EAllusion wrote:In the lead-in housekeeping podcast, he goes on extensively about Klein acting in bad faith for accusing Murray of promoting racialist pseudoscience (which is true) and Sam Harris not appreciating that context when promoting him (which is also true), to justify not having a podcast with him.
This is a pretty good example of why it's difficult to take what you say on this subject seriously. Both your parentheticals are highly debatable. This thread is 17 pages long, ffs.
So your claim here is that Harris didn't understand the controversy surrounding the book prior to having Murrey on his podcast? This is what you want to posit?
If so, I don't think you've ever honestly listened to what he has to say. It's such an outrageous and cynical misreading of the situation, I'm not sure where to begin.
EAllusion wrote:He calls his actions slanderous. In that context, he he spends some time talking about how someone as dishonest as Klein does not deserve to be engaged to set up a change of heart after putting it to a vote to note their upcoming exchange.
So, if you saw someone publicly misrepresenting your comments and you'd been the subject of prior campaigns from other assholes misrepresenting you in similar ways, you wouldn't be wary?
EAllusion wrote:After his exchange with Klein, he reaffirms Klein's extreme dishonesty.
What Harris specifically says is that he has given up on reaching the "far left." He calls doing so a "delusion" and compares trying to reach them like trying to reach neo-Nazis. It's hopeless. He calls them "too far gone." By engage, I mean that he has given up on a serious exchange of ideas. This doesn't mean he won't deign to lecture or insult or talk. He says specifically he will talk with them, but it's pointless to think they can engage in fruitful discourse. It just mean's he's given up. He is willing to engage in the same way you are willing to engage DocCam. And he's not willing to engage in precisely the same way according to his comments.
Well, that's not the impression your initial post gave, but this is a possible interpretation of his postmortem.
I don't blame Harris for his exasperation with Klein. The guy had his head up his ass. I listened to the whole thing, and Klein never once addressed Harris's point in any real, thoughtful way. He kept insisting you can't talk about data on race without involving black people, or something equally incoherent and unrelated to the real topic. He listed several people he thought Sam should have on the show to talk about Klein's personal passions and ignored about 90% of what Sam said.
He wasn't as bad as Resa Aslan, but close. If I were in Harris's place, I wouldn't bother with him any more either. I admit, I have an issue with Harris's use of the term "far left" but I think much of what he said on that follow-up podcast was more out of exasperation than how he'll proceed to live his life going forward. Engaging people is what he's about. I've been listening to too much of what he has to say lately to think he's going to let this episode stop his from speaking to whomever, whether they deserve his attention or not (*cough creationists cough*). He's been doing it for years.
God belief is for people who don't want to live life on the universe's terms.