Jordan Peterson

Black Swan · 13-09-2018 2:40pm

raah! wrote: »

So far, in this thread, there hasn't so much been arguments against his thesis, but rather reference to the existence of such arguments.

From your perspective raah!, briefly, what is Peterson's "thesis?"

raah! · 13-09-2018 6:47pm

Why did you put the word thesis in scare quotes?

Peterson's thesis, pertinent to this discussion here, is that the social hierarchies that arise in human societies are determined more by biological factors than social factors, he supports this by pointing out the relationship between physiology and position in social status, and argues further that those physiological relations to social position are innate, and his lobster analogy is one of the arguments he uses in an attempt to point out the ridiculousness of calling such social structures, and our relation to them, artificial. He combines this with the idea that what is natural is good and efficient to say that the economic hierarchies of capitalism are ok, and things like perhaps women not being Ceo's, being natural, is better for them. etc.

Of course he has many "theses" (which, by the way, if you look that word up in the dictionary you will see how absurd it is to put it in scare quotes), none of which have really been addressed by his main detractors in this thread. Again, there is difference between referencing an argument and making one. If I were to respond to your question in the style you seem to prefer, I would do something like "Jordan Peterson's thesis has been described - link".

mayordenis · 13-09-2018 6:55pm

I don't think anyone is naturally suited to being a CEO. That doesn't make a lot of sense, requires a number of logical leaps. Physiological differences? Yes. Are there particular reasons why people may be better suited to certain things? Sure. Men are more naturally CEOs. Bit of a leap.

Physiological traits determining social status is fine in physical meritocracies, so if we go back a couple of hundred years then Jordan is spot on. We however live in reality and the present, we'll need some manner of complete break down of society for his way to have any reason to be.

raah! · 13-09-2018 7:08pm

He argues that from the point of view of these "Big Five personality traits" ;
they are: openness to experience, conscientiousness, extraversion, agreeableness, and neuroticism.

He then says that the scientific literature (in whatever that field is called. Personality psychology? He lectures in it anyway), is in favour of women having certain scores in some traits and men having certain scores in others. I don't know then if he says that men and women having these scores is absolutely something that is biological (he might), but he does say that your position on whatever hierarchy you are on can be predicted by your scores on these personality traits, and IQ.

From there, there are just statements from the scientific literature about IQ and personality by gender, and he uses that to explain things like pay gaps etc. (I think, it's been a while since I saw those youtube clips). Another thing you may often hear is that psychopaths are natural CEOs. There could be more male psychopaths.

Also, leaving peterson aside, physiological traits still do determine positions in social hierarchies. Look at a secondary school and you will see that very clearly. The same social structures are always still there, it's just people build things on top of them. Instead of it being who is the ape who kills the most other apes, it's who is best at basketball. Also look at hollywood.

And anyway, just because a given hierarchy is not a bestial physical meritocracy, doesn't mean it is a just one. People with more money being treated better and getting away with crimes is not just; and you easily could argue that that economic hierarchy is not a physical one

Black Swan · 14-09-2018 5:33pm

raah! wrote: »

Why did you put the word thesis in scare quotes?

raah! wrote: »

Of course he has many "theses" (which, by the way, if you look that word up in the dictionary you will see how absurd it is to put it in scare quotes)...

Quotation marks are now scary? Quotation marks were simply used here to narrow the focus on Peterson's thesis by quoting that word from your earlier comment. It's a common practice used to focus discussion and exclude other comments which may not address Peterson's core thoughts. It's already been commented in this thread (and elsewhere) that Peterson sometimes rambles on and on in Maps, 12 Rules, and videos, and in doing so, may dilute, distract, or confound an understanding of his thesis; or if in fact he has "theses" (your quotation marks) and not simply one thesis that he has failed to precisely state, or otherwise has confounded it in his manner of speaking and writing.

At university we frequently ask PhD students what their "thesis" statement is for their research problem. Typically such a statement can be framed into a sentence with few words that are generally high in conceptual context and content. For example, when attempting to briefly summarize the structural-functionalist thesis in philosophy someone may state the catchy phrase "Form follows function" (Louis Sullivan, 1896).

raah! · 15-09-2018 11:36am

Black Swan wrote: »

Quotation marks are now scary? Quotation marks were simply used here to narrow the focus on Peterson's thesis by quoting that word from your earlier comment. It's a common practice used to focus discussion and exclude other comments which may not address Peterson's core thoughts.

I can hardly see how such focusing would be necessary since his thesis was the sole object of a single sentence. That sort of use is in no way a common practice. That would be like someone going: 'can I have an "apple" '. The only way to correctly interpret that is that:
a) The person doesn't understand how to use quotation marks.
b) They are expressing doubt about whether or not the thing is an apple. Or if this is used in the way you did it there, it is drawing attention to the use of a particular word, and questioning its appropriateness etc. That is what "Scare Quotes" are https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Scare_quotes. Another common use is to draw attention to the use of a word for the purposes of deriding the user.

So, giving you the benefit of the doubt, you were either questioning that Peterson could have a "thesis" at all, or questioning my use of the word thesis. The former of these doesn't make sense, given the sense in which I used the word thesis: "a statement or theory that is put forward as a premise to be maintained or proved." To express scepticism about Peterson's making statements or theories seems to me to be rather excessively uncharitable.

Either way, what I have briefly, and in single sentence outlined, and what I have said before, can be seen as a common thread running through much of Peterson's thought: that a naturally evolved system of rules is a good one; that a naturally evolved social structure is a good one. That the former are naturally evolved he justifies with Jungian theories, the later, with lobster analogies and personality psychology.

Black Swan · 15-09-2018 12:38pm

raah! wrote: »

I can hardly see how such focusing would be necessary since his thesis was the sole object of a single sentence. That sort of use is in no way a common practice.

Yes it is a common practice in scholarly presentations, lectures, debates, and discussions. The specific example given above was used in class and appeared in quotation marks last academic quarter to get a PhD student to focus on a concise, conceptual thesis statement of their research project; i.e., to help them before they went to defense. It's one of many examples that could be made here to suggest that it was in common practice in scholarly discussions. But for some reason you are placing an extraordinary and somewhat bewildering emphasis on one word with quotation marks. I would hope that this one quoted word was not being used to discredit the poster and anything else they may discuss (e.g., ad hominem argument), when the original intention was only to seek a focused observation from a poster familiar with Peterson's works; i.e., because Peterson was not always clear as to what his thesis may be in Maps, Rules, and videos, as well as when Peterson all too often gets sidetracked in gender controversies when interviewed.

raah! wrote: »

Peterson's thought: that a naturally evolved system of rules is a good one; that a naturally evolved social structure is a good one. That the former are naturally evolved he justifies with Jungian theories, the later, with lobster analogies and personality psychology.

Thank you for this concise statement. It's useful to our thread discussion. It was the original object of my post with the one quoted word, with no other purpose intended.

raah! · 17-09-2018 12:06pm

Black Swan wrote: »

Yes it is a common practice in scholarly presentations, lectures, debates, and discussions. The specific example given above was used in class and appeared in quotation marks last academic quarter to get a PhD student to focus on a concise, conceptual thesis statement of their research project; i.e., to help them before they went to defense. It's one of many examples that could be made here to suggest that it was in common practice in scholarly discussions. But for some reason you are placing an extraordinary and somewhat bewildering emphasis on one word with quotation marks. I would hope that this one quoted word was not being used to discredit the poster and anything else they may discuss (e.g., ad hominem argument), when the original intention was only to seek a focused observation from a poster familiar with Peterson's works; i.e., because Peterson was not always clear as to what his thesis may be in Maps, Rules, and videos, as well as when Peterson all too often gets sidetracked in gender controversies when interviewed.

Well, fair enough. I do think, however, that such focusing would be better purposed by use of italics, which, as you can see, are freely available here on this message board, though they may not be for writing on a blackboard. I am also in academia, and read many papers, and am more accustomed to this means of achieving this type of focusing, so I interpreted it as scare quotes.

I think it's true that he is often evasive. I think he most evinces this evasiveness when someone directly asks him something about his actual profession of any sort of religious beliefs. He will say "I act as though I believe it" (which is a rare time he answered directly), or will say "I would have to talk for twelve hours about that to give it an answer". However, I think there is a difference between this evasiveness, evinced when he is in a sort of hostile interview situation, and the sort of off topic rambling he does when just presenting his own ideas and thoughts to a sympathetic audience. For example, if you look at the first lecture of his biblical lecture series, I don't think he gets past the first sentence in the whole first lecture, despite an expressed desire to cover some significant portion of genesis.

cdgalwegian · 25-11-2018 2:19pm

Howzers,

I had started a thread here a number of years ago which was active for a while, and have only just returned with a follow-on to it. As I had been dipping in and out of the Jordan Peterson ‘phenomenon’ recently (nearly finished watching his Maps of Meaning series), I had a quick look to see if there was chatter here, and (almost inevitably) there was. However it had petred out, without delving it that much, which is a pity, because ‘love him or loathe him’, he is certainly provocative in an intellectually stimulating way.
The most interesting thing about his ‘provocations’, so far as I can tell so far, lies in his approach to the nature vs nurture debate, in that he wants to bring his empirical background in clinical psychology to bear on the practical engagement of individuals in the complexities of modern life. His approach is that of a defender of biological determinism, which can only be tempered by our conscious capacities. Iows, because of his self-admitted obsession with totalitarianism, he sees our social institutions as playing out, for the mostpart, our inherent biological tendencies, and attempts to dampen them down on an intellectual/philosphical level-which seeps into politics- inevitably leads to (cultural) totalitarianism.
Petersen is, effectively, on a conservative crusade against cultural totalitarianism slipping in through the back door. His beef, generally, seems to be against the principle of equity, and in particular about how this principle is utilized by postmodernist cadres (where he is linked to conspiracy theories). He talks of the sleight-of-hand Marxists pulled off when Marxist/Leninism was shown to have required brutal imposition of its theories, and to stagger on for as long as it did- and the response was to turn the economic oppression of the subjugated into oppression by certain intellectual elites, as an expression of power (hence Marxists allying with postmodernists, who are ideologically opposed.
The conservatism of Petersen then, appears to be a clarion call for ‘biological traditionalism’, as it were. His thesis seems to be that we as conscious human beings have a paradoxical ‘gift’; we have a capacity that no other creature has, but that it is currently ‘going against the grain’-which it will do in ebbs and flows anyway- way too far. He reckons our rationalisations towards ideas of equity (rather than equality of opportunity, which he fully endorses) ignores our biological bases too much, and that these rationalisations have taken root- and I suppose to his mind metastasized- into society. This, he contends, is dangerous to society.

Fathom · 28-11-2018 10:25pm

Does Peterson have a formally constructed philosophy? If so, can someone diagram it?

cdgalwegian · 29-11-2018 12:08am

In one of his videos he says it took him 15 years to formulate his philosophy, which is contained in his book and youtube lectures; Maps of Meaning. I watched the lecture series on youtube (skipped through a lot of the last ones, didn't bother with the last one). It's basically Jungian archetypes- as manifested in the world, and how to utilize them to be a competent human i.e. well-balanced in a complex world. He uses diagrams in them as he goes along.
He's undoubtedly erudite, and fills his lectures with loads of pertinent information, some of it suspect, so that even if you think it's hokum, it's still entertaining and thought-provoking. I've read a lot of criticisms, and agree with most of them, but I still enjoyed the lectures (they did become a bit repetitive though).

Black Swan · 04-12-2018 10:22pm

cdgalwegian wrote: »

It's basically Jungian archetypes- as manifested in the world, and how to utilize them to be a competent human i.e. well-balanced in a complex world.

I do not see Peterson as advocating a "well-balanced" relationship between men and women today. Jung had been criticized for his paternalistic ideas, as has Peterson. Jung was consistent with his bygone era in this regard, whereas Peterson today is behind times, and has failed to recognize the evolution and increased participation of women in society today. Consequently Peterson's appeal to some men has been high, while at the same time many women reject his positions as archaic.

cdgalwegian · 04-12-2018 11:44pm

Black Swan wrote: »

I do not see Peterson as advocating a "well-balanced" relationship between men and women today.

I only heard of Jordan Peterson about a month ago, and in watching his stuff found it quite interesting, though flawed. I see your point, however would bet that he would consider the dominance hierarchy, as the major natural structure of society (as a corollary of being part of the animal kingdom), and hence optimally balanced, as being well-balanced. That's not to say he doesn't think it is a frictionless system, just the optimal system for any animal society, as 'proven' by its genetically based ubiquity.

Obviously, as Peterson himself might (or maybe might not) say- "yes, but well-balanced for who?", in a postmodern way (while decrying a postmodern stance). In other words, from what I've seen, I think he justifies male dominance in hierarchical systems as part of the natural order, just the way a slave-owner might have found justification for the slave system due to supposed 'natural' superiority. Foucault would have been proud.

Black Swan · 07-12-2018 12:26am

cdgalwegian wrote: »

In other words, from what I've seen, I think he justifies male dominance in hierarchical systems as part of the natural order, just the way a slave-owner might have found justification for the slave system due to supposed 'natural' superiority. Foucault would have been proud.

Methinks you have captured a part of Peterson's point-of-view here.

Fathom · 16-12-2018 6:14pm

cdgalwegian wrote: »

I only heard of Jordan Peterson about a month ago, and in watching his stuff found it quite interesting, though flawed.

Peterson's appeal to science was outdated.

cdgalwegian · 20-12-2018 5:32pm

Fathom wrote: »

Peterson's appeal to science was outdated.

I was kinda waiting for an expansion of what you meant (in response to my vague/unexplored use of ‘flawed’ i presume).

I’m not quite sure what you meant though- did you mean his appeal to science was outdated, or that he was appealing to an outdated science? I would assume the latter, because an appeal to science per se in a scientific thesis is hard to imagine as being outdated. Which begs the question, what outdated science do you mean?

Fathom · 13-03-2019 2:14am

cdgalwegian wrote: »

I was kinda waiting for an expansion of what you meant (in response to my vague/unexplored use of ‘flawed’ i presume).

This was also covered by others in the above discussions. Peterson's science in Maps was outdated. For example, Peterson uses the left-brain vs right-brain literature to support his positions, including the differences between men and women. In the first place, this bilateral distinction when discussing the brain was intended as metaphor, and not to be taken literally as Peterson does. Garth Morgan has suggested that metaphors were useful to foster discussions, but he cautions that metaphors tend to be distortions of reality and should be considered thus. Furthermore, the literature in cognitive science that I have read suggests that this bilateral distinction has not been supported today, and that the brain is not so simplistic, but rather extraordinarily more complex, with much to be still discovered.

Hobosan · 13-03-2019 3:36am

cdgalwegian wrote: »

In other words, from what I've seen, I think he justifies male dominance in hierarchical systems as part of the natural order, just the way a slave-owner might have found justification for the slave system due to supposed 'natural' superiority. Foucault would have been proud.

Indeed, men dominate at every level, from General to cannon fodder. Lots and lots of cannon fodder. Hopefully women will gain more opportunities to order the cannon fodder around. It would make the spectacle more palatable.

Fathom · 15-03-2019 9:53pm

Hobosan wrote: »

Indeed, men dominate at every level, from General to cannon fodder. Lots and lots of cannon fodder. Hopefully women will gain more opportunities to order the cannon fodder around. It would make the spectacle more palatable.

NASA on TV crawl yesterday reports that the first man on mars may be a woman. What would Peterson say to that?

Black Swan · 17-03-2019 11:43pm

Hobosan wrote: »

Indeed, men dominate at every level, from General to cannon fodder. Lots and lots of cannon fodder. Hopefully women will gain more opportunities to order the cannon fodder around. It would make the spectacle more palatable.

Is Peterson a subtle advocate of Men's Rights Activism (opposite of feminism)?

Fathom · 18-03-2019 2:46am

Black Swan wrote: »

Is Peterson a subtle advocate of Men's Rights Activism (opposite of feminism)?

Feminism real? Other than self-proclaimed? Can one be for women's rights and not be a feminist? Peterson appears to be for men's rights. Hence, more males in audiences of his vid programs.

AllForIt · 18-03-2019 3:15am

Fathom wrote: »

NASA on TV crawl yesterday reports that the first man on mars may be a woman. What would Peterson say to that?

He'd probably point out that the accumulated technology that went into the achievement of creating a craft capable of going to the moon was invented by mostly men because men are more interested in 'things' (physical) than women are, hence higher uptake by men in STEM subjects etc. The first sentient being to reach outer space was a primate and you'd hardly attribute this achievement to the primate.

Black Swan · 21-03-2019 6:26pm

Fathom wrote: »

Feminism real? Other than self-proclaimed?

Good question. There are those that proclaim to be feminists, while there may be many more that do not identify with the label, yet favour advancing women's rights. For example, I doubt that all women in the #Me Too movement label themselves feminists.

Fathom wrote: »

Can one be for women's rights and not be a feminist?

It is very convenient to label someone as a feminist, rather than to acknowledge the complexity of someone's position on women's rights. Such oversimplifications fit with the sensationalism stirred up by Peterson, as well as the childish name calling of Donald Trump towards his political opponents found in America. Labeling someone a feminist can also be damaging to their life and career choices in a McCarthyism fashion.

Fathom wrote: »

Peterson appears to be for men's rights. Hence, more males in audiences of his vid programs.

Peterson openly attacks feminism in 2018 videos (and before), as well as elsewhere. Such attacks were controversial, drawing attention to him, as well as the book he has been selling.

Fathom · 23-03-2019 7:51pm

AllForIt wrote: »

He'd probably point out that the accumulated technology that went into the achievement of creating a craft capable of going to the moon was invented by mostly men because men are more interested in 'things' (physical) than women are, hence higher uptake by men in STEM subjects etc.

Peterson's position.

Fathom · 23-03-2019 7:53pm

Black Swan wrote: »

Peterson openly attacks feminism in 2018 videos (and before), as well as elsewhere. Such attacks were controversial, drawing attention to him, as well as the book he has been selling.

Trump method. Art of Deal. Say "sensationalist" and "outrageous" things. Draws news media. Sells books.

Black Swan · 25-03-2019 3:54pm

Bookstore with 57 stores in New Zealand has pulled Peterson's 12 Rules of Life book from shelves “in light of some extremely disturbing material."

cdgalwegian · 25-03-2019 4:16pm

Fathom wrote: »

This was also covered by others in the above discussions.

Peterson's science in Maps was outdated. For example, Peterson uses the left-brain vs right-brain literature to support his positions, including the differences between men and women.

Hi Fathom,

The left/right brain personality study(s) was originally a tentative study as far as I can recall, but one which the media jumped on and ran with, and which gained a lot of currency in the self-help industry before science properly caught up with it. Iows, I don’t think there was ever much science behind it; Peterson seems to have picked an easily digestible, but only initially and partially confirmed piece of scientific data to use for his own ends- that of promoting his favourite natural order of things here on earth; natural male dominance. Normally, Maier’s Law applies:

If the facts do not conform to the theory, they must be disposed of.
-- N.R. Maier, "American Psychologist", March 1960

“Peterson’s Law” seems to be a less subtle technique in how to keep a theory going in the face of countervailing evidence- If the facts don’t conform to the theory, carry on regardless.

The left/right brain personality ‘science’ was the easiest to spot, and so the most obvious to pick.
I must admit, I sped through a lot of it, and skipped some: I do remember lots of generalizations and dubious assertions, but can’t remember (other) specific cases of outdated science. You seem certain of them; can you list them (can others chip in?) ? It would be good to have a go-to list of same.

Fathom · 25-03-2019 8:13pm

Peterson has "built a case on false facts and distortions of general observations from the scientific literature... distorting the evidence" to fit a conservative political agenda in Maps, 12 Rules, videos, lectures, and other media (biologist P.Z. Myers). Examples:

Uses left-brain right-brain as factual argument, ignoring it's only a metaphor not scientifically valid (Maps).
Cites the neurochemistry of lobsters and that of humans treating them as similar in terms of influencing behavior for both. Uses serotonin for behavioral parallels between lobsters and humans.
Directly compares the social behavior of chimpanzees with human behavior.
Peterson claims "The Nature of Nature... it is a truism of biology that evolution is conservative." Misrepresents biology with political position.
Peterson claims humans are wired to a "dominance hierarchy" in an attempt to justify paternalism; the subordination of women to men (Maps).
Peterson claims "Everything I'm saying and thinking about religion is nested inside a evolutionary viewpoint." Confuses religion with science.
Peterson treats archtypical superstitious myths as "objectively true" for his anthropomorphised gods, spirits, and male heroes.

Fathom · 25-03-2019 8:17pm

Black Swan wrote: »

Bookstore with 57 stores in New Zealand has pulled Peterson's 12 Rules of Life book from shelves “in light of some extremely disturbing material."

Cambridge University just withdrew its offer of a visiting fellowship to Peterson after being pictured with his arm around a man wearing an anti-Islam shirt in social media.

cdgalwegian · 25-03-2019 9:49pm

Fathom wrote: »

Peterson has "built a case on false facts and distortions of general observations from the scientific literature... distorting the evidence" to fit a conservative political agenda in Maps, 12 Rules, videos, lectures, and other media (biologist P.Z. Myers).

Examples:
Uses left-brain right-brain as factual argument, ignoring it's only a metaphor not scientifically valid (Maps).

Cites the neurochemistry of lobsters and that of humans treating them as similar in terms of influencing behavior for both. Uses serotonin for behavioral parallels between lobsters and humans.

Directly compares the social behavior of chimpanzees with human behavior.

Peterson claims "The Nature of Nature... it is a truism of biology that evolution is conservative." Misrepresents biology with political position.

Peterson claims humans are wired to a "dominance hierarchy" in an attempt to justify paternalism; the subordination of women to men (Maps).

Peterson claims "Everything I'm saying and thinking about religion is nested inside a evolutionary viewpoint." Confuses religion with science.

Peterson treats archtypical superstitious myths as "objectively true" for his anthropomorphised gods, spirits, and male heroes.

Apart from the left/right brain reference again, the rest of the list concerns Peterson's over-generalizing and plain old misrepresentations. It was his use of outdated science I was looking for.

Point 7 is not outdated science either, but rather pure pseudoscience- Jungian archetypes. It gets negatively mentioned by a lot by people, but is not attacked in the way it should be. Perhaps the misuse of scientific data to further a thesis is more repugnant, so Jungian archetypes aren't front and centre; in the crosshairs. However, his whole thesis of Maps rests on them. Archetypes are nonsense on stilts, having no more scientific import than tarot cards or phrenology. Yet Peterson's re-imagining and re-tooling of them through Campbell's mythical tropes (as pointed out by Black Swan) lends a certain panache that unfortunately is capable of fooling many, in his intellectual sleight of hand.

Jordan Peterson

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