Chomsky’s Approch to Philosophical Inquiry

May 30th, 2024

 

 

 

AUDIO OF THE TEXT

 

By Noam’s approach to philosophical inquiry I have in mind those meta-philosophical conceptual distinctions that appear very often in his technical work and; play a crucial part in presentation and I believe more so in his analysis. For Noam, like many analytic philosophers there is no clear distinction between science and philosophy – because philosophy has no independent domain of inquiry where specific puzzles and problems can be solved by internally developed tools for gaining substantial understanding or insight. What is called ‘philosophy’ now a days is a second order inquiry, i.e. more reflexive parts of (to a large part natural) sciences1. This is distinct from what Katz’ called traditional view of philosophy, of say, Thomas Nagel, who held that philosophy can tell us something about a-priori truths2. Further, Noam’s naturalistic view of philosophy is methodological – that is, that the way for acquiring knowledge about the natural world is through method of scientific inquiry – naturalistic theory creation (not any set of procedures but the social and intellectual practice), this is distinct from Quine’s epistemic naturalism which limits the acquisition of knowledge about the natural world through scientific means in the already existing categories of physical entities – primarily entities of physics.

Broadly, Noam’s categorization of philosophical issues fall under three categories: 1. common-sense 2. theoretical problems and, 3. Pseudo-theoretical problems. Of the three, the third class of issues are mostly incomprehensible and not genuine issues in there existing form. And only fruitful and relevant inquiry can be either common-sense or natural scientific and theoretic in nature. Below, I will first discuss what are common-sense issues followed by natural scientific issues and then briefly talk abut the third category.

1. Common-sense and Oxford Philosophy.

There are a set of issues in that revolve around confusion from how certain words are used. For ex. What “is it like to be” a bat? Can computers “think”? Is “water” H2O? And many more. For Noam, like the oxford linguistic philosophers – to understand what these words and phrases mean is to look at how they are used. Strawson for example noted that “to refer” is something people do, it is an act.3 And to understand how particular linguistic unit is used in action we need to understand how we use them. We use the phrase “is like a”, among other things, to point to some resembling properties; we use “think” when talking about humans and maybe some animals, not organs like brain.

So, there is a category of philosophical questions that are not real questions about natural world but rise from the confused usage of phrases and terms.

The internal-meaning of these words and phrases acquired in natural course of language acquisition and interaction with the outside world have the following properties:

1. are reasonably assumed to be innate (in the Cartesian sense, as dispositional);

2. are anthropocentric (primarily human interest- and action-related);

3. are rich and (so far) undefined, although (in principle) targets of the naturalistic theory of mind (including growth);

4. are flexibly used in various ways and applied (in metaphor, for example) in a diverse set of circumstances, invite creativity, appear to be domain-general; and

5. are constitutive of an understanding of ‘our’ world, which is the world of everyday practical affairs.”4

The problems about phrases and terms can be meaningfully asked when these are constructed within part of explanatory framework – a scientific account and programme. Hence, the way Putnam dealt with the problem of “meaning” is incomprehensible because there is no explanatory framework where this term is used but questions about Davidsonian semantics programme can be asked more fruitfully and are a function of programmes research and explanatory vitality. This leads us to the second class of issues5.

2. Theoretical Problems.

To understand this set of problems let us recall that Noam is primarily a natural scientist – a researcher who is studying the properties of a “mental organ” within a biolinguistic framework6. This fact in light of his believe about the role of philosophy tells us that Noam’s primary concerns lies in this category of problems, which are the more reflective aspects of biolinguistic naturalistic inquiry. In these issues most of his convictions are drawn from history of scientific practice and ideas. Noam follows Lakatos’ framework and sees the practice of Kuhnian normal science as a competition and comparison of research programmes. For most of his academic life this has been a criticism of empiricist and behaviorist programmes. (But also structuralist and technology based explanatory efforts.) Lakatos notes that “the basic unit of appraisal must be not an isolated theory or conjunction of theories but rather a ‘research programme’, with a conventionally accepted (and thus by provisional decision’ irrefutable’) ‘hard core’ and with a ‘positive heuristic’ which defines problems, outlines the construction of a belt of auxiliary hypotheses, foresees anomalies and turns them victoriously into examples, all according to a preconceived plan.”7

Lakatos’ programme comparisons bring Kuhn’s evaluation phase of competing paradigmatic theories into normal science practice. Based on the choice criterion, which the initiated researchers acquires in the course of her training she conducts rational evaluation for justification of a programme. The choice of a research progamme is under-determined by all the facts, which cannot lead a researcher by logic to the correct way of puzzle and problem solving in a domain and no one correct explanatory account. These choices are determined by non-empirical considerations. As the programmes are not empirically equivalent, that is that the relevant evidence for the particular programme’s scope is not shared. What might be within scope of one descriptive and explanatory enterprise might not enter into the other, making their points of contact with nature distinct. The programmes are then judged on other merits: “These five characteristics—accuracy, consistency, scope, simplicity, and fruitfulness—are all standard criteria for evaluating the adequacy of a [programme]. If they had not been, I would have devoted far more space to them in my book, for I agree entirely with the traditional view that they play a vital role when scientists must choose between [programmes]. Together with others of much the same sort, they provide the shared basis for [programme] choice.”8

2.1. Methodological Assumptions and Questions

Generally speaking, methodological issues are those that arise out of particular commitments that dictate nature of descriptive and explanatory features of a given programme. These commitments cannot be judged on empirical bases. The above mentioned five values and other like them guide the rational deliberation on these issues. While the eventual degradation of programme might be a logical consequence of its internal features, a researcher in the normal course of work has to justify the work based on such criterion.

In case of biolinguistics, Noam holds that the explanatory goal of the enterprise must be what the human person acquires, how this is structured and how it grows and so enables linguistic performance of a competent person. And for this enterprise to be consistent with related successful programmes it must been treated as part of biology and proceed on similar lines. To not do so as a doctrine, is a form of dualism that treats study of mind-brain distinct from study of rest of human biology9 Like biologists, Noam hold that genetics provides for development of specific organs, with specific properties and structures and function within the whole organism. That matures and works according to internal rules, laws of nature and external stimulus. Like natural scientists he believes that idealizations and generalizations with considerations of formalization (in terms of mathematics that captures the nature of system under study10) are essential, as the goal of a scientist is not to explain the phenomenon, but to develop theories that explains underlying principles of nature11. These and other methodological features shape his explanatory and descriptive enterprise.

These are distinct from behaviorist and empiricist dualist-methodological commitments, in that they postulate powerful general learning mechanism and possibility of boundless learning – for example infinitely varied and all kinds of associations and grammars. Unlike any known features in the biological world. Its explanatory accounts then, restricts itself to set of inputs and observable behaviors – and does not postulate specific internal mechanisms – other then the above mentioned general learning mechanism (like conditioning, associationism etc) contra, the genetically given specific systems. They therefore tend to be externalist and statistical in their explanatory goals and choice of descriptive terms – making the enterprise less adequate on these counts and also on count of external consistency.

This distinction is not clearly demarcated. Methodological commitments do have some empirical bases – the choice of what are the relevant one and their imports to explanatory goals and description restriction are value driven. Biolinguistics is based on the empirical consensus that humans are biological systems and that the genetic and evolutionary developmental programmes have been largely successful.

2.2 Empirical Assumptions and Questions

Empirical assumptions are the concrete descriptive claims about state of things (that such and such is the case, say a mechanism) within any programme.. These claims can in principle be fleshed out for empirical testing within the programmes assumptions and therefore can be empirically substantiated. And the results evaluated on rational grounds – usually not affecting the more established or entrenched ‘hard core’ parts. This could explain why Noam has focused his criticism more on methodological grounds and not on empirical ones, as these can be easily defended as minor anomalies if the methodological assumptions are taken for granted. This is seen by many as a radical idea that paradigms cannot be criticized or defended primarily on empirical grounds but, acceptable to anyone who has studied any period of scientific history.

Empirical assumptions, of say particular mechanism of learning etc, can be judged in principle on the bases of descriptive and explanatory adequacy of a particular instantiation of mechanism under question, and of the feasibility of such mechanism in explaining the relevant phenomenon12. It goes without saying that all of this is done keeping in mind the relevant evaluations of associated studies within parameters of both (or more) paradigms.

2.2.1. Substantial and Insubstantial Empirical Assumptions:

Compared to methodological commitments, researchers are more flexible in giving up particular empirical assumptions about particular the state of things. This happens when test(s), thought experiments or reflection within the programmes’ parameters repeatedly suggest otherwise, and this might leave the programme largely intact based on other internal factors.

Insubstantial empirical assumptions of a programme are those state of things claims that allow easy reformulation of these claims into substantial empirical assumption and claims of another contending programme, leaving only the differing terminological and descriptive and explanatory choices of the first program intact. When Quine grants possibility of “innate structures of yet unknown characteristics” and “quality space” in acquisition of knowledge this is vague enough in a particular way to be reformulated as a nativist theory of knowledge acquisition13. When core empirical assumptions have become insubstantial, it looses much of its power. This combined with external inconsistencies, descriptive inadequacies of postulated mechanism,s and their non-feasibility further weakens a programme.

Substantial empirical assumptions are those that do not allow such reformulation of a particular empirical claim and are thus substantially distinct. Hume’s theory of acquisition of knowledge for example details the mechanism of primary and, secondary impressions forming faded impressions that associate by specific rules; is an empirical assumption. Goodman while studying induction also maintained substantial distinction and this lead him to absurd results14.

3. Mind-Body Problem as Methodological Assumption of a Failed Programme.

We can now look, albeit only superficially and briefly, at how Noam’s views on the mind-body problem can be seen within this schematic.

What was the mind-body problem? Emphasizing the historicity of Descartes Mind-Body distinction, Desmond Clarke writes that “when Descartes wrote about matter, the matter in question was a theoretical construct of Cartesian natural philosophy. Whatever corpus or materia may have meant in that system, these terms certainly did not mean the same as ‘matter’ today.” And that his mind-body distinction is not “conceptually isomorphic with what is now called the mind-body problem”.15

Descartes and his contemporary “physical scientists assumed that the universe was composed of microscopic corpuscles and that all natural phenomena could be explained in terms of corpuscular shape, size, motion, and interaction. That nest of commitments proved to be both metaphysical and methodological. As metaphysical, it told scientists what sorts of entities the universe did and did not contain: there was only shaped matter in motion. As methodological, it told them what ultimate laws and fundamental explanations must be like: laws must specify corpuscular motion and interaction, and explanation must reduce any given natural phenomenon to corpuscular action under these laws.”16

But there are features of the world, Descartes noted, namely of intellect and of willed action – broadly the mental substance or things, that do not allow themselves to be formulated in the corpuscular mechanical framework. This led “Descartes to think of the scope of the material as being co-extensive with those natural phenomena for which we can, at least in principle, provide a scientific explanation, and to classify whatever lies outside the scope of the latter as ‘immaterial’. It may be that mental phenomena are immaterial in both senses.”17

Then, for Descartes, the Mind-Body problem was a problem of explanatory gap while assuming the adequacy of the given methodological commitment. But after Principia was gradually accepted and corpuscularism gave way to an explanatory account that could include new and ever increasing variety of explanations and entities. After the shift from a rigid to relaxed methodological commitment there was no longer “material” things or substance from which immaterial things could be compared and with the collapse of the “material” there was no gap to be closed. Rather there were all sorts of things in the world – electrical things, chemical things, mental things, etc. The study of how one sort of things interact with other became regular part of scientific effort in mature areas for assimilation and integration.

4 Pseudo-Theoretical Issues & Other Pseudo-Problems.

A large part of writing in philosophy journals does not appear to be formal inquiries in logic or anything like critical programmes appraisal that Chomsky engages in. But if they are not doing this, any historical work or clarification of pseudo-problems, then what are they engaged in? For example, many thinker still write about mind-body problem devoid of any historicity and without any roots in natural sciences. This exercise, since the gradual decline in support of naturalism among some philosophers, tacitly assumes metaphysical inquiries outside the bounds of natural science. But a major lesson from Descartes to Newton chapter in history was that a priori speculation devoid of naturalistic research is not fruitful. What kinds of mechanisms and entities there are in the world is described by best available theories.

Two kinds of a-priori question especially make no sense to Chomsky: those about ontology and realism. And, Chomsky’s approach to ontological issues is almost identical with Carnap’s:

“This voluntarist orientation remained fundamental. The notion that something beyond the scope of science might actually be the case seemed to Carnap a back door to the readmission of traditional prejudices and conformities of all kinds. Certainly we need to make assumptions, he acknowledged, but we can decide on these, and spell them out; they are not “out there” for us to find. On these grounds he deprecated Quine’s preoccupation with ontology. It makes no sense to talk about “what there is,” Carnap said, without specifying the language framework in which this is asserted; any such claim can only be understood or judged relative to a framework. It makes perfectly good sense to ask, within a framework that includes, say, the Zermelo-Frankel axioms for set theory, whether there are infinite numbers. Such “internal” questions have determinate answers. But it makes no sense, outside such a framework, to ask “just in general” whether “there are” infinite numbers. Not only is there no determinate answer, but there is no way to give such an “external” question itself any clear meaning.”18

Same remarks and in similar terminology can be found in Noam’s interviews and writings. Another kind of question that Noam believes is meaningless is to ask in general is whether such and such thing is real? Things are real within or are crucial part of a ‘language framework’ (borrowing Carnap’s terminology) depending on the choice of ‘language framework’. That is to say, things exists in various senses. For example, Sherlock’s hat is real in the fictional universe, so when we choose to talk about things in Conan Doyle’s book, the hat exists, if we talk about economical things “the economic crisis in Pakistan” is a real thing, in language framework where we are talking about how the natural world works, the things in our best available theories exists. We can only ask whether a thing is real if we are clear about in what sense and ‘language framework’ are we talking about and does that framework has this entity in it.

This view in Chomsky probably has some connections with pragmatism of later Carnap and Frege’s theory of sense. And also the relation between the philosophical attitude associated with this name and the aspects of language use within a community named pragmatism by Mead and Charles Morris. But I cannot proceed in that direction at the moment.

5. Conclusion.

A schematic can only help navigate and guide us in our search but not do the hard work of clear thinking for us. And this schematism I believes gives a clear enough picture to better navigate Noam’s philosophical writings. Noam philosophical project is influenced by Carnap’s scientific philosophy and is a peculiar kind of therapeutic work. These can most visibly be seen in his criticism of behaviorism, which at first was motivated theoretically but as the Cold War took hold of the social sciences and intellectuals were eager in assisting in the task of social management, also for moral and political reasons. The image of human nature behaviorism and empiricism presents and justifies is unacceptable to Noam and to every person who values individual deliberation, choice and liberty. As a substantive thesis, these ideas show tendency to be against the free development of capacities and diminish the role of rational common sense of judgment and creative capacities and justify control – managerial, technocratic, statist, corporate, patriarchal, casteist and other. Humans for Noam and other libertarian socialists are not bound, are undetermined, and seek creative and experimental initiatives taking form of infinite possibilities without coercive in a free associative society. In social writings too similar schema can be found that might shed light on meta-philosophical, moral and practical consideration of Noam Chomsky that I believe are of considerable value in time of multiple and extreme global crisis.

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Footnotes:

1Interview with Ludlow, “Science is metaphysics, trying to understand how the world works”. And section about Kant and philosophy as reflective science at https://youtu.be/6N8HYdAuUZs .

2Katz – Rational Realism.

3P. F. Strawson, ‘On Referring’, Mind, New Series, Vol. 59, No. 235 (Jul., 1950), pp. 320-344. Stable URL: http://www.jstor.org/stable/2251176 .

4James McGilvray, Chomsky 2nd edition

5Interview with Ludlow

6C. R. Gallistel, ‘Learning Organs’.

7Lakatos – Methodology of scientific programmes.

8Kuhn, ‘Objectivity, Value Judgment, and Theory Choice’. I have replaces phrases about theory choice with those about programme choice.

9Noam Chomsky – Naturalism and Dualism in Study of Language and Mind.

10Turing-Post machines and recursion theory etc.

11I.B. Cohen – Newtonian Revolution.

12Chomsky, Noam, SOME EMPIRICAL ASSUMPTIONS IN MODERN PHILOSOPHY OF LANGUAGE, Philosophy, Science, Method -Essays in Honor or Ernest Nagel.

13Chomsky, Noam. Problems of Knowledge and Freedom: The Russell Lectures,

14Ibid.

15Clarke, Descartes’ Theory of Mind

16Kuhn, Structure.

17Clarke, Descartes’ Theory of Mind

18A.W, Carus, ‘Carnap’s intellectual development’ in Cambridge Companion to Carnap.

Would Carnap have tolerated modern metaphysics?

March 28th, 2024

Cohen, W.A; Marschall, B. Would Carnap have tolerated modern metaphysics? The Monist, 106 (2023), pp 326-341.

The paper describes two phases of Carnap’s criticism of “metaphysics”. The first meaning-theoretic critique rested on the inability of certain natural language grammatical forms to correctly map to the logical forms (for example where the logical form ¬∃(x)R(x) can be in the natural language grammatical form R(x).) Then such natural language statements are meaningless. The second “value-based” phase, forced by the appearance of certain logical languages that could in fact map many such grammatical forms, was based on the “principle of tolerance” for all such logical languages but demanded that they clearly state their syntactic rules and that frameworks be valuable for practical inquiry. Those frameworks or languages that do not state their syntactic rules clearly or whose value is dubious are to be less valued and possibly meaningless.

The §4 seems to be wrong (at least quite weak) in its emphasis on the value being based on practical scientific considerations. I believe this is due to a reading of the tolerance principle devoid of its general thesis. The principle was a special case for the foundations of mathematics program of his ontological neutrality. While talking of Aufbau he summed up the attitude as “my attitude was again ontologically neutral. For me, it was simply a methodological question of choosing the most suitable basis for the system to be constructed, either a phenomenalistic or a physicalistic basis. The ontological theses of the traditional doctrines of either phenomenalism or materialism remained for me entirely out of consideration… in the Aufbau I merely refrained from taking sides; I added that, if one proceeds from the discussion of language forms to that of the corresponding metaphysical theses about the reality or unreality of some kind of entities, he steps beyond the bounds of science.” There can be no metaphysics beyond the bounds of sciences, ontological questions are to be answered by our best theories and only meaningful questions are of methodology and epistemology not ontology.

This principle can possibly be used to test whether Carnap would have tolerated contemporary mereology or not. My own partially articulated opinion is that the problem of meaningless metaphysics can be best understood through informal logic principle of sense-domains consistency1. Asking whether a discussion is within a single sense-domain or not. Where a sense-domain is the sets of predicates and constants that are implied by using the particular term in a particular sense (either one of several possible natural language senses or any theoretic sense). If the discussion switches domains without clarification or uses predicates and constants inconsistent with the sense in that particular domain then the discussion risks becoming non-sense. One assumption in this theory is that there is no sense of the terms in isolation that are also not natural language commonsense.

Perhaps what I am getting at through sense-domain principle is only a way of avoiding semantic ambiguities. Similarly, there are ways of avoiding syntactic ambiguities in natural languages. But maybe what some people assume Carnap to be saying is that certain kinds of inquiries are necessarily ambiguous because they are contentless or/and meaningless. And this can somehow be shown by logical or epistemic analysis. But both the critiques Carnap offered were inquiry general. His later criticism of ontology was perpahs methodological and based on the value and success of non-ontological inquiries and the fruitlessness of ontological ones.

 

1This is not a “theory” in naturalistic sense because argumentation and language-use for inquiry is a human action and without a theory of human action a theory of argumentation in this sense is impossible. But to the extent the goals and intention of the person engaged in argumentation is insight though clear exchange then some principles for clear discussions can be sketched out. Sense-domain principle being one such proposal.

 

 

Quick review of “Determined” by Robert Sapolsky

March 11th, 2024

I intended to write a critique of Sapolsky’s method for the study of human behavior in his last two books but after reading a couple of chapters from both I did not think it worthwhile for the following reasons: his writings are filled with anecdotes, thought experiments whose explanatory connection remains dubious. he uses terms like “decision”, “intent” etc in peculiar ways to draw one unclear conclusion after the other. For example, “You view a picture of someone holding an object, for a fraction of a second; you must decide whether it was a cell phone or a handgun.” We don’t “decide” how we interpret our impressions in any meaningful sense of this word. If it is an intense situation, where the capacity to deliberate is subdued by other needs but that is not how we live day to day – there is a rush, tiredness, and biases; that might inform initial impressions. But as soon as the impressions are conscious, the faculty and capacity of deliberation can review the impression.

And he does not answer any of the classical objections against determinism. So, instead after a brief criticism of his political program, I will point out some classical positions on free will on which Sapolsky has written 700+ pages and those he failed to acknowledge and address.

What little I could gather about his political and social program is the following.  Based on “Hierarchies, Obedience, and Resistance” in his previous book Behave and the first two chapters of Determined. Based on these two conclusions can be clearly seen in his writings:

  1. Human individuals have natural inequalities and they are reflected in the natural hierarchies of human societies. These hierarchies if led by people who are not concerned about the “common good” (“bad apples”) can be harmful and if people or groups are concerned with the “common good” (“good apples”) then they can be good. Sometimes people subordinated in the hierarchy can “resist” and new “heroes” can emerge, creating new and different hierarchies. He writes that “like other hierarchical species, we have alpha individuals, but unlike most others, we occasionally get to choose them. Moreover, they often are not merely highest ranking but also “lead,” attempting to maximize this thing called the common good.”
  2. People lack deliberation (and hence reasons) and have no real control over what they do and hence over the world, so it is not a problem if they live in hierarchies, they are in fact necessary for their survival. [The whole of the latest book]

Human dignity and freedom lie in our capacity to be undetermined, and free to act on rational grounds, and any restriction on our deliberative capacities is unjust. These enlightenment and libertarian ideas cannot be formulated in Sapolsky’s behaviorist worldview. In fact, this is what he is trying to resist. Sapolsky loses objectivity in a social inquiry by pretending to be neutral or fooling himself into believing that he actually is (perhaps because he was determined to do so) when he is defending a particular view of human nature and justification for command societies where intense “learning” programs will be required for possibly gaining correct morality, under the garbs of science. Because theologies and ideologies are old-fashioned nowadays, scientific jargon with no substance sells. Maybe I am being unfair and this is just his thesis presented in the culture of debate and deliberation. [He writes: “Thus, a lot of people have linked emergence and free will; I will not consider most of them because, to be frank, I can’t understand what they’re suggesting, and to be franker, I don’t think the lack of comprehension is entirely my fault.” emphasis added] But the point remains the same with or without his “intent”.

In Determined, he argues in favor of a strong determinism. Where we have no room for free will.

Experience of freedom of choice is perhaps more intensely felt than perceptual experience. You can stop reading this right now – you do have that choice, and you can act on it or not. We can try to study this capacity and the “faculty of choice” in Descartes’ phrase as a feature of the mind/brain, as a particular part of nature we are yet to learn about – and may or may not succeed. Or we can say this experience is an illusion and we do not have any choice. Sapolsky begins the book talking about William James, but I guess he did not consider his views on this issue for the same reasons he left out other thinkers. James noted that “the arguments I am about to urge all proceed on two suppositions: first, when we make theories about the world and discuss them with one another, we do so in order to attain a conception of things which shall give us subjective satisfaction; and, second, if there be two conceptions, and the one seems to us, on the whole, more rational than the other, we are entitled to suppose that the more rational one is the truer of the two.” James then notes if determinism were true then why is the proponent of determinism engaging in rational argument about the soundness of their claims. Is she compelled to do it and reader not free to judge the claim to be more or less truer? This picture and also the picture of not trusting our most immediate experience have no rational grounds be considered correct.

 

 

Review of: ‘Global Warming In India: Science, Impacts and Politics’, Nagaraj Adve, Eklavya, 2022.

March 4th, 2024

[Published in November 2022, volume 46, No 11 of The Book Review India]

Nagaraj Adve’s Global Warming In India is a brief and practical guide that enables the reader to engage with the discussions, debates and actions about the most pressing social and moral issue before our generation. It is written with a sense of hope and compassion for the “ordinary people” that is largely missing in similar and popular books, which tend to focus more on the specialist and technocratic solutions handed over from above and to which most of us are expected to assent to and participate merely as a consumer or observer. The first chapter about the science of global warming is presented without unnecessary jargons and covers all the concepts necessary to clearly grasp the phenomenon. But where this books differs the most from other popular climate change books is in Chapter 2 where the author identifies the “systematic drivers” of the crisis.

The root cause of climate change is capitalism’s DNA, argues Nagaraj. A society which organizes its most important tasks and goals around the maximization of profits cannot address the needs of the ecosystems or its poor and working people. It produces more and more goods by degrading quality of work and the environment through cost cuttings in pollution prevention and casualizing jobs. Lets recount two (out of many) recent incidents that support this claim. One day after Putin invaded Ukraine the LNG Allies a oil and gas lobbying association wrote an open letter to Joe Biden asking him to expand the fossil fuel infrastructure to fill the export gap in Europe created by the war and also by the sanctions against Russia1. And as a result new gas and oil pipelines have been sanctioned along with $300 million in funding by the US government for the new fossil fuel infrastructure.2 And in India, the Economic Times reported that, “Russia’s invasion of Ukraine has opened arbitrage opportunities so enticing that Reliance Industries Ltd deferred maintenance work at the world’s biggest oil refining complex to churn out more diesel and naphtha after prices surged.”3

It is often claimed that it is taking us so much time to switch from fossil fuels to greener sources of energy because of all the inertia built in from previous decades of planning. But as these cases illustrate the cause of delay is not only past inertia but active investment and development for more fossil fuel dependence in present and for future.

Also, related to this is the Indian government’s policy positions on climate change. The Indian NDCs for the Paris Agreement almost entirely depend on reducing the share of fossil fuel in the energy mix. Nagaraj addresses with the deficiency of such approach in the later chapters. He points out that for actual and meaningful reduction of greenhouse gas emissions the fossil fuels must drop in absolute terms. But this demand is rejected by the Indian government and also by much of the liberal and left critics and environmentalist. They object that why should India, a “developing” nation give up on its opportunity “to grow” for mitigating a crisis created by the richer nations? One answer is being provided by the leaders of the most venerable and island nations. They have been repeatedly saying that India and China are among the top emitters and emerging economies and “while they (India and China) develop; we die; and why should we accept this?”4 The self-image of India created by the Indian intellectuals is very self serving, shifting from a “powerful” nation to “developing poor” nation as the needs of the business and political elites demand. India is the third biggest emitter of greenhouse gases and when it claims its right to more “carbon space” to develop at the cost of islands and coastal communities then, how different is the notion of “carbon space” from Nazi “living space”?

Moreover, as Nagaraj distinctly points out the policies that lead to climate crisis have also led to unparalleled inequality both globally and in India. The NCRB 2021 report reveals that in 2021, 1,64,033 people committed suicide in India, including 5 daily wage earners every hour.5 While, “during the pandemic (since March 2020, through to November 30th, 2021) the wealth of billionaires increased from INR 23.14 lakh crore (USD 313 billion) to INR 53.16 lakh crore (USD 719 billion). More than 4.6 crore Indians meanwhile are estimated to have fallen into extreme poverty in 2020 (nearly half of the global new poor according to the United Nations.) The stark wealth inequality in India is a result of an economic system rigged in favour of the super-rich over the poor and marginalised.”6 So how justified can a business as usual let-India-develop position be when only development seems to be of the top 1% and top 10% of Indians.

The final chapter on solution is filled with thought provoking ideas that are just the right balance of specific and general to help come up with concrete plans while allowing creativity and local needs to be assimilated. But, the solutions have to acknowledge and recognize the faces and the forces responsible for the economic and climate crisis: the billionaires and their corporations.

This book is an essential reading for anyone who wants to make sense of the changes taking place before us and to be a positive part of it.

1https://lngallies.com/energy-security/

2‘How the gas industry used the Ukraine war to secure new fossil fuel infrastructure’ Bulletin of the Atomic Scientists.

3‘Billionaire Mukesh Ambani’s refinery makes millions from war windfall’ Economic Times, May 09 2022

4Quoted in Karin Bäckstrand, Ole Elgström (2013) ‘The EU’s role in climate change negotiations: from leader to ‘leadiator’, Journal of European Public Policy, 20:10, 1369-1386, DOI:10.1080/13501763.2013.781781

5https://frontline.thehindu.com/social-issues/ncrb-2021-report-dying-young-and-jobless-in-india/article65894493.ece

6https://www.oxfamindia.org/press-release/inequality-kills-india-supplement-2022

A source of BJP power.

April 21st, 2022

PART I.

जैसे जैसे इस देश में चीजें और ज्यादा घिनौनी और वेह्शियना होती जा रही हैं, इस घिनोने समाज और राजनीति के पीछे की कुछ सचाई बाहरी रूप के पीछे छुपती जा रही हैं. यह की, 2014 में बीजेपी के जीतने का एक बड़ा कारन (शायद सबसे बड़ा काऱण) बड़े उतयोगपति और अरबपति वर्ग की फंडिंग, और उनके न्यूज़ नेटवर्क का बीजेपी को समर्थन था.

यह की, इस उद्योगपति और अरबपति वर्ग को कुश रख कर ही यह पार्टी ताकत बनाए हुए है. अरबपतियों और बड़े उद्योगों के लिए टैक्स माफ़ी, ‘इज़ ऑफ़ डूइंग बिसनेस्स’ के नाम पर कानून खोखले करना, मजदूर वर्ग की बची कुछ ताकत को भी कुचल देने वाले नए श्रम कानून लागु करना, वगेरा वगेरा।

यह अरबपति वर्ग और बीजेपी की सांठगांठ के आलावा हिंदुत्व संगठनो और अरबपति वर्ग का एक और आम उदेश है: माइनॉरिटी और गरीबों के लिए बानी पोलिसिओं को हटाना, ताकि सरकार की जगह कम्पनिया ले सकें मुनाफे के लिए. जब हिंदुत्व संगठन नेहरू पर कीचड़ उछालते है तब वो इस देश के अरबपति वर्ग को बड़ी ख़ुशी देता है, क्यंकि वो कीचड एक ऐसी आर्थिक विवस्था जो गैर-बराबरी काम करने की कोशिश करती है और कंपनियों पर सामाजिक न्याय के चलते कुछ रोक लगाती है, उस विचार पर भी वो कीचड़ गिरती है.

हम संविधान को चाहे कितनी भी बार सीधा पढ़ लें या उल्टा करके, ये पैसे और राजनैतिक ताकत की सचाई है, जिसको आज की उथल-पुथल में याद रखना ज़रूरी है. जबतक अरबपति वर्ग को ये सरकार खुश रखेगी, उनको और अमीर बनाती रहेगी, और ताकत देती रहेगी, और लोगों को आर्थिक मुद्दों से दूर रखेगी, तब तक इसका ही राज रहेगा.

यह भी सच है की यह इस्थिति बनी ही इस्सलिये थी क्योंकि जादातर मुद्दे जो काम करने वाले वर्ग के जीवन पर असर डालते है उन् पर बात करना बंद कर दी गई थी, क्योंकि वो कंपनियों को, उनके न्यूज़ चैनल्स को पसंद नहीं. तो ऐसे में ये कोई चौकाने वाली बात नहीं है की जब सारी राजनैतिक पार्टिया जनता को आर्थिक मुद्दे से दूर रखना चाहती है थो पेचान की राजनीति में सबसे कट्टर पहचान की राजनीति करने वाली पार्टी की सबसे आगे रहेगी.

कश्मीर फाइल्स & लिबरल

March 20th, 2022
कश्मीर फाइल्स की रिलीज से जो भारत के समाज की – खासकर हिन्दू समाज के कुछ वर्गों की – जो नफरत सामने आ रही है वो आज नहीं पैदा हुई है. ना ही वो 2014 में पैदा हुई. 2017 के एक नेशनल सर्वे में सिर्फ 8% भारतियों ने यह कहा था की कश्मीर में मिलिट्री ज़ोर का इस्तेमाल कम किया जाना चाहिए, और लगभग 70% भारतियों ने कहाँ था की भारत की सेना को और ज़ादा बल और हिंसा का इस्तेमाल करना चाहिए. ये पुलवामा के पहले और बुरहान वानी की मौत के 2 साल बाद की बात है – जब भारत की सेना पेलेट गन का इस्तेमाल आम जनता पर कर रही थी. याद रखने वाली बात है की पेलेट गन का इस्तेमाल 2010 से कांग्रेस सर्कार द्वारा शुरू करा गया था.
उस ही सर्वे में ये भी पता चला की भारत के लोगो से जब पूछा गया की देश को बेहतर बनाने में कोनसे संसथान का सबसे ज़ादा योगदान है तो कोर्ट, पुलिस, सर्कार, एन.जी.ओ अदि से काफी ऊपर मिलिट्री अति है. हिंसा, मिलिटरीवाद, और कश्मीर के लोगो से दुरी और कई लोगो की नफरत आज की बात नहीं है और इसकी जड़ हिन्दुत्बा से गहरी जाती है – बल्कि “लिबरल” लोगो में भी आसानी से मिल जाती है.
क्यों 1990 से 2014 के बीच “लिबरल” भारत के और लोगों के बीच मिलिट्री और कश्मीर में हिंसा के बारे में लोगो की चेतना में बदलाव नहीं ला सके? क्या पता आने वाले दिनों में भी आम लोगो के बीच इन मुददों पर संघटित तरीके से लोगों की चेतना बदलने का काम कर पाएंगे या नहीं.
जादातर लोगों की सामाजिक चेतना लेक्चर हॉल और सेमिनार में नहीं बनती – जहाँ पहले से पढ़े लिखे और शोध में समय दे सकने वाले लोग आते हैं. रोज़मर्रा के सघर्षो, यूनियन गतिविधियों और कुछ गैर राजनैतिक प्लेटफॉर्म्स में ही लोगो के साथ इन मुददों पर समज विकसित करने का काम किया जा सकता है. जो की वो सभी लोग, जो समाज में गैरबराबरी और हिंसा का राज चाहते है, बखूबी कर रहे है.
नए इंस्टाग्राम लेफ़्टिस्ट्स में से कई लोगों का तो ये मानना है की जो लोग दुनिया में उनके जैसी सोच ले कर नहीं गिरे वो सब उनके दुश्मन है. जिसका मतलब जादातर मजदूर वर्ग भी क्यंकि उनमे से कुछ लोग भगवा स्कार्फ़ और माथे पर टिका लगा कर घूमने लगे है. जबकि ये दोनों बर्ताव एक ही सिक्के के दो पहलु है – अपने आप को एक नैतिक दृष्टि के गुट के हिस्से के रूप में दिखाना. जबतक हम इन लोगो से बात नहीं करेंगे और इनको अपना हिस्सा नहीं मानेंगे तबतक इस्थिति सिर्फ बत्तर होनी है.

Indian missile drops accidentally in Pakistan

March 13th, 2022
I wonder how Indian media and establishment would have reacted if a Pakistani super-sonic cruise missile would have entered Indian airspace and landed in Haryana. (To the best of my knowledge Pakistan has none.)
Most likely this was a BrahMos cruise missile first tested in 2020 in Andamans. This is a ‘fire-and-forget’ missile that cannot be launched without locking in on a fixed target. Which raises the question of why was a missile locked in on Pakistan during peacetime?
And even if there is no wish to escalate tensions on either side this incident should remind us that at the end of the day these killing machines are Machines that fail. And if this happens in a time of escalated tensions on the border or diplomatically the results would definitely be catastrophic for all.
This incident should make us demand demilitarization, resuming peace talks with Pakistan, and at least demilitarization of Kashmir – the first step towards a peaceful solution.

अरबपति वर्ग की तरफ से भारत को नए साल की शुभकामनाएँ

January 4th, 2022

पिछले हफ्ते कुछ अखबारों ने बड़ी खुशी से ये खबर दी की भारत में डॉलर अरबपति की संख्या में बढ़ोत्तरी हुई है. 2021, का साल जो दुनियाभर के ज्यादातर लोगों के लिए एक खौफनाक वक्त था उस साल भारत में 40 नए अरबपति बने.अब इस देश में 126 डॉलर अरबपति है. इन् 126 लोगों की पूँजी मिला कर रु.55 लाख करोड़ की है. इसका मतलब है की इन 126 लोगों के पास इस देश के 80 लाख परिवारों की कुल सम्पति से ज़्यादा सम्पति है.

यह उस 2021 के आंकड़े है जिस साल इस देश में पहले कभी ना देखी गई तेजी से लोगों ने लम्बे समय नौकरी ना मिलने के बाद नौकरी खोजना ही बंद कर दिया। और यह सिर्फ कोरोना महामारी और उसके आर्थिक असर के कारन नहीं है. 2016 से लगातार इस देश में लोग नौकरी मिलने की उम्मीद छोर कर बाजार से बहार जा रहे है. जिसका एक असर यह है की भारत के ज्यादातर परिवारों में एक से अधिक सदस्य के पास रोज़गार नहीं है. 2016 में सिर्फ 34% परिवार थे जिनमे एक से ज़्यादा लोगो के पास काम था. 2021 में यह संख्या 24% हो गई है. 2020 के लॉकडाउन के दौरान यह 17% थी.

तो जिस समय इस देश के ज्यादातर परिवार भुखमरी के करीब जा रहे है उस ही समय कुछ मुट्ठी भर लोग इस देश की पूरी सम्पति अपने पास समेत रहे है.

यह 126 डॉलर अरबपति वर्ग में सबसे ऊपर है मुकेश अम्बानी. मुकेश अम्बानी ने पिछले साल हर एक मिनट रु. 2 लाख अपनी सम्पति में जोड़े. जो हम में से ज्यादातर लोगों को जोड़ने में कम से कम 2 साल लगेगा.

फेयरवर्क इंडिया की नाई रिपोर्ट के अनुसार 2021 में ज्यादातर सामान और खाना डिलीवरी वर्कर्स की आमदनी में गिरावट आई है, पेट्रोल के दाम में बढ़ोत्तरी और कंपनी के कमीशन भड़ने की वजह से.

रिपोर्ट ने यह भी बताया की हर एक डिलीवरी कंपनी अपने मजदूरों को एकजुट हो कर अपनी बात रखने से रोकने के लिए बहुत मेहनत कर रही है. उनका एक बडा मकसद यूनियन ना बनने देना है. बॉस वर्ग यह बात जानता है की एक कर्मचारी एक बड़ी कंपनी के सामने मोहताज और बेबस है.

लेकिन बॉस वर्ग और बॉस वर्ग में भी अरबपति वर्ग आपस में एकजुट है और रोज़ इस देश को लूटने की मशक्कत कर रहा है. और इसका अंजाम हम अपने आसपास की गरीबी, बेबसी और ना-उम्मीदी में देख रहे है.

गैरबराबरी से परेशानी क्या है?

December 28th, 2021

भारत में रह रहे 50% परिवारों के पास औसत तौर पर Rs.66,000 की पूंजी है – जो एक बड़ा झटका आने पर परिवार को सड़क पर ले आता है. इस देश के सबसे अमीर 10% लोगों के पास इस देश की 65% संपत्ति है – और उनमें से भी सबसे अमीर 1% लोगों के पास देश की संपत्ति का 33% हिस्सा है.

समाज की संपत्ति के बंटवारे में गैरबराबरी सिर्फ ग़रीब, मज़दूर, मध्यम वर्ग और अमीर “बोस” कॉर्पोरेट वर्ग के बीच ही नहीं है – ये जाती की बुनियाद पर भी बटी है. हाल ही में प्रकाशित एक रिपोर्ट के हिसाब से इस देश के 50% अनुसूचित जनजाति से लोग गरीबी रेखा के नीचे है, ये आंकड़ा अनुसूचित जाती के लिए 33.3% है और पिछड़ा वर्ग के लिए 27.2% है. जबकि देश की बची हुई जनसंख्या में 15.6% लोग गरीबी रेखा के नीचे है. ये साफ़ है की इस देश में अनुसूचित जनजाति और अनुसूचित जाती बेहद मार खाई हुई है उस समय जब की देश में हर जाती और धर्म के लोग गैरबराबरी और गरीबी से ग्रस्त है.

यह हकीकत के बावजूद अक्सर लोगो से सुना है की लेकिन वो मेहनत करते है तो अमीर है, वो तेज़ दिमाग है, वग़ैरा-वगेरा. इस हालात को बनाए रखने के लिए जो चीज़े हमें सिखाई गई है उन्हें दोहराते है.

लेकिन ये 10% और 1% सबसे अमीर लोग इतनी पूंजी का क्या करते है? घर में गेहूं चावल भर कर रख लेते है? फ्रिज ख़रीद लेते है? सबसे महंगी कार और हवाईजहाज खरीदने के बावजूद इस वर्ग के पैसे में कमी नहीं आती तो फिर ये पूँजी का क्या होता है?

इस सम्पति से मिलती है राजनीतिक ताकत। खरीदते है समाज के संसाधन – कॉलेज, पानी, रेलवे स्टेशन, हवाई अड्डे, बिजली उत्पाद करने वाले बिजली घर. साफ़ लफ़्ज़ों में कहें तो ये देश को खरीदते है.

आप में से अगर किसी को लोकतंत्र शब्द सुना सुना लग रहा हो तो गुज़ारिश करूँगा की सोचने की कोशिश करें की ऐसे हालात में लोकतंत्र की क्या इस्थिति हो सकती है – याद दिला दूँ की इस देश में राजनैतिक पार्टियों को कॉर्पोरेट्स बिना हिसाब पैसा दे सकते है.

यह भी याद दिला दूँ की ये 10% और 1% का वही अमीर वर्ग की है जिनकी कार और मॉल के लिए आज के शहर बने है, यह वही वर्ग है जो इस देश के कार्बन उत्सर्जन और प्रदूषण के लिए जिम्मेदार है. ये लूट है. ये खून है. ये गैरबराबरी है.

 

 

 

 

Hierarchy of Professional Ethics in Civil Engineering

December 13th, 2021

The Preamble of the ASCE Code of Ethics reads: “Members of The American Society of Civil Engineers conduct themselves with integrity and professionalism, and above all else protect and advance the health, safety, and welfare of the public through the practice of Civil Engineering.”