Listen
Lists are always strange. Lists of 100 best novels in English that include some of the worst novels ever written – that kind of thing. They’re always strange. That list of UK public intellectuals that was then augmented by a female version, both of them including some very odd ‘intellectuals’ – movie stars, advertisers, publicists. Strange. So of course this list is strange. But all the same, I have to bleat at a couple of inclusions. Why so many clerics? The pope, al-Qaradawi, al-Sistani? Those are intellectuals? And then there’s Paglia, and Thomas Friedman. But these lists are always strange, so whatever.
So whodja vote for? I’ll tell you mine. Ayaan Hirsi Ali, Dawkins, Dennett, Hitchens, Sen. I’d already chosen them before I noticed that at least three of them have some connection with B&W. Two have articles here, another has sent email comments for quoting. But I voted before I thought of that.
Wow, that list highlights the poor quality of our public intellectuals. Or rather the generally debased state of public debate. I really can’t bring myself to vote.
I like some of Dennett’s philosophy (but it is hardly earth shattering), Singer lead me to vegetarianism (even though I think he is actually wrong in many of his positions), Dawkins had an interesting idea or two a long time ago, and I like the way he attacks woolly-thinking (but he hasn’t really come up with a whole lot of intellectual contribution recently), Kahneman’s done some interesting work (but it is hardly dazzling in its reach), and the rest I either don’t know, would violently resist them being labelled intellectuals, or simply think are wrong.
Most of these people are famour for being famous, whatever ideas they may have, and many I suspect have none, that is not why they are known. God, I feel like the whole world has been transformed into Newsnight Review – I remember why I cancelled my subscription to Prospect now, because it was like all the really bad bits of the New Statesman, the Guardian and the Observer all bound together.
There are quite a few who are famous for being famous – but perhaps that is inevitable in a list of public intellectuals. But still – I think Paglia and Friedman are terrible choices because the fame is so out of proportion to the intellectual merit.
But, since it is a list of public intellectuals, I voted partly on the basis of polemical service. Dawkins, Dennett, Sen all do good work in that line, I think.
Yeah, but I think that was what I found so distasteful – the way that it is really the public aspect, rather than the intellectual, that gets these people on the list. I mean, really, Naomi Klein, James Lovelock, Martin Rees, Craig Venter! As far as I can tell, you don’t need to be an intellectual, just have access to the comments section of a newspaper, or appear on TV a bit. What next, Julie Burchill?
Damn you PM
Julie Burchill was going to be my write-in.
Hey PM, I voted Lovelock in! (I’m unconvinced by his Gaia hypothesis, but I must say it’s a very pretty hypothesis).
Other votes were Hobsbawn, Chomsky (for his linguistics, mainly), Dawkins, Weinberg.
M.
Since there’s such an emphasis on clerics, I’m surprised that Rowan Williams didn’t get a mention. He’s staggering intelligent and not an unpopular writer.
(I don’t subscribe to the view that theists must be stupid. ;))
I voted for Rees, even though I think he is a bit of an oik, solely because he was my old supervisor’s supervisor. Academic nepotism is a fine old tradition and one I’m proud to uphold. :)
I’m just glad Paul Davies wasn’t on there.