I’ve always felt that the corus to Ok Go’s “Here It Goes Again” pretty much sums up Grad school.

Just when you think that you’re in control,
Just when you think that you’ve got a hold,
Just when you get on a roll —

Here it goes, here it goes, here it goes again.
Oh, here it goes again.
I should have known,
Should have known,
Should have known again,
But here it goes again.
Oh, here it goes again.

It helps that the song is upbeat and lighthearted; it helps to keep its exasperated but comedic tone in mind when I’m contemplating crawling into a corner and hiding there for the remainder of my existence. After all, this is all going to end at some point, no matter how frustrating it can be along the way; and when it does, I have a sneaking suspicion that on many levels I will miss it, and the absurd hilarity of learning through living. Of course, that means nothing when you’re in the thick of the shit, for as Ok Go also sings:

I guess there’s got to be a break in the monotony, but Jesus, when it rains how it pours.

What?

I would never think of John Williams and Phillip Glass as being even remotely musically related — beyond the superficial facts that they both write wordless music for movies — and yet Pandora is telling me they are. Strange.

Newton is totally Jesus: the big bad wolf of teleology.

Teleology is one of those words that scholars use that makes those unfamiliar with academia look at you with worried, confused brows. However that response doesn’t necessarily change much even when someone is quite familiar with the concept.

Teleology, simply put, is any explanatory scheme which posits, or implicitly assumes, a driving logic or force to a phenomenon that, in the long run, ensures a particular outcome. So, for example, in history we often battle “teleological interpretations,” which are viewed as ahistorical. They are viewed as such because rather than looking at the evidence as is, a teleological history interprets the evidence through an ideological lens that tells a story of inevitability and, usually, ultimate meaning.

A good example of this is Marxism. Marxism is now considered, by most scholars, as horrendously teleological. This is because Marxism posits a clear, inevitable story for the progress of history – the mode of production eventually collapses under its own internal contradictions, producing a new synthesis and, eventually, the final turnover will be the proletariat revolution where then all this dialectic nonsense can stop and we can all rock on in communist equality. (This is why, in my mind, those who can really be called “Marxists” in this sense, rather than just materialists, seem to be attracted to qualities suspiciously similar to the comfortable equations offered by religion.) Hard core Marxists, by the way, considered that not a theory or even a matter of the social sciences, but a factual matter of hard science. Thus when Marxists scholars produced history, they took all evidence and selected and shaped it to fit into this schema, so they could point as say, “see, we are this or that far along to the inevitable proletariat revolution and communist yumminess.”

Thus, ever since Marxism and other teleological schemas starting losing their hegemonic control over the mind of scholars (I employ that other scholarly term to poke fun at us some more) in the 60s and into the 80s, teleological is one of the worst things someone can say about your work. It’s almost the equivalent of saying, “This history is really ahistorical,” or, “you are putting your politics into this interpretation.”

But this has gone a little overboard in recent years. It has gotten to the point where, some people call even the simple argument of cause and effect “teleological.” I’ve seen it several times in seminar. Explanatory schemes that are simply arguing for long term trends – in economics, in culture, whatever – can be picked away at by skeptics who say, now really, was it really all that simple? Can’t we complicate this picture a bit and show how this process doesn’t really hold over time at all? (Sometimes I suspect these holes are picked simply so that someone can write a book about some obscure topic; if the general community accepts a cause and effect scheme which mutes the relative importance of a lot of other topics, a lot of the folks who like to write three-hundred page tomes on rural shoemakers are going to be out of work.) Because no “cause” can really explain any phenomena that isn’t strictly limited and delineated; that’s teleological.

But this is silly. And why it is silly is well shown in this debate between B.J.T. Dobbs and Richard S. Westfall over the Scientific Revolution. Dobbs does not think historians should employ the concept of the scientific revolution anymore – to make her point she leaves the phrase uncapitalized – because she argues that embedded in any such concept is a teleological assumption of the ultimate triumph of progress, as if reason is some force external to historical circumstance that is slowly marching around the globe and through time to save us all. (Newton is totally Jesus, dude.) To quote from her article, Newton as Final Cause and First Mover:

““It is a teleological story we tell: Newton is the hidden end toward which the whole narrative is inexorably drawn, the Final Cause of the Scientific Revolution” (29).

Herbert Butterfield, who wrote one of the foundational books on the Scientific Revolution after WWII, broke his own antipathy to “Whiggish” history (which is simply the history of liberal thought where “progress” is viewed as eventually triumphing, particularly in the form of Parliamentary or representative institutions) in the way he approaches and relishes the accomplishes of the Scientific Revolution:

“His book,” argues Dobbs, “is pervaded with the conviction that the ‘winner’ scientific ideas were right and good, and their triumph is made to seem inevitable” (30).

Dobbs argues that by reading the present into the past, historians interpret the men of the Scientific Revolution to be modern thinkers like ourselves, and in a sense by admiring them are really praising ourselves. When confronted with some of their not so modern behavior, such as Newton’s obsession with alchemy, she quotes scholars through the decades who have been put off and concerned about this, openly disappointed and confused that such a great mind could engage in such a superstitious activity:

“I think the problem arises somewhat in this fashion,” argues Dobbs, “we choose for praise the thinkers that seem to us to have contributed to modernity, but we unconsciously assume that their thought patterns were fundamentally just like ours” (34).

Dobbs makes several good points in her article which at some point or another, were true enough; but I believe that she is setting up a straw man to a great degree, although she explicitly denies that particular critique. How many modern day scholars are really so disturbed by Newton’s alchemy? I find it completely unproblematic; it is not surprising that Newton chose to direct his energies and talents in directions other than our modern science, particularly if he thought there was an underlying logic that he could apply to it. And few historians today are insensitive to the social context of the Scientific Revolution or science in general; indeed the History of Science now has its own discipline. (To be fair, Dobbs was writing in the mid 1990s, so the situation could have looked much different from her viewpoint).

But on larger points I also feel she is mistaken; because to posit that there was a long term, fundamental change in the nature of a society, and that this can be proscribed to scientific developments and the concurrent effects of this on the surrounding culture, is not to set up any “God of Science” that is necessarily guiding all events. Westfall makes this and many other strong points in his article, The Scientific Revolution Reasserted.

“To pick up on another theme in Dobb’s chapter, there was of course nothing inevitable about Newton’s work. Like the rest of the Scientific Revolution, it was a free creation of the human spirit, mediating on the evidence that nature presents and forcing itself to conform to that evidence. … However, what did happen had an internal logic, because Newton consciously built on the work of earlier men. Internal logic is not inevitability” (48).

Badass.

Furthermore, Westfall takes to issue the tendency Dobbs seems to be falling into to argue that all good history is history that keeps its head out of the present; that to truly understand the past, you must only work within the understandings and events of the times, rather than project them forward or read in contemporary experience. But, as Westfall here argues, if taken to an extreme this takes much of the point out of the purpose of doing history:

“Merely describing the past in its own terms does not constitute the historian’s function in my notion of it. We are not antiquarians. We are called to help the present understand itself by understanding how it came to be. We strive to find a meaningful order in the multifarious events of the past and thus, explicitly or implicitly, we pass judgments on the relative importance of events. Before we dismiss Butterfield’s statement on the Scientific Revolution by attaching the pejorative adjective ‘Whiggish’ to it, let us pause to consider whether it may not be correct” (42).

I applaud the decision to “pass judgments on the relative important of events.” Too often you hear the critique of “well, this isn’t what people at the time thought,” or, “there is no evidence that at the time, this is how people explained things.” Well, of course. One of the main lessons of history is sometimes that historians see things much more clearly than those in the midst of the historical moment; we have a bird’s eye view of course, whereas individuals and specific groups only have their vantage point, their interests and experiences to draw from. So we have to make inferences, at the end of the day, about what was more important in the long run to long term developments and what wasn’t. If that means downplaying the relative importance of some people’s eccentric experiences, well, they’re dead so I am sure it won’t hurt their feelings.

Finally, Westfall makes the point that to downplay the Scientific Revolution as merely a self-congratulating phenomena made up by historians requires ignoring the fact that science shapes almost every aspect of our lives today, and has been doing so for quite a while. The fundamentals of human understanding have in fact changed, and it seems to be sticking around:

“Clearly I think that it was and that the transformation was a once and for all event that has never been reversed. Scientists of today can read and recognize works done after 1687. It takes a historian to comprehend those written before 1543” (44).

And furthermore, this is no small event which can be isolated as purely a discussion amongst historians with an interest in the history of science:

“Before the Scientific Revolution, theology was the queen of all the sciences. …. Theology is not even allowed on the premises anymore. Here is the very heart of Butterfield’s specific statement. A once Christian culture has become a scientific one” (43).

That’s a Revolution if I ever saw one.

I was planning on posting something cynical.

Or, at least a reflection on the lack of reason within certain segments of the population; but then I started watching videos on YouTube of election night, of celebrations in the streets all over the country, and it ruined the mood for it. This is probably my favorite video, which might seem odd since, there are no close ups of tears or spontaneous, joyous dancing, and I am all about the tears of joy and spontaneous, joyous dancing — but I think it is the fact that you can hear the whole city erupting, the thousands of thousands of cries of joy and yelps of happiness, echoing through the city infusing the air around it with an almost other-wordly moment of “hallelujah” – that is so overwhelmingly amazing to me. Listening to this sent repeated shivers all over my body, till the whole thing was hotly tingling — really, it was amazing.

Plus I’ve only been there once, and I already fucking love Seattle.

Progress, 2008.

There’s nothing I can add to it – all I know for me is that, I see reason to hope for a kinder country. I see reason to hope for a more thoughtful country. I have reason to hope for a country where everyone is treated with dignity, and no one believes this country belongs to any one person, any one idea, any one religion; where plurality is how we define ourselves, united only in the appreciation of our diversity. I see reason to hope for a time where that is enough; where people find enough meaning and beauty in this that, exclusion will no longer be necessary, and ignorance will hold no appeal.

That, and holy fucking shit, Obama won Virginia. Obama won’s Jefferson’s state; Obama won the heart of the Old South. This is change; this means to me, that progress can be real, and can be achieved.

And should Prop 8 pass; well, there’s another front which I feel obliged to enthusiastically thrown myself upon. And somehow, we’ll get that progress; one day we will.

I hate what a weakling this man makes of me.

Because I have to admit that I cried. Profusely.

Why I voted against Prop 8.

To many of us, the issue of gay marriage appears clear cut: to deny any individual from engaging in the social choices the supposedly “normal” folk do is repressive discrimination; a characteristic of a society not fully comfortable either with diversity or the fluid, unstable nature of any given culture. But to approach somebody with this opening is often to allow them to have recourse to several claims against both the seemingly self-evident logic and, furthermore, the jingoistic accusation of being a liberal elitist, out of touch with true American values. So I am going to attempt to articulate, hopefully a little more clearly, why some of the most common arguments I have been made aware of in favor of Prop 8 have no philosophical ground — and often less historical ground than they think of — to stand on.

The Bible says homosexuality is wrong. Of course, this is the easiest argument to debunk; the Bible says a lot of things are wrong, and that punishments such as say, selling your daughters into slavery, are morally righteous behaviors. Of course, I will not list the litany of ridiculous mortal wrongs in the Bible that get as much or more attention than homosexuality — that has already been done very well in such places as the West Wing monologue of President Bartlet, just to name perhaps the most famous. But the fact remains that this is cited over and over again by the faithful, despite the fact that I have never heard a single person citing this reason for opposing gay marriage (or homosexuality in general) respond to the critique that the Bible list a host of other things as fatally immoral that no modern human being would ever proscribe to. Those who still believe in a literal interpretation of the Bible are so far beyond analytical discourse, in any case, as to be unreachable by anything I might attempt here to dissuade them.

Gays are tying to “impose” their “lifestyle” on everyone else: I am perhaps most familiar with this argument. Firstly, the whole problem with this is that it assumes that homosexuals somehow exist alongside or outside of a culture which is “ours,” or, is somehow the property of the majority, and it is the majority who have the right to determine its nature. Of course, if direct democracy was always in play, legalistically this could be true — Prop 8 shows this clearly — but this is of course, one of the classic shortcomings of democracy. Political theory has long wondered with how to deal with the problem of the majority in a democracy, democratically voting to override the rights of the minority. This is particularly problematic when those in the majority argue that these “rights” are somewhat fanciful ideas made up anyway. But truly, few supporters of Prop 8 disbelieve in personal and civil rights; indeed, that would be “anti-American” and deny them their rhetoric of their American right to be left alone by the government or, interventionist courts. (Even though those Courts ensured most of them their rights, but that’s another story).

The blind spot comes in when those made uneasy by Prop 8 conceive of homosexuals as somehow individuals just along for the ride rather than as full members of the culture. You see this opinion occur frequently when you hear the argument that there is nothing wrong with being gay, but marriage needs to remain “traditional.” Hence, the legitimate, or real American culture, is conceived of as being the true culture, the real America. Everyone else in this picture are people who are selfishly and deviously trying to detract from that, when really, they ought to just keep to themselves and be thankful for what tolerance they do enjoy in, of course, the greatest, freest country in the world. This conception of culture as somehow “belonging” to the majority group can only be undone by an obscene amount of education, and perhaps not even achieved then. For to imagine the society that you live in, your culture, to be in a constant state of redefinition and flux — to be composed, in fact, not of a single set of values but of an incredible range of preferences and beliefs — is for many to feel as if they are losing their moorings, their very grounding and also, their sense of identity and security in what constitutes a proper and moral life. To put it in a shorter but more academic way, to recognize that there is no legitimate reason for homosexuals to be barred from marriage would be, for many Americans, the ultimate postmodern crisis. This might, at times, inspire a little understanding or sympathy from us; we are often asking more than we realize when we insist that people give up their fundamental understandings of the meanings and realities of their world.

This claim of imposition is also based on nostalgia for the supposed days when homosexuals kept to themselves — when nobody wanted special treatment or threw their lifestyle in your face, as if to judge you for being normal! Such reactions are merely the reasoning of someone who does not consciously acknowledge how uncomfortable they are made by that with which they are not familiar. Homosexuals didn’t have it better in the days when they “kept it to themselves” — rather they lived under an awful silence, and when they broke it suffered consequences that often escalated to physical violence. The double standard about “imposing” homosexual lifestyle can easily be exposed by a simple example — when Ellen announced on her sitcom that she is gay, some called this “imposing” or “advocating” her lifestyle; why not just keep it to herself?, I remember someone asking. But when a famous news anchor gets married and has a whole segment with photographs, stories, and adorable montages to romantic music, nobody thinks they are “imposing” their “straight culture” on viewers. Rather, it is clear that they are just expressing themselves and their experiences — in short, being who they are. Those who argue for a return to the days when everyone just “kept things to themselves” were those who were be able to be blissfully unaware of the persecution and violence endured by those who for whatever reason, failed to “keep it to themselves” to the satisfaction of an intolerant society.

Marriage is a religious issue and thus should only be decided by the churches. Firstly, this is entirely too easy to debunk. If religion and marriage were today so completely tied up, why then, are atheists allowed to marry? How long ago was it (and I do not believe it was ever the case in America) that a declaration of faith or, any particular faith, was legally required for marriage?

But the argument gets its force, of course, from the historical link between religion and marriage, and the ever powerful sentiment that “tradition” is our bulwark against the new, corrupting age. (Even though, in the long run, this does not even seem to hold up; marriage was an institution long before Christianity came along, and seems to be in some form in almost every culture in the modern (and ancient) world. Why then does contemporary religion have a particular right to determine its nature?) However, this argument again results from a lack of awareness of historical and cultural change — just because something once was so does not mean it ought, by right, stay that way. Should slavery have continued until ended by the market because historically, slave holding had been an activity based on the economic interests of the slaveholders? (Right to private property: slavery :: right to religious freedom : banning gay marriage). Cultural realities have origins, true, in traditions that carry down in some from hundreds of generations — however, this does not make “tradition” any more sacred than the change that accompanies it, and never in any society in the history of globe has history itself ceased to function, to change old standards and make new, to shift cultural definitions and aspirations. Religion, as it exists in the United States today, is supposed to be separated from the state in a secular system; yet millions of Americans refuse to recognize that coupled with the protection of religious belief and expression from interference from the state comes the right of anyone to do whatever they please with that religion — and as the society has largely secularized marriage; note the atheists marriage above; there is no right to deny homosexuals marriage because homosexuality falls outside of the belief system of some churches. In short, things change; always have, always will. Perhaps the only constant is the tendency of people, in their fear and uncertainty, to cry out for purer, more traditional days.

Conclusion:

Of course, feeding into all of these arguments — especially one and three — are underlying fears of homosexuals being perverted, deviants, a threat to children’s innocence (as we have seen from all the pro Prop 8 commercials) and a minority suppressing a majority. But there is almost no arguing to someone who consciously holds these views — they are so fundamentally based in fear and ignorance that to try to overcome them with sheer reason is to be screaming at a wall. Thus I will not even attempt to prove that homosexuality is a naturally occurring preference, that homosexuals are no more morally “corrupt” than heterosexuals, that the “traditional family” as such does not appear to be much more functional or inherently superior than families that differ from this model. And when people argue the slippery slope argument — what, will we be marrying horses next? – I would simply reply, so what? What do you care if someone marries a horse, a dog, someone of the same sex? What business is it of yours? For no group of people – majority or minority – can determine the values of an open, pluralistic society. We all must be treated equal and whatever beliefs we have, realize that we cannot use them to limit the equal rights and opportunities of others.

And to those who believe that civil unions somehow make it all better, that it is a fair deal, I have very little patience. It is the equivalent of arguing the line of thought I outlined above: “Us, the “normal” majority, will allow you to have the same structural rights as we; but when it comes to full cultural recognition of you as our equals in every way, then you’re shit out of luck.” Someone who argues that to ask to be treated exactly the same as anyone else in a society — to have the exact same rights, options and recognitions open to you — is to be asking for “special treatment,” is someone who has either never felt the pang of persecution or, simply lacks faith in the ultimate equality of all human beings.

Unfortunately, many otherwise good, open minded people in our culture today fall victim to any number of these cultural misconceptions. Not all who will vote yes on Prop 8 are bigots ready to decry homosexuality as a mortal sin — they are, however, disappointments. They are disappointments to a progress several centuries old, where human beings have been able to apply their reason to overcome their cultural biases and realize that the quality of humanity is far more inclusive than our tribal tendencies before imagined it to be. They are disappointments when they do not realize that gay marriage is a civil rights issue, as clear cut as the ending of segregation and discrimination in the South, as clear cut as the right of women to vote. Every couple of generations has seemed to have to come to terms with the fact that the only moral thing to do is to enlarge the circle under which people are treated humanely and equally. Hopefully, even if Prop 8 does pass this Tuesday, we will eventually get to the place where more Americans base their patriotism on the tradition of Enlightenment in America rather than that of intolerance and exclusion.