Basel conference: one more day

Looking forward to Steven Shaviro’s keynote tomorrow. (And by the way, why do we call them keynotes when they aren’t at the beginning of the conference? “Plenary” does the job, and should be used for all main speakers, but now there seem to be 3 or 4 keynotes for every conference.)

All of the panels have been enjoyable so far as well. And it’s a lovely city, and my third or so time here.

some utter nonsense on Twitter

Shirin Sadeghi ‏@ShirinSadeghi
White House is blaming the Middle East protests on a trailer (there’s no evidence of a film) & deflecting blame from US policy in the region

2h Shirin Sadeghi Shirin Sadeghi ‏@ShirinSadeghi
Those in power would rather blame a film trailer (whose film has yet to be seen) than the realities on the ground.

Poppycock. These were not protests against U.S. policies in the region. That’s just a convenient way to move us back to the comfortable game in which absolutely everything is the West’s own fault and in which we are always the worst– which of course is just the flip side of saying that we are the best.

It’s sort of like the people who blame absolutely everything on the CIA, not realizing that this amounts to a grotesque inflation of the American status and role in the world– as if only America had causal power, just as only God has causal power for the occasionalist philosophers.

If we say “poor babies, they can’t help it, they are so oppressed,” then we infantilize them. Personally, I’d rather take the Egyptians seriously (they’ve certainly earned it) while telling them that they are utterly and completely out of line in this particular case, just as they were when they attacked the Algerian Embassy in 2009 after a lost football match. And in this case it’s not just the protestors, but the Brotherhood government that played the manipulative game of egging them on while wringing their hands over the “stress” felt by those inside the Embassy.

If you’re a one-note Johnny or Jenny who can only say “imperialism” no matter what the case may be, then you’re not much of a political thinker. A precondition of being in a position to criticize the West is that you should be willing to concede when the fault lies on the other side. This is one of those moments.

score a point for the U.S. Embassy on this one

Calling out the Brotherhood on their typical duplicity:

“Seemingly stung, the Brotherhood replied some 20 minutes later, saying ‘we understand you’re under a lot of stress, but it will be more helpful if you point out exactly the Arabic feed of concern.'”

Nice try at turning the tables, but the Brotherhood has a very long track record of two-faced behavior. Very long. Their Arabic tweets were egging on the protests, of course.

what gets cited?

In response to THIS post, which is circulating on Facebook today, which claims that articles always get cited more than books and book chapters…

In most fields, articles do get cited the most, since books and book chapters often take the form of textbooks or popularizing accounts rather than scholarly monographs.

But in continental philosophy (declarations of the analytic/continental divide are still completely premature, at least in cultural terms) the book is king. Articles come second. And book chapters simply get lost in the shuffle.

My four most cited publications are, in order:

1. Prince of Networks
2. Tool-Being
3. Guerrilla Metaphysics
4. Heidegger Explained

The two most cited articles (“On Vicarious Causation” and the 2007 Speculative Realism transcript) are well behind my four oldest books, and I suspect that will be true for most people working in the continental philosophy idiom. We are a book culture, whereas analytic philosophy is an article culture. And this difference points to other, deeper differences that still persist between the two styles of philosophy.

still no sympathy whatsoever

Consider this NY Times headline: “Embassies of U.S. and Allies Under Siege in Muslim World”

And undeservedly so. The “U.S. and Allies” are typical targets in much political discourse, but in this case they are being attacked solely for one of their greatest strengths: free speech rights, which are sadly underdeveloped in the countries where these attacks are occurring, including the country where I live.

Again, I am well aware that offensive speech about religious figures is taken very seriously in these countries in a way that most of us do not take it seriously. But again, I could hardly care less. There is a right to insult Islam in the United States just as there is a right to insult anything else, and the right to insult anything must receive maximal defense.

Don’t forget– the protests here are not provoked by “U.S. imperialism,” they are provoked by activities occurring under the protection of the U.S. First Constitutional Amendment, which I hope you will all agree is a very good thing.

This is the most disappointing thing I’ve seen from the Egyptian street since the pointless Algerian Embassy attack in late 2009. (The Mubarak regime and SCAF did numerous disappointing things too. I’m talking here about the crowds.)

flag at US Embassy in Cairo is restored

And this is a moment when that flag stands for free speech over the out-of-control religious bigotry of violent street mobs, so I’m very happy to post this photo here today. I’m extremely disappointed in the Egyptian government’s handling of this situation.

And I say this not as a distant observer, but as someone who has greatly enjoyed my 12 years of living in Egypt and with Egyptians.

book excesses

I’m sure most of you can empathize with this in some way. I made a vow not to buy any books on this trip, yet somehow I’ve bought 12. I’m not even sure how it happened, except that the speculative realism book display here at the Basel conference is unbelievably complete, and some of the damage to my luggage allowance happened for that reason.

The dealer was so sweet. He overheard me and a friend mentioning that there were only a few omissions, and came rushing over to ask what they were. He had aimed at an exhaustive SR exhibit.

And it even went well beyond SR. Simondon in German, for instance. (Meillassoux was available in three different languages.) He had really done his homework.

All right, I found his business card:

Buchhandlung Das Labyrinth
Nadelberg 17
CH -4001 Basel

perhaps The Onion’s most ambitious effort yet

America’s brilliant humor newspaper takes on the recent Embassy attacks with a zinger of a porn cartoon. HERE. Wow.