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Tuesday, May 19, 2015

Third observation

Gosh, realize where you are, or activate the literacy required to be in another place other than "where you think you are."

An immigrant from Africa arrives on Lampedusa. He has no papers. He gives you his name, and you don't know if it is really his or not. He doesn't tell you where he is from. He doesn't speak your language, but he has escaped from some hell or misfortune; and for all purposes practical he says he is your responsibility. You must treat him like a human being. You give him pasta with tomato sauce because he is hungry. He says this food is not fit for humans to eat.

He has only part of the context, his own, which he has attempted to force upon his interlocutor. He commits the sin of not understanding the relatio-spatio-temporal context. He is no longer living in his context; he is now in one made by and for Italians and Europeans. Thus, pasta with tomato sauce.

Sam Harris and Noam Chomsky got into it recently, and part of their now published discussion had to do with whether or not to publish an email interchange. Although not an easy read and embedded within are words as keys to who has said something of substance or not, my take is that here at the other end of the literate spectrum--"sophisticated" and nuanced writing and reading--context is (was) (also) all important.

My paraphrase of this aspect of their so-called "non-interchange" is this: At Sam's urging, Noam consented to publishing their emails even though he, Noam, found the idea weird and self-aggrandizing. As a result of the non-interchange, Sam felt he could claim the higher ground by showing that they(?) had reached The Limits of Discourse, which was not what their conversation was about to begin with.

What? The publication of a private conversation demonstrated the limits of discourse? What happened to the issues they were discussing? Weren't they the compelling reason for publishing? Apparently not, because Sam ignored or tanked 'em, that is created/framed another context.

But you decide.* This is just my reading . . . which is again, I contend, confusion about context, or the game, the two created as they jousted.

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The Limits of Discourse : As Demonstrated by Sam Harris and Noam Chomsky : Sam Harris
Samharris.org, (2015). The Limits of Discourse : As Demonstrated by Sam Harris and Noam Chomsky : Sam Harris. [online] Available at: http://www.samharris.org/blog/item/the-limits-of-discourse [Accessed 19 May 2015].