from the pleiades and we have been taught that political correctness
demands that we treat all these things with equal weight
because we have no mathematical ability no logical ability we
don't know how to ask the questions that expose some positions as preposterous trivial insulting to the intelligence and unworthy of repition.
So. We all are very comfortable bashing science and flailing away at that
but that isn't our enemy science is capable of undertaking it's own reformation and critique and has been
engaged in that fairly vigorously for sometime. The enemy that will really subvert the enterprise
of building a world based on clarity
is the belief that we cannot point out the pernicious forms of idiocy
that flourish in our own community and this problem is growing worse all the time.
I mean just pick up a copy of magical blend or shamans drum and you will discover an appeal to the
level of intellect that makes whats going on with television advertising
look like a meeting of the Princeton Institute of Advanced study.
We have tolerated too many loose heads in our community.
We are not willing to take on the karma involved in argument and discourse that actually
gores somebody's ox. So that at the end of the day irridology or mormonism or some other form of institutionally supported
foolishness lies in shreds on the floor we consider this politically incorrect
I can feel the tension in this room because people sense I might gore their particular ox.
If we had learned mathematical logic or reason or rules of evidence
when someone approaches us excited to inform us that the ruins of lamoria have been spotted in the deep sea off big sir
or something like that we would be able to respond to that with the contempt it deserves.
I had a conversation about this recently with someone who if I had to describe their job category I would describe them as a mafiosa
and I said what do you think of the abduction phenomenon
and without hesitation this person said there are just so many foolish people in the world
and to me all of these things are intelligence tests
and the people who pass the intelligence test are not worried about pro bono proctologists from other star systems
showing up unannounced in their bedrooms.
So you know we we have perfected politeness.
We have perfected the ability to listen to damn foolishness without betraying by so much as the
flick of an eyebrow that we realize what we're in the presence in of.
Now I think it's time to refine our mathematical skills learn to think straight and
not be afraid to denounce the pernicious forms of foolishness
which are viscerating the energies of our community and making us appear
marginal and absurd in the discourse about truly transforming society.
AUDIENCE CHEERS
Well I can't wait to see this laboratory of clarity unfold before me tonight.
As all nonsense is dispelled.
The scalpel of reason is brought out by turns.
Yes, well it is an ambiguous enterprise and fraught with contradiction but forward.
Ever forward.