oh noes he dared to criticize Sam Harris!
this man must be crazy

If only there was more critical analysis about the kind of statements of the thinkers, atheists, etc, that tend to be favored in this site.
Not only gives variety, and balance, but you end up learning more about what you support.

Thanks for sharing this.

Zizeks assertion that Harris's postulation of "restructuring our ethical experience" as a means to be able to torture people as a civic duty in order to prevent further suffering, has completley missed the point Harris was trying to make.

The moon illusion with regard to torture is an analogy to religion/faith and reason/logic. To take that on faith (no pun intended) and brutally follow it through to the logical end without taking into account, as Zizek is so fantastic at doing himself, the power of analogy, is doing the entire topic a massive disservice...and I think Zizek even knows it.

Its the same idea with the torture pill, its an analogy, that to show those of faith their ignorance in stark contrast with reality / reason, would benefit all of mankind, with the assumption that showing those of "faith" that its not a virtue can allow them to think more rationally / critically.

Dont get me wrong, Zizek is a great philosopher, but hes just totally missed the ball on this one.

Is it just me, or does it look like he has fleas?

I havent read the book, but your interpretation isn't really clear,it isn't really clear that this is a simple analogy



"Harris stated that "[I]f you think it is ever justifiable to drop bombs in an attempt to kill a man like Osama bin Laden (and thereby risk killing and maiming innocent men, women, and children), you should think it may sometimes be justifiable to "water-board" a man like Osama bin Laden."[20] Ultimately, Harris maintains that torture should remain illegal, and that comparing torture with collateral damage does not cause him to see torture as "acceptable." However, he believes that discussion is needed on the coherence of our beliefs regarding the two."


Zizek attacks the very act of discussing torture as a possibility

what is fundamentally wrong with Harris - according to Zizek - is "that we need promises", i.e faith and trust, at least in an interpersonal context

Zizek is wrong to insinuate that there's something wrong with wanting the best of both worlds (decaf coffee, fat free cake etc).

However optimizing for some characteristic (fat-freeness) tends to neglect other characteristics (taste, sugariness, the health effects of the chemicals they use to replace fat, health effects of deficiencies in certain kinds of fat).

Have a hard time listening to him because of his extreme lisp. That's not to say his lack of speaking ability detracts from his points, but it's very hard to finish a talk like this in one sitting.
Unfair? Yes, but so is me being a good speaker but poor thinker.

Yeah, he has a bad accent that's definitely slavic. Hard to understand him sometimes. Zizek is from Slovenia.

>> ^bluecliff:
Zizek attacks the very act of discussing torture as a possibility
what is fundamentally wrong with Harris - according to Zizek - is "that we need promises", i.e faith and trust, at least in an interpersonal context


I don't think that's quite what he means. "Faith and trust, at least in an interpersonal context," is insufficient for torture to be ruled out as a possibility. There are individuals in whom we cannot and should not have faith and trust, as Zizek understands (and points out later in the lecture, in the example of Hitler).

That said, I don't think it's all that clear how his criticism of Harris actually does work. He never quite makes explicit the logical connection between the concept of the "Neighbor" and the impermissibility of torture. After this video, he gets lost in a rabbit trail explaining what the Neighbor means and how it relates both to modern politics and the illusion of really connecting with others.

I think he may have intended to point out a problem with reducing ethical behavior to a set of scientific principles, since, after all, we're free individuals (and thus Neighbors), and such calculations are inconsistent with freedom.

Or he maybe he just thought that the torture Harris is talking about is another instance of demonizing the Other. Who knows?

One of my philosophy professors used get lost and fail to complete his arguments like this. He's a brilliant guy, and I almost never missed taking a class with him, but his lectures could drive you nuts sometimes.

Does he suffer from OCD of some sorts? What with all the sniffing, coughing, shirt pulling? Oh and also misses Harris' point by a mile.

>> ^HadouKen24:

I don't think that's quite what he means. "Faith and trust, at least in an interpersonal context," is insufficient for torture to be ruled out as a possibility. There are individuals in whom we cannot and should not have faith and trust, as Zizek understands (and points out later in the lecture, in the example of Hitler).
That said, I don't think it's all that clear how his criticism of Harris actually does work. He never quite makes explicit the logical connection between the concept of the "Neighbor" and the impermissibility of torture. After this video, he gets lost in a rabbit trail explaining what the Neighbor means and how it relates both to modern politics and the illusion of really connecting with others.
I think he may have intended to point out a problem with reducing ethical behavior to a set of scientific principles, since, after all, we're free individuals (and thus Neighbors), and such calculations are inconsistent with freedom.
Or he maybe he just thought that the torture Harris is talking about is another instance of demonizing the Other. Who knows?
One of my philosophy professors used get lost and fail to complete his arguments like this. He's a brilliant guy, and I almost never missed taking a class with him, but his lectures could drive you nuts sometimes.




You're right (especially about his talking style)

...the "need for promises", and "the Neighbor" have nothing per se to do with torture, it's rather with Harris comments on faith.


From this:
http://www.lacan.com/symptom8_articles/zizek8.html

"Consequently, what Harris aims at with his imagined "truth pill" is nothing less than the abolition of the dimension of the Neighbor: the tortured subject is no longer a Neighbor, but an object whose pain is neutralized, reduced to a property that has to be dealt with in a rational utilitarian calculus (so much pain is tolerable if it prevents a much greater amount of pain) - what disappears here is the abyss of the infinity that pertains to a subject. It is thus significant that the book which argues for torture is also the book entitled The End of Belief - not, however, in the obvious sense of "You see, it is only our belief in God, the divine in junction to love your neighbor, that ultimately prevents us from torturing people!", but in a much more radical sense. Another subject (and, ultimately, subject as such) is for Lacan not something directly given, but a "presupposition," something presumed, an object of belief - how can I ever be sure that what I see in front of me is another subject, not a depthless flat biological machine?

My interpolation -

it all has to do with the fact that you can discus weather a chair in front of you really exists, but in the end everyone can go home and have a cup of tea, without agreeing, thats why epistemology is easy, we can all believe in crazy things like "matter" or "god" without there being a real problem. But when we asks the question - is this in front of me a Man, a Person, you have to say Yes, emphatically. You have to say "I believe".

You're point about Hitler is also right, but lets say you have Hitler in a basement, If you're a normal being you really wouldn't like hearing the screams of a man in pain, seeing pain in another Person, even if he is Hitler, because let's face it, he was a Man.

What Harris is saying is that this can be dealt with (science is not the problem, you could imagine it without a "pill")by removing the spastic screams - even if it is just a theoretical supposition. It's not about the impermissibility of torture, as far as I can see, it's about how we perceive the lump of flesh in front of us. Harris is not only destroying it's "infinite dimension" but also our ability to see it and feel it. You can torture Hitler, but the least you could experience the horror of the process


Any way, thats my thoughts...
Who's up for some enchillada?

He doesn't even get to a point in the end, he completely trails off and forgets what he's talking about with absolutely no conclusion.

The difference is that Sam Harris is possibly the most reasonable person you will ever get to listen to - and Slavoj Zizek is a philosopher of entertainment, he attempts to break things down into things they're not!

The only argument you could have against Sam Harris' reasonable assertions is that we should use something other than reason to decide what the most reasonable positions are, which would just be dumb.

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