Sam Harris and Noam Chomsky (enemy, atrocities, government, European)

[bolehboleh]

The Limits of Discourse : As Demonstrated by Sam Harris and Noam Chomsky : Sam Harris

Did you guys have a chance to read it? I'm still digesting what I've read and I may respond later.

I'd like to hear what everyone else thinks.

[bolehboleh]

I found the topics very interesting but the debate frustrated me. It started with Chomsky being contentious towards Harris and Harris taking the debate by dwelling on Chomsky's rudeness. Harris has some holes in his arguments - although he often brings up US missteps in a number of conflicts, he sees them has just a side bar. The real bad guys are the "enemy" and the US, despite involving itself in conflicts that maybe it should stay away from, is still the good guy most of the time.

Chomsky's weakness is that he's so quick to condemn American, European etc... imperialism that he neglects the many influences that cause some groups of people to be violent.

[Gaylenwoof]

I appreciate Chomsky's efforts to point out the atrocities of US policy, but I think he ruined a good opportunity to have a productive debate with Harris. Overall, I think that Harris and Chomsky have a lot in common insofar as both are willing to expose US mistakes. As Harris says: "Nothing I said or didn’t say should have been construed as an unwillingness to criticize the U.S. government or to discuss any of its specific actions that may, in fact, constitute atrocities. As to whether we can trust Chomsky’s account of the al-Shifa bombing, I have my doubts." [3rd paragraph from the bottom in the linked article.] Harris is not rubber-stamping US Policy, and he is not uncritical of the intentions of US policy-makers. He's just not comfortable with the extreme comparisons made by Chomsky. I think Harris has the more reasonable approach here.

[oberon_1]

Chomsky is a nut. Anyway, as linguist, how did he become a revered political and phylosophical expert? How (and why) his opinion carries more weight than anyone elses?