David Hume trumps Steven Pinker

On October 20th, Andrew Sullivan suggests "reason" leads one to support Kerry's candidacy for president. Sullivan cites two scholar that will vote for Senator Kerry.

Professor Camille Paglia tells us: "In the hope that he will restore our alliances and reduce rabid anti-Americanism in this era of terrorism when international good will and cooperation are crucial."

Professor Steven Pinker tells us: "The reason is reason: Bush uses too little of it. In the war on terror, his administration stints on loose-nuke surveillance while confiscating nail clippers and issuing color-coded duct tape advisories. His restrictions on stem cell research are incoherent, his dismissal of possible climate change inexcusable."

A simple reading of their reason reveals Paglia's choice is based on "hope," and Pinker delusionally believes he knows how Bush's mind works. Contrary to Sullivan's suggestion, their scholarly reasoning is an opinion, with no more merit than mine.

During this election cycle, Reason is battling Emotions. A month ago, Jim Hoagland, "Worldviews That Are Worlds Apart," told us: "These two candidates are night and day -- more precisely, they are emotion vs. reason, instinct vs. intellect."

Over two hundred years ago, David Hume, A Treatise of Human Nature, taught us: reason gives rise to no action.

War demands action. Alexander did not defeat Darius because he hoped or reasoned he could. Wars are not won with hope, as Paglia suggests. Wars are not won with superior reasoning, as Pinker suggests. Wars are won by steadfast, unyielding, resolute action.

The Funeral Oration, that Thucydides placed in the mouth of Pericles, is an emotional appeal to his countrymen. Shakespeare's Saint Crispen's Day speech was an emotional appeal to his army. Livy cites numerous examples when Roman generals when facing certain destruction called forth the emotions (e.g., shame, anger, or fear) of their struggling armies and their fortunes changed.

Pinker's true complaint is he would have made different choices than Bush. Pinker's complaint regarding the lack of funding to secure "loose-nukes" is reasonable. However, given the widespread moral disagreement regarding stem cell research, Pinker's assertion that Bush's policy is "incoherent" is an emotional judgment.

Perhaps, Pinker believes there should be no moral bounds placed upon scientific research; however, most people would disagree with this notion.

Pinker reveals his true partisan colors when he complains about Bush's "dismissal of possible climate change [as] inexcusable." As a scientist, that deals with precise language and incontroverible data, Pinker choses to ignore the widely known FACT that 95 Senators (including John Kerry) passed a resolution, which stipulated what the Senate would consider an acceptable treaty on global warming (S.Res.98). Due to the passage of that resolution, President Clinton did not submit this treaty for ratification, for he knew it would be rejected.

Professor J.M. Roberts, History of the World, teaches us there have been 17 to 19 periods in which the earth has heated up and cooled off. Roberts tells us elephants once grazed on grassland in north Africa, an area dessicated long before man descended from his tree to begin motoring about using his infernal combustion engine.

As Pinker well knows, the science involved with global warming is not settled. It is more than passing strange for a scientist to be as blandly unskeptical as Pinker appears to be. As Darwin said, "a good deal of skepticism in a scientific man is advisable to avoid much loss of time." Or as Isaac Asimov said, "Man's greatest asset is the unsettled mind." But Pinker is content with his notional belief.

What we have shown is Pinker's complaint, regarding "climate change," should also be directed towards Senator Kerry. Perhaps, Pinker holds fast to the notion that it is unimportant what Kerry did, it is only important what he says he would do.

Kerry famously says, "I would do almost everything differently" than Bush. However, this is mere speculation or a counterfactual statement, for we can only empirical know what Kerry has done.

For a man that claims he knows How the Mind Works, Pinker may want to re-examine his own brand of scholarly dogmatism.