Read on Twitter
Thread:
I hesitate to post this because I’m sure it will hurt some feelings and cause some to become defensive. But the problem is important enough and pervasive enough that I encourage us all to be on the lookout for it—even in ourselves.
I hesitate to post this because I’m sure it will hurt some feelings and cause some to become defensive. But the problem is important enough and pervasive enough that I encourage us all to be on the lookout for it—even in ourselves.
As a professor who has been reading student papers for over thirty years, I have developed (along with every other professor, no doubt) a keen awareness of borrowed language, hackneyed phrases, and clichéd thinking that serves to stem rather than spur thinking.
Indeed it is actually a large part of a professor’s job to help students get past the ways in which shortcuts in language reflect and create shortcuts in thinking. Humorous, timeless examples are phrases like “in the world today,” “throughout human history,” “in time immemorial.”
But it gets more serious than this.
For the past few months I’ve noticed an increase in certain phrasing used by some prone to engage in conspiracy theory thinking or to discredit expertise in general and elevate their own “special knowledge.”
For the past few months I’ve noticed an increase in certain phrasing used by some prone to engage in conspiracy theory thinking or to discredit expertise in general and elevate their own “special knowledge.”
Some of the common hackneyed phrases I see in social media with those who lack of trust in expertise include: “Do your own research.” “Ask better questions.” “That’s a logical fallacy.” “Think for yourself.” “Be more intellectual.”
Simply saying these things might “sound good” but they are meaningless when not actually being done. Now these ideas and questions are noble and good and ones I promote myself. But when they are repeated as mere clichés with no substance underneath, they are empty phrases.
When pressed, there is often nothing or little of substance to support the assertions. “Doing your own research” by googling and sharing articles from Facebook from unreliable sources by people untrained in the subject and therefore unable to determine ...
... the source’s reliability, for example, is not good research. And when pressed to explain what a particular logical fallacy is, the person needs to be able to explain what it is. And too often this is not the case.
Distrust in expertise and authority is the postmodernism so many warned us about—ironically, it’s often the same people doing both.
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A few good follow up comments from others with more of these phrases:
https://twitter.com/xapatotheworld/status/1272726731959533568?s=21 https://twitter.com/xapatotheworld/status/1272726731959533568
https://twitter.com/xapatotheworld/status/1272726731959533568?s=21 https://twitter.com/xapatotheworld/status/1272726731959533568
https://twitter.com/laurielspies/status/1272661585824227329?s=21 https://twitter.com/laurielspies/status/1272661585824227329
https://twitter.com/douginroc/status/1272672807483256834?s=21 https://twitter.com/douginroc/status/1272672807483256834
https://twitter.com/alonrobinson/status/1272952863900270592?s=21 https://twitter.com/alonrobinson/status/1272952863900270592
https://twitter.com/shoddemiller/status/1273017997393879046?s=21 https://twitter.com/shoddemiller/status/1273017997393879046
https://twitter.com/deb_wa/status/1273026276798980105?s=21 https://twitter.com/deb_wa/status/1273026276798980105
