Viewing a single comment thread. View all comments

chrispd01 t1_j5fc8p9 wrote

What is the deal with Harris ? Just asking as I was excited to see Nussbaum whom I love since reading the Fragility of Goodness …

1

gardsy26 t1_j5fxzd6 wrote

You should find out for yourself! He has written many books and has a very influential podcast (my opinion). Here's the wiki:

Samuel Harris is an American philosopher, neuroscientist, author, and podcast host. His work touches on a range of topics, including rationality, religion, ethics, free will, neuroscience, meditation, psychedelics, philosophy of mind, politics, terrorism, and artificial intelligence. Harris came to prominence for his criticism of religion, and Islam in particular, and is known as one of the "Four Horsemen" of New Atheism, along with Richard Dawkins, Christopher Hitchens, and Daniel Dennett.

Although after a recent interview which resulted in memes and click-bait headlines taking things out of context, he is now the whipping boy of the right. On the other hand he equally (if not more) criticizes the left, resulting him to be targeted by people who align there also. He's an easy target for online trolls and those who want to earn internet points fairly easily without critical thought.

4

palsh7 OP t1_j5gscx0 wrote

As my submission statement said, Sam Harris is the author of The Moral Landscape, Free Will, Lying, The End of Faith, and other NYT best sellers. Sam received a degree in philosophy from Stanford University and a Ph.D. in neuroscience from UCLA. He has also practiced meditation for more than 30 years and has studied with many Tibetan, Indian, Burmese, and Western meditation teachers, both in the United States and abroad. He is the creator of the meditation app Waking Up.

2

chrispd01 t1_j5guudg wrote

Well, yeah. I read your submission, Stephen. But there seems to be a lot of buzz about him. Your statement wasn that helpful on the gossip side …

1

palsh7 OP t1_j5gy0as wrote

I don't know what "Stephen" is supposed to mean.

"What's the deal with [him]" is a pretty unspecific question. Are you asking why it is that some people don't like him? If that's what you meant, I can answer that.

He started his writing career attacking religion alongside Richard Dawkins, so the Christian Right really didn't like him. Then more recently he criticized Donald Trump quite a lot, so they got even more incensed. Then he rejected association with some former debate partners like Jordan Peterson, publicly saying that they'd gone off the deep end during the Trump years, and during Covid, and that made the right even angrier.

But the Left doesn't like him, either. While attacking religion post-9/11, he paid special attention to Islam, and how the specific tenets and beliefs of a religion or religious person can lead to increased suffering. This got people like Glenn Greenwald and Sam Seder quite angry, because they thought it supported endless war in the Middle East. More recently, as I mentioned, Sam debated Jordan Peterson about religion, and because his relationship with him during the debates was friendly, people lumped them together. Sam has also rejected most of the talking points of the social justice Left, and was labeled racist when he interviewed Charles Murray, the author of The Bell Curve, popularly believed to be a text that supports racism. Though he is no further right on race than someone like John McWhorter, who is fairly center-left politically, this label has stuck in some circles, especially after Ezra Klein debated him.

Most of his time, though, is spent talking about consciousness, the self, free will, meditation, charitable giving, and other middle of the road topics.

3

chrispd01 t1_j5hakn2 wrote

I have no idea where the Stephen came from - some auto-complete. Thanks for this. Very thorough and appreciated.

5

palsh7 OP t1_j5ias7x wrote

>very thorough and appreciated

Someone downvoted it. LOL.

3

chrispd01 t1_j5ic2kw wrote

Welcome to Reddit. Where no honest effort goes unpunished ….

3

palsh7 OP t1_j5icc2m wrote

This entire post was at 0 for like the first five hours or so. I was pleasantly surprised to see it break through. Didn’t think it would even be visible.

2

chrispd01 t1_j5idvzc wrote

I just really like Nussbaum. She is such a great reader and writer .. I need to figure out how to access this interview

2

hammersickle0217 t1_j5fncza wrote

We aren’t allowed to talk about it. See all the deleted comments? The short version is that he has paper degrees and is intellectually dishonest. Very little critical thinking.

−3

gardsy26 t1_j5fusu3 wrote

Please. It's because no one can provide a coherent credible criticism of him

Why is he intellectually dishonest?

5

hammersickle0217 t1_j5fv81z wrote

Tried that. It gets deleted.

1

gardsy26 t1_j5fvgjk wrote

DM the criticism so I can understand.

1

Tinac4 t1_j5j2lfa wrote

Unless unddit missed something, your removed comment was was “Obligatory down vote, for Sam.” and nothing else. What makes you think that the mods removed your comment because it criticized Harris, and not because it violated commenting rules 1 and 2?

1