Holiday in Stilbaai

What a privilege - being on holiday in the beautiful Southern Cape seaside village, Stilbaai (translated from Afrikaans - "quiet or still bay"). We come here roughly every two years with whichever family members can make it. It's like being in another country; relaxed and practically no crime (the locals know why). A few years ago the town briefly made news when it became known that the police were using a donkey cart to patrol the streets.

It's winter now and the weather varies from balmy winter sunshine to cold and wet. Southern Right whales have arrived for their breeding season and can be seen blowing in the bay.

Although the past few days have been too cold, my son (Dieter) and I had our first experiences of sea kayaking just before the cold spell. My next purchase will be wetsuits so that we can become all-weather kayakers! The whales have arrived just after our last outing two days ago, but we did see dolphins playing in the waves.

Here are two holiday scenes from Stilbaai:


Skulpiesbaai ("Shell Bay"). Stone age tidal fish traps used by the San and Khoisan peoples are visible in the foreground. The area is rich in archeological sites; the well-known Blombos Cave archeological dig is near Stilbaai.


Dieter and I entering the bay through the mouth of the Goukou River.

Science and belief in God

I have been avoiding and will in future be avoiding discussions of science and religion on this blog. I find the posturing and intolerance of fundamentalists on both sides objectionable.

Here, however, is a fresh breeze on the subject. Michael Shermer of the Skeptic Magazine and the Templeton Foundation co-operated in producing a balanced booklet in which prominent commenters on both sides of the debate made reasoned contributions.

The question at issue was:

Does science make belief in God obsolete?

Schermer commented as follows on the process in eSkeptic:

"Since I am aware of the reputation that the Templeton Foundation has within the skeptical, atheist, and humanist communities for harboring a right-wing Christian agenda, I would like to note that, in fact, they invited me to select the commentators and edit their essays, and insisted that I include skeptics, atheists, and humanists, which you will see that I did. There was never any hint to me that I should edit the commentaries to come out a certain way to match the alleged agenda ..."

Contributors on the "Yes" side were:

Victor Stenger: Yes. Worse. Science renders belief in God incoherent.

Steven Pinker: Yes, if by science we include secular reason and knowledge.

Pervez Hoodbhoy: Not necessarily. You must find a science-compatible God.

Stuart Kauffman: No, if we redefine God as creativity in the universe.

Chrisopher Hitchens: No, but it should.

Michael Shermer: It depends: belief no, God yes.

Contributors on the "No" side:

Mary Midgley: Of course not, belief in God is not a scientific question.

Kenneth Miller: Of course not. Science expands our appreciation of the Divine.

William D. Phillips: Absolutely not! Belief in God is not a scientific matter.

Robert Sapolsky: No. Belief offers something that science doesn’t.

Jerome Groopman: No. Not at all.

Keith Ward: No.

Christoph Cardinal Schönborn: No.

The booklet is available online from the Templeton Foundation here.

On bullshit, quacks and charlatans

I became aware of "bullshit" as an academically "respectable" term with the 2005 publication of the philosophical mini-book On Bullshit by Prof. Harry Frankfurt. It was surprisingly successful and triggered widespread media and public interest. Prof. Ben Kotzee of the Department of Philosophy of the University of Cape Town pointed out the reason for this success here:

"What people enjoy about Frankfurt’s book, it seems, is that having a theory of bullshit available makes it possible now to do with a straight face what you previously had to hide in a cough: say that someone is talking bullshit. (We might say that, after Frankfurt, “bullshit” is a technical term.)"

The South African press also took notice, especially in 2006 after a public lecture entitled Our vision and our mission: Bullshit, assertion and belief by Prof. Kotzee.



South African readers can get On Bullshit here from Kalahari.net.

What then is "bullshit" when it is not the excrement of a male bovine? It is clear that it is human communication of some kind, whether verbal or written, and that its purpose is to deceive. Animals also deceive, but do they bullshit?

Kotzee distinguishes between "Frankfurt-bullshit" and "Cohen-bullshit" (See Cohen reference in Kotzee's article).

According to Kotzee:

"... Frankfurt holds that bullshit involves a “deliberate misrepresentation”; like lying, bullshitting amounts to someone trying to deceive another. Bullshitting involves deceptive intent, making whether an utterance is bullshit dependent on the state of mind of the bullshitter rather than on features of the utterance itself. (p. 3)"

while,

"Cohen-bullshit is bullshit with a life of its own and is bullshit independently of the bullshitters (sic) intent to deceive. (Cohen-bullshit) ... is a species of nonsense: specifically, it is 'unclarifiable nonsense'. (pp. 7-8)"

Kotzee points out that for both Frankfurt's bullshit (deception) and Cohen's bullshit(nonsense), the question whether someone can believe their own bullshit, holds a problem. In Frankfurt's case, it would require self-deception, which Kotzee believes is unlikely to be conscious. With Cohen-bullshit, being nonsense, the bullshitter according to Kotzee, also cannot believe his/her own bullshit.

How can these ideas be applied to quacks and charlatans? These two terms are often used interchangeably, but as the definitions below show, charlatan has a stronger connotation with fraud.

Dr. Stephen Barrett of Quackwatch defines quackery as the promotion of unsubstantiated methods that lack a scientifically plausible rationale. Wictionary defines a charlatan as a malicious trickster; a fake person, especially one who deceives for personal profit.

In reality, it must be said that it will often be practically impossible to distinguish quacks from charlatans. Let us do so for present purposes, however. Then it would seem that quacks would be more inclined to Cohen-bullshit and charlatans more to Frankfurt-bullshit. With the charlatan the line between bullshit and outright lies and fraud may be a thin one.

Read these links to Quackometer and Neurologica
to see good examples of the application of the theory of bullshit to quackery.

Also see Neil Postman's Bullshit and the art of crap-detection

The concept of "occurring"

Many years ago, probably in the early 1990's, I attended a clinical neuropsychology workshop presented by Dr Muriel Lezak. She is the writer of one of the foremost books in clinical neuropsychology, Neuropsychological Assessment.



At the workshop Dr. Lezak introduced an idea that I found useful ever since, the concept of "occurring". She related it to the disinhibition often found in persons with pre-frontal lobe injuries. Appreciation of the inappropriateness of their disinhibited behaviour and the effect thereof on others "just does not occur" to them.

The concept of "occurring" is useful in helping parents and teachers understand the cognitive effects of brain injuries and some developmental disorders on children. I believe that the concept can be extended to explain in simple terms the misunderstandings that often arise due to sexual, cultural and generational differences. We often do not appreciate the extent to which differences in culture, education and life experiences influence our perceptions, habits and the understanding of our environment. If the neural capacity, memory trace or access to it, or specific knowledge does not exist or is destroyed, a simple "it just did not occur to him/her", may sometimes be the key to understanding and acceptance.